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Tllli IILAHIUN Twenty-fziqve Years Over twenty-five years ago, one winter morning when the thermometer registered below zero, the citizens of Appleton awoke to find the old Ryan High School a smouldering ruin. Up to that time, there had been no semblance of a union system of schools, for the thirdi fourth, and second wards each supported an independent high school. With the burning of the Ryan High, a great adjustment was necessary. The citizens decided to have one union high school of size sufhcient to accommodate the youth of the city. Those men of greater vision, among whom was Mayor Frank W. Harriman, insisted on a building large enough to accommodate three hundred fifty or four hundred pupils: but they thought it would be many a year before the student body would reach that mark. During the period of the construction of the new union building four present onel classes were held in various buildings about the city. The students enjoyed little journeys to the theater, city hall, and other build- ingsg but we wonder how much else they accom- lished and how the teachers survived. In the early days of the union system liter- ary and debating societies were in vogue. The girls' society, lVlinervias, had among its early 7 members Esther Erb, Enid Saecker, and Flor- ence Ross. Agora, literary and debating society for both boys and girls, also elected the debate teams. Doubtless many ponderous questions too deep for more mature brains were definitely and hnally settled by these groups. For entertainment, plays, debates, dances, and athletics held the attention. ln l906, a vau- deville was given: the admission was twenty-five cents, expenses were one hundred eighty dollars, and the profit was eighty dollars. Girls as well as boys participated in interscholastic basketball. ln 1906, the boys held the state basketball cham- pionship. The Hyde Declamatory Contest, the Keller Oratorical Contest, and later the Heiss Memorial Contest sponsored by the class of I9I 6 in honor of William Heiss who lost his life in the 'T--:L World War, were very prominent. In l905, Mae Spencer won first place in a declamatory contest in Chicagog in l907, Florence Canavan won a similar honor. During these years the basketball teams captured championships occasionally and always played well. On October 26, 1911, President Taft visited Appleton. The student body marched to the campus of Lawrence College where from the steps of main hall the president addressed the citizens. About l9I I-IZ, the methods of dancing began to change. The pupils had been enjoying the old-fashioned two-step and waltz, with variations such as the circular two-step, broom waltz, and rye waltz. Then the Boston and tango appeared, much to the consternation of the more dignified and staid elders. The occasional boy and girl who dared brave the stares and comments of the chaperones were branded as belonging to the fast set. The parties, as a whole, were very simple. ln the fall, the annual l'ug1v i'lt'7'i'u
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