Baldwin School - Prism Yearbook (Bryn Mawr, PA)

Page 18 text:

Zo the Seniors Seniors stand in a Janus-like position, looking back with regret but forward with anticipation. The present world presents a great challenge to your generation, for you can sec the tragic results of mis- taken thinking and action, mistakes which you can- not afford to make again. On you, too, rests the responsibility for building a better world at the end of the war. While all this gives your lives a serious aspect, they have a purposefulness which is exciting in it- self and which should make you look toward the future eagerly. You are richly equipped with well- trained minds, habits of careful workmanship and a background of wide and varied opportunities. Now you arc called upon to use all this, to be resource- ful and competent, ready to face new situations courageously and honestly. You must participate whole-heartedly in the life of the world; to stand aside would dwarf your life. My hope for you is that you will gain the real satisfaction which comes from taking part with en- thusiasm in a cooperative venture; that from a deep faith you will find the serenity to meet all changes in your life; that you will keep a gaiety of heart in any situation; and that each of you may find life a great adventure. Rosamond Cross

Page 20 text:

Our Senior fear This year did not start out as usual for the Seniors. School began late be- cause of the infantile paralysis epidemic, so the usual five days of orientation for the Senior boarders was telescoped to two. The day-students, of course, had the jump on the boarders, and were the first to take over their Senior duties. They brought their advisees to school on a very hot Friday, before the boarding- Seniors came back on Monday night. By hot, we mean hot! But, of course, the Seniors all wore their blazers with the perversity and insistence that makes the light blue blazer seen every day from October 1st to June 9th. As boarders, our first real taste of being Seniors was sitting in the Main Hall on Tuesday, waiting for our advisees to come. We went right down after breakfast and deposited ourselves on the steps leading down to the front door. We felt very silly and ill at ease, and throughout the day received new girls who were in an even worse condition. Some came anchored safely to their mothers, but others, like lost children from another world, suddenly plunked themselves inside the door, and looked with mingled amazement, stupor, terror, or blessing at Haynes, as she introduced herself. Then each new girl was led off to teachers who asked her innumerable questions, while the Seniors sat on. remarking on the noted good looks of the ‘new crop.' The beginning was not altogether different, though, because after Tuesday came Wednesday, and the day-student Seniors came back. The halls were popu- lated once more, as of yore, with groups of girls. “Gee, it’s swell to see you” . . “and then we went to Montana, and then” . . “What a marvelous tan! . . The chatter stopped, however, when someone said. Where do you look, when you sit on the platform?” This was just the second time that we had been confronted with a problem which is intrinsically Senior in nature. Do you pick out someone to stare at, choose a particularly enlightening spot on the wall for the worthy Senior gaze, or nonchalantly peruse the “Cum Laudc” boards? No one knew. That was the queer thing at first—just being a Senior. The anticipation of the glory of the position was the real fun. We expected to be so different, and it was just the way you feel when you go from seventeen to eighteen—no different at all. You kept expecting to see last year’s faces and red blazers around school, and they just weren’t there. After eleven years of anticipation, and admiration for the Seniors, we all felt inadequate. This feeling, however, was dominant only in the first few weeks of school. Although we still think, sometimes, how queer it is to be Seniors, we realized ourselves completely, as a Senior Class, after our organization and election of officers. Welchic, quite logically, was elected president. Kitty Bates retained her position as Vice-President, and Stew became Secretary-Treasurer. To us. these elections were very significant, because—well, we just wouldn't be the Senior Class without Welchie, flowers in hair, neat little black attendance book, and dozens of perfectly organized lists of anything and everything.