Baldwin School - Prism Yearbook (Bryn Mawr, PA)

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After these major class elections, the Board of this Annual was chosen, and we began our documentary exposition of school life—supposedly as it really is. This was our first contact with the fact that this wasn't really an ordinary year. Some people felt that this was not a year in which we should waste our time and money on so seemingly trivial a thing as an account of Senior life. But we felt that it was very important to us, and that although we should have a very simple book, it should show our years in high school as they have been—carefree, casual, and, unfortunately, self-centered. It was in this state of mind—with the “European war” three thousand miles away, and no thought of active participa- tion—that we chose for the theme of our book “The Average Day of a Senior.” These average days slipped by with nothing out of routine, until the Hill Glee Club Concert came along. Each year the day-students receive quite a shock at the First Concert. It, naturally, never occurs to them that the boarders can possibly have any real glamour” or “sophistication.” Unconsciously they think that the boarders will appear, as usual, with colorless lips and stringy hair. The surprise received at seeing the boarders with sleek coiffures, low-cut dresses, ear- rings, and scarlet lips, jolts the day-students cut of their natural feeling of social superiority. It’s a real revelation! Thanksgiving came with its traditional ceremony—a delicious, candlelit din- ner, interspersed with speeches and toasts. Parents came to spend the weekend with their daughters, and the whole week was very unusual and pleasant. We had just gotten down to work after Thanksgiving when along came a nice ordinary Sunday. Girls sat around in their rooms, knitting and playing bridge, and those who had to were in the Library studying. Some lucky few were walking on the grounds with their “callers,” and the Main Hall was being prepared for tea. It was December 7th. A little after three o’clock, the symphony on the radio was interrupted by a news flash—“Hawaii bombed by Japanese planes”—The first selfish reaction was, “That means Bob—or Bill, or Johnny—or maybe even Dad.” A dreadful rush of emotionalism— Damn dirty Japs” . . . “Treachery!” America still clinging to the outmoded idea of an engraved announcement of warlike inten- tions. . . “Emperor Hirohito cordially invites the United States . . .” It was said that the command at Pearl Harbor was asleep at the switch. A few men in command—why should they be blamed? All America, everybody, was sound, sound asleep. If not. they might have realized that Poland did not receive an invitation to Mr. Hitler’s Grand Brawl, and neither did Norway or Denmark, or 'Flic Lowlands. On Monday, the 8th. we all left our 5th period (lasses, a little after noon. We went to the Upper School Study Hall to hear President Roosevelt’s war mes- sage to Congress. After having read Wilson's momentous address of April 2nd, 1917, the President’s simple request for a declaration of war left us, as those who heard Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address must have been, amazed at the brevity, completeness, and significance of a few lines. Then “The Star Spangled Banner,” springing to its original meaning after the dawn raid, was played by the Marine Band.

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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.

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Things moved quickly after that Monday. Within a week the hoarding school had its first Air Raid Drill. In the middle of the night, the klaxon began to blare. There was no such thing as turning on any lights, because the main switch was thrown off. Out of bed we jumped in the darkness, struggled into sweaters, ski pants, coats, shoes and socks, and after finding our buddies, we hurried to our various Air Raid Stations in the basement. Everything was silent except for a hushed, quick roll call, and the noise of people breathing a little more heavily than usual. It seemed ironic that huddled with us in the Playroom, the hall, and the Old Gym, were English girls who had been sent to America to be safe. It made one think, if peace and safety were not to be found in America, where could they be found? With only a few changes in our lives, like the } ossibility of Air Raid Drills at any hour of the day or night, we gradually sank back into the old groove of boarding school life. Christmas vacation arrived, and with it came the Senior Christmas Breakfast. Dressed as convicts, we came into the Dining Room singing our own version of If I Had the Wings of An Angel,” and dragging imaginary chains. After a hurried cup of coffee, which partially revived the day-students, who were quite overcome by getting up at the unheard of hour of a quarter of seven, we jumped up, tore off our stripes, and rushed out of the Dining Room singing the traditional Bye, Bye, Baldwin!” When we came back from Vacation, school had a different atmosphere. Blackout curtains were put up each night before the lights went on, and every- one who could was taking First Aid. Anywhere in the halls you were likely to stumble on some poor victim of fanatical First Aiders, completely mummified with every imaginable kind of bandage. Red. yellow, and green knitting yarns were superseded by grey-blue for British War Relief, or olive-drab for our own boys.” It’s hard to realize that we are living in years unprecedented in swiftness of action, and horror of complete, world-comprehensive war. Winter was quite the same as usual. There was the disappointment of having planned our Senior Sleigh Ride, and then by evening to have had the snow disappear. There will be the problem of thinking up something to do in place of the Senior Bonfire which, of course, we cannot have since we mustn’t waste anything this year, especially not paper or books. Even the main immediate effect of the war upon us, that of not being able to get servants, and so doing the waiting and setting-up ourselves, has been taken more as a joke than anything else. To sec girls, and—supreme laugh- faculty members, trundling carts of dishes down the Dining Room is still funny. Even getting up at seven o’clock to come down and set up tables isn’t bad. and people hum, or burst forth with My Mammy done told me . .”, to accompanying clinking plates and silverware. So life goes on, especially lighthcartedly now that it is Spring. With only seven weeks of high school left for us Seniors, we look back on the Lawrence- villc Concert which we all enjoyed endlessly, and look forward to the Spring