Bourne High School - Canal Currents Yearbook (Bourne, MA)

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Canal Currents Bourne High School I OFTEN wonder about the study, work, and time that lie behind a few in- significant pencil marks on a desk. Think of the big tests and the little quizzes, everybody racking his braiii trying to get a passing mark while over in the corner sits the class dope. He s happily digging away at the desk top trying to carve a picture of his best girl with a pencil. Across the room is the class genius earnestly figuring out a problem on the varnished top, or if no work is necessary, he is completing his initials in block style. More often all this happens when class gets dull or while waiting for the end of the final period. A student’s head is often seen buried behind his pal earnestly completing a masterpiece. Look over by the window. That quiet little Freshman is absently drawing the three rings of a pawn-broker while watching the freighter going through the Canal. What a wonderful time one could have if he could read the thoughts that run through the minds of these great artists at the time of their earnest endeavors. John Dixon, ’46 AI! In A Lifetime i WAS reading the Society column of our town paper, when I happened to come across two names which were very familiar to me. They struck a note in my memory and incidents of five and ten years ago ran through my mind. The Baxters lived on Elm Street right next door to that white house with green blinds and the sign saying Wm. F. Morris.” The former had a little girl, Sandra, and the Morrises a cute curly-haired boy named Alan. These two were just the same age and therefore they did things throughout their childhood together. They both got red bicycles on their tenth birthdays; they both went up the high school steps as very nervous Freshmen when they were fourteen. All this may seem very nice, but who put a turtle in whose bed one hot summer’s night, and who dipped whose pigtails in ink ever so many times and as if that weren’t enough, added a coat of glue to make sure it would stick? If there was any mischief on Elm Street on Hallowe’en, it us- ually had to do with the royal Baxter-Morris battle. In high school they played many mean tricks on each other. A day never passed without at least one book missing, or a forged note demanding one’s presence at the ' prin- cipal’s office. A minor offence was locking one in a closet to which no one had a key, and one just missed two or three classes until the janitor could take the door off. Yes, many of these memories flashed through my mind as I read that item saving: Mr. and Mrs. Alan Morris — Childhood Siveethearts. Nancy Stephenson, ’47 Page Twenty -eight

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Bourne High School Canal Currents THE QUESTION After our graduation what then? What happens when boys become young men? And little girls grow up too fast? The thrill of youth! How long does it last? These are questions that are puzzling me, But my future I do not want to see. My life would soon lose all its zest So not to know I believe is best. Vivian Trench, ’46 WORLD PEACE Now our minds are filled with the thought That peace and happiness should be brought To us, though brotherhood of man. And unity in every land. This peace can only be achieved By work and strife it is believed. Through trust and faith in God and man, Hatred, suffering, and wars we shall ban. Phyllis Harrison, ’46 MIGHTY EARLE AT BAT Ginger on the mound, Earle up to bat. Ginger hurls the ball, Earle goes down flat. Earle’s up to bat again With revenge in his eyes. Past goes the ball Earle nearly dies. Two strikes on mighty Earle As Ginger hurls once more. Past goes the ball As Earle hits the floor. Three strikes on mighty Earle As the umpire yells, You’re out!’’ The crowd’s a mass of roars And Earle begins to pout. It is now inning seven And Earle’s up to the bat. Ginger hurls the ball Earle swings the bat. The ball comes flying through the air AS Earle is rounding third. The crowd is cheering more than before The ball still flies like a bird. The score is nine to seven. For mighty Earle has done his best. The team had gotten six And Earle got all the rest. Herbert Ellis, ’46 DREAM If I were rich, I would build me a home, Down by the sea where it’s whipped to a foam. I’d build it small, but I’d build it strong. I’d build it to live in for ever so long. There I would live for many a year. In peace and quiet with nary a fear. And when I died, they could lay me home, Down by the sea where it’s whipped to a foam. John Dixon, ’46 Page Twenty -seven

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Bourne t igh School Canal Currents A Blue Plug O NE evening several summers ago, I was bass fishing along the banks of the Cape Cod Canal. As I remember it, there was no strain on my rod as a result of too many fish. I noticed a little speck floating down next to the bank in the slew current, but thinking it only a piece of driftwood, 1 let it go at that. Soon that piece of driftwood floated right by me and then I saw that it was an oli, battered, wooden bass plug. Naturally 1 scooped it out of the w ' ater and examined it. The paint was all chipped and three- cuarters off and the hooks were rusted and dull. I slipped it into my tackle box. That night after I got home, 1 painted. I painted it colors that 1 had never seen before on bass plugs. I gave it a deep blue back and a white stomach. Next morning when 1 arose at dawn, 1 put that old plug in my box and took it down to the Canal with me. There were no fish around and nobody was catching any. I was standing on a big rock and casting out a tin squid with a pork rind, letting it slide down in the current just enough so as to reel it in slowly over a little sand ledge jutting out into the Canal. That spot often produced bass when others did not. but not this morning. A fishing friend of mine drove in with his car and walked down to me. He took a look through my tackle box to see what 1 had for baits. He told me to put on the blue plug. I looked at him and laughed out loud. I told him that if some of the other anglers saw me with that thing on, they would throw me in. He w ' as a persistent cuss and brought the plug down to me and made me snap it on. I did and gave it a heave out into the water. I let it float down current and brought it in over the sand ledge slowly, giving it a jerk once in a while so that it somewhat resembled a wounded mackerel. Just as I reeled it in over the ledge, a bass slammed at it with a vengeance. I guess he was provoked at such an ungodly colored fish as that in the water. I played the fish a few minutes and then landed him. Out of the next six casts I took four bass and then they quit for good, but I had a total of five in about as many minutes. I could have sold that plug for four dollars to a certain man but I was too proud of it to .sell it. How many tackle boxes along the Canal banks do not have at least one blue plug in them and how many tackle stores do not have a couple of hun- dred of them selling like hotcakes? I do not claim any credit for the blue plug although I’d never seen any before that. I guess I owe it all to my friend’s stubbornness. Laurence Jackson, ’47 Page Twenty -nine