Conneaut High School - Tattler Yearbook (Conneaut, OH)

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VALEDICTORY » “THE BUILDERS.” All are architects of Fate. Working in these walls of Ti ne. Through all the past ages the inhabitants of the world have been working and now we step upon the scene and enjoy the sum of their labors. Everything that has gone before enters into our life and time. How many thousands have laid down their lives to make our comforts possible! How much bloodshed has there been! How many have perished or suffered in prison or dungeon that we might enjoy liberty of speech and freedom of action! Consider the number of people who have aided in producing and gathering, or perhaps manufacturing and transporting some little article for which you pay only a few cents. Wherever you go multitudes have prepared the way. protected and saved you trouble and drudgery. However nothing of value is free. We must pay the price the world demands; we must give of our personal service. “Can our indebtedness ever be paid?” says the worker. “The world owes me a living.” says the shirker. There could not exist a more erroneous idea. We are placed here with a bread winning problem before us whose process of solution is the building of individual character. Nature endows us with the raw material for that building and the success of the finished structure lies with us. Therefore it behooves us to build wisely. When Nestor stood before the Greek generals and counseled attack upon Troy, he said. “The secret of victory is in getting food ready.” This well applies to the preparation necessary for our life work. We should make at the beginning a right inventory of the gifts which Nature supplies, as no carpenter knows what tools are in the box until he lifts the lid and unwraps one instrument after another. So the instruments of the soul must be unfolded by education. No building of a city without can compare in beauty and richness with the building process of the soul within. Our building may be a lordly castle or only a thatched roof cabin, yet each worker putting fidelity into brick and stone will find by so doing that he has carved his own character into beauty beyond that of priceless gems. How many who have lived failures and died in misery might have achieved happiness and sue cess, had they but used wisdom and forethought in the choice of their lifework. Wc should work in the right place no matter what the sacrifice, for no one can do his best until he does that for which he was created. He must pull with, not against the current and must work for the love of il if he would win success. Earth knows no tragedy like the death of the soul’s ideals. The vessel may lose its sails and masts but if it only keeps its guiding star, the harbor may be reached. What could be more painful than to discover after many failures that we arc fixed in a groove in which wc 20

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Katherine Waite “A little nonsense now and then Is relished by the best of men.” Forest Walrath “A solemn youth, with sober phiz. Who eats his grub and minds his biz. Track team. 1907-1908-1909. Class Treasurer, 1907 1908 1909. Business Manager of Annual. Senior Play. 1909 Class Speaker. Lena Walker “A laugh is worth a thousand groans in any market.” Glee Club. 1906. Girls’ Octette, 1907-1908-1909. Mixed Chorus. 1907-1908. 9

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must run for the rest of our days? That we have mistaken our .vocation? That our ability is wasted? On the other hand with our decision wisely made, our building begun, wc may cast into it a full heart, and expend upon it all our energies, nor fear that we will do too much for we are not working for money nor for fame, but each for the joy of the working, and Let us do our work as well, both the unseen and the seen; Make the house where gods may dwell, beautiful, entire and clean. Among the suggestive legends of the Indians is one on the lost opportunity. It tells how the good genius desiring to bestow a blessing upon a beautiful damsel took her to a large field of corn saying:— Daughter, in the field before us, the ears of corn, in the hands of those who pluck them in faith, shall have talismanic virtues and the virtue shall be in proportion to the size and beauty of the ear gathered. Thou shalt pass through the field once and pluck one ear. It must be taken as thou guest forward, and thou shalt not stop in thy path, nor shalt thou retrace a single step in quest of thine object. Select an car' full and fair, and according to its size and beauty shall be its value to thee as a talisman. The maiden thanked the good genius and then set forward upon her quest. As she advanced she saw many ears of corn large, ripe and beautiful, such as calm judgment might have told her would possess virtues enough, but in her eagerness to grasp the very best, she left these fair ears behind, hoping that she might find one still fairer. At length, as the day was closing she reached a part of the field where the stalks were shorter and thinner and the ears very small and shriveled. She now regretted the lovely ears she had left behind, and disdained to pick from the poor show around her. for here she found not an ear which bore perfect grain. She went on. but alas! only to find the stalks more and more feeble and blighted, until at last, as the day was closing and the night coming on, she found herself at the end of the field without having plucked an ear of any kind. She saw her folly when too late. God grant that this may not be our fate but that when finished, our life work may be a record of well spent years employed in the one task, the making of manhood or womanhood and that dying we may exclaim with Horace Greely ‘'Fame is a vapor, popularity an accident, riches take wings, those who cheer today will curse tomorrow, only one thing endures— Character. Dear Teachers: Our hearts throb with gratitude to you for your painstaking efforts in our behalf. We would thank you for your expressed desire for our future, and above all we would thank you for those countless hours when you fain would have rested but which must be spent under the study lamp deciphering hieroglyphics which our carelessness had made a formidable task. We thank you for making our school days so full of sunshine, and if at any moment we have caused you pain we ask your forgiveness. We thank the Superintendent and the Board of Education for their interest in providing us with capable teachers and for the honor they bestow upon us tonight. My dear classmates, we have now come to the parting of the ways, we are on the brink of separation. Never more will we all meet together in hall or classroom of old C. II. S. Many pleasures have been ours. The world has ever as yet presented its sunny side. But should darkness come in the future, we still have Memory, a wonderful possession, where all the pleasures of youth are stored. Memory! through which it is given to the soul to rise above age. pain, and earth’s troubles and revel in the beauty and fragrance of youthful friendships and pleasures. May the records on the pages of memory of C. II. S. ever prove a stimulus to the best motives and highest ambitions of which