Fairmont High School - Maple Leaves Yearbook (Fairmont, WV)

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OUT OF THE I-IAZY PAST- -- TO THE GLORIQUS FUTURE L. The Present Fairmont High School I have a faint recollection that but for the accident of circumstances, I might have been a member of the Mercer Class. These circumstances, I might say, were not. wholly accidental. They had to do with a series of conferences between the school authorities and my father which resulted in a decision that the Virginia Milif tary Institute could do more for me than Fairmont High. And, looking back at it, and with due respect for all concerned, it did! The Virginia Military Institute and Fairmont High School furnish a scholastic background for my adolescent years in the same manner that the woolf and warp of a piece of Barnsville shoddy tied the texture together, for I find in plumbing the wells of memory that I also became a member of the high school class of 1903, and was associated with such sweet souls as Aubrey Meredith, Homer Samuel Bell, Georgia Torrey, Maude La Wear QI recall her but faintlyj, Rose Vance fhow I love herlj, Claudia Snider fand her, toolj, Lenore Mitchell, Zora Kinsey and Lulu Conaway. The vicissitudes of attempting to transplant Virginia Military Institute culture into the nascent life of Fairmont High was so great that a sheepskin was out of the question. If I remember correctly, I tried to introduce cigarette smoking in the school building. Prior to my triumphal return from Virginia, and refentry into the high school, the smoking of cigarettes was confined to the little brick building at the corner of the alley, but I, being 17 and possessed of much worldly experience, decided to carry the practice into the school building itself. My girl companf - 'I - ions were shocked beyonds words at such an audaf FW-Sf F- H- S- ' ,W I Seven

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OUT OF THE HAZY PAST - - TO THE GLORIOUS FUTURE Our School History . ' 6, - Q55 TANDING in the auditorium of the new high school building, a man of my own O C1 d Q 'd- LJCC as HL, age turne to me an .tai . l . You and I appreciate this. For us, it 'Ji 'QM is the fulfillment of a dream, but the boys and girls who come romping in here next season will take it as a matter of course. These young folks are enjoying the harvest, for which we tilled the ground and planted the seed! Thirty years ago, when that man attended Fairmont High, the entire school was housed in a large room in C, E, Smith the building at the corner of Adams and Quincy streets, which is now known as Fraternity Hall. There were, I think, in addition to a cubby hole used by the principal, two other cubby holes used as class rooms. In one of these, Miss Jennie Fleming taught ancient history, and in the other, a knowledge of the language of the Romans was unfolded in clouds of soot, intellectual as well as material. In the main room, where clouds of chalk dust played in the slanting sunbeams from the tall windows, the minds of the young men and young women were broad' ened by perpendicular plunges into the mazes of algebra and higher arithmetic. There was no recreation, no amusement, and little to hope for in the future. Occasionally a youth, feeling a crying need for a stimulant for his sympathetic system, would slip an overshoe in the tall Burnside stove that stood in the south' west corner of the room. If the resulting confusion was particularly odoriferous, events for some days to come would be dated from that overshoe. In those days not very many students served their long and dreary time. Girls stuck better than boys, there having been but sixteen lads to receive diplomas in the six years from 1897 and 1903. In the class of 1896 three hardy lads received the sheepskin. These were Prose' cuting Attorney M. Earle Morgan, Dr. Walter E. Boydston, and Charles E. Way' man. The next year's class, known as the Cryonne Class, contained but one boy, john J. McCool. 'Ninetyfeight was the Spanish War year, and the five girls and two boys who graduated about the time the local guardsmen were leaving for the mobilization camps, called themselves the Patriotic Seven. The class of '99 had twelve girls and four boys. This class had no name, but the following year the Jennie Fleming Class graduated one lone boy and nine vivacious girls. This boy, by the way, was Dr. Chesney M. Ramage. The class of 1901 was nameless. James E. Dowden was the only boy, and of girls there were six. The Mer cer Class of 1902 was unique in that it numbered five boys and one girl. She was Mildred Pickett. Among l the boys was Fred Torrey, the sculptor, and Phil Pitzer, Class Room, 1893 the Mannington banker. Six

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,OF THE gl-IAZY PAST -- 5- TO ,THE GLORIOUS FUTURE cious attempt, but the boys urged me on with such words of encouragement as Go on, we'll back you up, and What business they got anyway telling a man he can't smoke? The first obstacle I had to cross was Professor Mercer, and I do believe that unless timely reinforcements arrived, I would have carried the day. I always had a way with Professor Mercer, and I'll always believe I had him sold on my right to smoke where I pleased, when Uncle Joe Rosier and Professor Humphreys hove into sight. Well, when my father fixed that up and arranged for my reinstatement, it was one of the express understandings that the school, as theretofore, would continue to make the rules. I have always been susceptible to feminine influence, and at 17, especially, I could be inspired to truly great deeds of valor by the smile and encouragement of the girl I loved. And, I might say, the reason Justice of the Peace Thomas W. Powell and I did not fight our scheduled duel for the hand of Miss Rose Vance, of the class of 1903, was the result of no weakening on the part of either of us, our mothers merely permitting us to oversleep. Another duel I was going to fight and didn't was over the hand of Miss Anna Braden. I challenged Dana Meredith, but nothing came of it, probably for the same reason. But for at least as long as I remained in High School, chivalry in the true sense had not entirely died out of the world, because the events preceding my second forced departure from the school can be traced to a whispered dare from the rosy lips of a maiden I admired. In one of the cubbyfhole rooms of the old school, illy ventilated, a man teacher had our class upon the rack, forcing us with exquisite torture to decline certain Lati-1 verbs.. One thing led to another. Words were passed. The situation was tense. Suddenly the maiden by our side whispered in my ear. Give him a whipping. I didn't exactly do that. The iight was declared to be a draw, like the Battle of Antietam, the teacher, like McClellan, holding the field, and I, like a bee, depart' ing quickly, and none too silently The events of the immediate future were somewhat hazy. There were confer' ences and consultations, and I was finally reinstated. To all outer aspects, there was a complete reconciliation, but deep in my heart I cherished the notion that the school didn't amount to much. And with the passing of years, that belief never diminished. This is why I have such a keen sense of appreciation for the new high school and what it promises for the future. It is everything my high school was not. For me and most of my associates the school was a prison which tended to enslave rather than to improve the youthful mind. , I This, you may be sure, was through no fault of the faculty and school authorities. There was yet to be an awakening of the people to the great experiment of public education. When I started to the high school, peof ple were still obsessed with the old notion that for each one of us life held a special purpose. We had not yet learned that ' . the best purpose of life is to live. The RMT View New F- H- S- Eight