Francesville High School - Francillian Yearbook (Francesville, IN)

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.V we. V l1: 'i no ii THE FIIANCILLIAN claimedf Why that's Ruth Gutwein's school day sweetheart. Just then Ralph came .in and we began ques- tioning him about Ruth. He told us that she and Virgil had been married the next year -following her gradua- tion. He had come into the posses- sion of his father's mill soon after that. - The next day, we arrived at the Beach. We took a airport at Palm taxi to th-e Palm Beach Hotel, where we freshened up a bit. We then set out for a 'walk along the beach. Sit- 'ting under a huge palm tree was a young couple very much absorbed in one another. Didn't that girl look familiar-and the boy? Why, sure enough, it was our midget classmate, Alice Hill, and of course, the youn.g man was Gordon Helfrich. We rushed over to them and all started asking ques-tions at once. Out off the hub- dub, Alice informed us that she was now Mrs. Helfrich, of Lafayette. Gor- don had been transferred from the North Slide Station in Monon to dis- trict manager of Conoc-o Gas and Oil Co. They were taking a two weeks' vacation before he assumed this po- sition. We were all very hungry and thinking that a sandwich would tide us over until luncheon, we hurried to the large hot dog stand down on the beach. After waiting for a while until our turn came to be waited on, we received the surprise of our life. Who should be coming to wait on us but our former cheer-leader of high school days, John Hancock. He had not lost the alblility to be heard, for upon seeing us he let out a yell that could be heard far down the beach. Johnnie started telling us his success as proprietor of a whale and hot dog stand. Milo Myers was in Johnnie's employment, catching whales which Johnnie made into delicious whale sandwiches. During our chat with Johnnie we learned that Roy Osburn of F. H. S. was no'w coach of the Texas University Basket Ball team, which had just won the semi-finals. They were to go to Austin, Texas, to play in the state tournament, but the team had gone on a. sit-down strike and refused to play. Roy was having a rather trying time, but we all hoped that everything would turn out all right. We then left Johnnie to return to our hotel for din-ner. After a love- ly dinner, we went for a short walk before retiring. We had all agreed to meet at seven o'clook the next morn- ing to go t-o the races. Johnnie came alon.g at seven in his Model T Ford and we all progressed to the race track. We purchased very good seats in the gra-ndstand and patiently awaited the starting of the race. Soon the cars were called to line up. The announcer called to car numbers and drivers, and then is w-hen we received the final blow. Car -no. 13 was being driven by Dot Severna. After this announcememnt we were all the more interested in the race. At the waving of the white flag, the cars raced forward-all but one. Car No. 13 was going in the opposite di- rection. At the half way mark, she raced between the cars tearing off a fender. We all sat breathless-we were not able -to speak! Dorothea ar- rived -at the starting point again. She changed gears and was attempting to to turn around, when she put it into reverse. Goin-g at a terrific speed, she went completely around the track backwards. By this time, we girls and especially Alice were almost frantic. During her zigzagged course around -the track, four of the remain- ing six cars had run off the track in attempting to avvoid her. Thus thefre were only two left beside Dorothea. She again arrived at the starting point and you know the third time is a charm. Rlghting herself, she at last started around the track in a normal position. We soon saw that there would be no competition for Dorothea at all. She won the feat by quite a margin. But to top it off, besides the 515,000 she received for 'winning the race, she also received a premium of 55,- 000 for her dare-devil driving. We all iushed down to see Dorothea, for we -thought she would need the atten- tion of two nurses and a doctor. But I -guess we didn't know Dorothea, for upon entering her small preparatory room, we found h-er 'quietly reading the newspaper. She told us that was the mos-t fun she had for some time. It was then that we needed -the smell- ing salts -instead of her. Dorothea then called our attention to the article about Coach Osburnls basket ball team winning the state tournament. He had at last straight- ened out his difficulties and had a championship team. We invited the entire group back to our suite to celebrate Dorothea's victory. Reaching -there, we turned on the radio and listened to the Lonely Hearts Program . At the completion of the program, the an- 1937

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THE FRANCILLIAN she was now Mrs. James Hamblin. Jiimfmy, our tease of high school days, was now the owner of the nicest night club in New York. Just then the announcer came forward 'to an- nounce the next numlber. Could you believe it? It was a song and tap- dance by the Hamblin twins, Jerry and Sherry, age 5. The children were cfirtainly talented, and gave a Won- derful performance, After their number, we girls re- turned to the Ritz Hotel for the next morning we were leaving for Florida, and needed a good n.ight's rest. In the middle of the night we were awakened by a noise from the room above. I-t sounded as though some- one were tapdancing. Standing it as long as we could, we rang for the manager. When he appeared at our door, we were surprised beyond be- lief, for who should he be but Herald Bailey. During our talk with Herald. we learned that his rich uncle had died willing this branch of hotels throughout the c-ountry to him. The noise was still progressing, so Her- ald and we three tired girls advanced to the above room. Herald knocked, and was met at the door .by a maid. He asked to see her mistress, who came forward just then. This time we were shocked, for the girl who had been tap-dancing above us was none other than Odetta Kes.ler. She asked us in, and while her maid was preparing a lunch, he told us about her success as a dancing star in the Ziegfeld Follies. After a delicious lunch with Odetta we again returned to our room, 'to sleep undisturbed the res-t of the night. The next morning we rushed to the airport to start our trip. We were just ready to board the plane, when the pilot came forward for a word w-ith the stewardess. The voices sounded familiar, and turning around we recognized the stewardess and pilot as being Lenora Kelley and Ralph Koebcke. This was Ralph's first trip as pilot since he had just been promoted from co-pilot. Lenora had also been transferred here from the United Air Lines. Wasn't it strange that fate should put these two together? After a smooth take- off we were in the air headed for Florida. Lenora came to serve us lunch and Ralph being relieved by the co-pilot, came to join us. As Lenora was preparing the small table, we noticed she was wearing a. dia- mond. Not knowing that it concerned anyone present, we asked her who the lucky person 'mighlt be. When we asked the question, we noticed Ralph blushed a deep pink! Much to our surprise, Lenora with the help of Ralph told us the great news. They were going to be married the next Wednesday. However, they were both going to continue to fly. Having such a capable person at the controls as Ralph, we felt quite safe for the remainder of the trip. We stopped at Atlanta, Georgia, for refueling. Across the way from the airport was a nice looking dairy farm. On the barn appeared the name. Eluston Free Germ Dairy. Remembering a boy by the name of Elston whom one of the girls of the Senior Class of '37 had been greatly interested in, we asked Lenora if this was the same person. She told us that Mardella Eide and Jim Elston were- now married and the owners of thin up-to-date dairy. As we had a stop here for 15 minu-tes, we ran across to see Mardella. She seemed very glad to see us and immediately asked us to come in. She told us all about her life on the dairy and showed us their collection of ribbons that their dairy cows had won at the state fairs. We were glad to know that ,Mardella was enjoying her mar- ried life and was doing so well. After a hasty goodbye, we returned to the airport. As we entered the plane, Lenora handed us a newspaper and called our attention to the huge headlines, LUDEMAN'S CROSS-COUNTRY BI- CYCLE RECORD BROKEN BY ACE JACKSON , which proved to be none other than Keith Jackson of hi-gh school days. Reading the complete article, we learned that Keith had completed his life-long ambition. He had traveled th-e entire distance from coast to coast on a Kiddy Kar. When he arrived on the Pacific Coast, he was presented with a new rubber- tired Kiddy Kar by the Walters- Kruger Toy Corporation. Lenora informed us that her old classmate, Florence Kruger, and her husband, Kenneth Walters owned this corpora- tion, manufacturing all types of toys for small children. As we continued to read the paper, the article, Big Mlill Strike in La- Crosse came to our attention. Mil- dred, reading the article further, learned that -the mrill belonged to a certain Virgil Hienhold. Mildred ex- 1937,

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TI-IE FRANCILLIAN - nounc-er turned the microphone over to the owner of the club. To our astonishment, the voice was that of Maru Reish. Du-rin-g her short talk, she gave consoling advice to those who had -been disappointed in love. This recalled to our minds the inci- dent of Lenora Kelley's and Ralph Koebcke's engagement, which we sur- mised probably led to her starting this club. For you know that would be disheartening to her! At the end of this program, the announcer stated that Madam Doris Kopka Netherton would now favor us with a vocal solo. I immediately recognized the name of Netherton, and as soon as she began to sing, we recognized the voice of Mrs. Nether- ton as being that of our old class- mate, Doris Kopka. Alice then told us that Doctor Junior Nethertron had a child's clinic in Buffalo, New York. Doris was the matron of an orphan's home which was in connection with the clinic. Besides this. every after- noon she sang on Maru's program over the radio. Melba and Mildred wondered why Doris would be Sing- ing on a Lonely Hearts Progam , but I personally knew of Doris' de- sires during high scho-ol days, and surmised the reason was on the ac- count of a certain young man from Rensselaer whom I had heard her talk about quite often! At the close of this program our guests said they must leave as they had a busy day. We stayed on in Palm Beach for two more days, but as nothing exciting happened and we did not meet any more of our former classmates, we decided to leave for another interesting state. We picked Nevada as our 'next stop, so the next day we took a plane to Reno. We landed in Reno and took a taxi to the Reno Hotel. After a short rest, we decided to explore the town. Passing the Babcock, Babcock and Babcock I aw Firm, we came face to face with Hilda Gutwein. We immediately be- gan questioning her, and she in- formed us her days as Mrs. Wilhite Foster proved to be very unhappy and she thought she could better the situation as Mrs. Tom. She told us that the life of an orchestra leader's wife was too lonesome as Wilhite had engagements all over the country and was very seldom home. They had come to a friendly agreement that he should follow his career and she would be free to be Mrs. Tom. She also hinted that he was quite atten- tive to his soloist, Dorothy Nine. Finding our vacation coming to a close we started the hormeward jour- ney. We took a plane from Reno to Indianapolis. Where we decided' to visit relatives for a day. Arriving at Melba's aunt's home, we found her cousin Jim just leaving for a Latin contest. He told us that his teacher was Miss June Morgan and she used to live in Francesville. Puttin-g two and two together, we came to the conclusion that here was another of our schoolmates doing her life-long ambition-to become a Lat- in teacher. One of .her pupils had won a state Latin contest for three consecutive years. thus proving her albility as a teacher. We decided to finish the trip by train. so we purchased tickets to Monticello. We arrived in Monticello and werw walking down the street when the first person to meet our eyes was Wilma Koebcke. She in- vited us to her home. While there she told us that she was now Mrs. Virgil Waymire and that he was now assistant .manager of Rider's Furni- ture Co. She also told us that Doro- thy their small daughter was not at home. since she had just taken her to rake her violin lesson. She also told us the news that Dorothy Jentz and .lack Render had married and lived on a farm near our own home town, Franccsville. This brought the decision to visit them. That aftern-oon she took us over to Dorothy's. But as luck would have it --she wasn't home. We learned that she and Jack had gone to the state tournament. Jack had not lost inter- est in the games although he was now a farmer. They certainly had a nice looking farm, and we knew that Dorothy was quite happy even though we didn't get to see her, for she had always been interested in the Render family. We had only one person yet to find -Lucille Schlatter, S-o stopping at her home we learned from her moth- er that Lucille was now Mrs. Robert Clausen and that they had just left for China. She had attended Moody Bible Institute which he did also. They had gone as missionaries to that far off unknown land. We quite well knew that the conditions -of the country would be much improved with such a capable person -to teach them. We reached home, Chicago, late that evening. Reading the evening 1937