George Washington High School - Compass Yearbook (Alexandria, VA)

Page 31 text:

LOOKING BACKWARD This is a topical survey of the Graduating Class of 37. Its component parts are one hundred and fifty young men and women ranging from average to super. Originally they hailed from two schools. George Mason and Alexandria High. Someone got the brilliant idea that in union there is strength. The outcome? George Washington High School. The majority are old citizens of Alexandria, but there is a large number that comes from places all the way from Maine to California. Some of the one hundred, fifty are handsome and valiant. The others are charming and demure. From its combined height of about seven hundred, seventy feet, it can more than overlook the Washington Monument. From such an elevation how far can this class not see! Its combined weight—seventeen thousand, five hundred pounds. Weight enough surely to anchor its feet to prosaic work, even though its head is in the clouds! Its combined girth is three thousand, nine hundred, twenty-four inches. Imagine the sensation it would create going into Woodward and Lothrop's asking for a belt, size three thousand, nine hundred, twenty-four! What a furor will follow the class when it goes out into the world! Approximately, its combined brains would fill six hundred, sixteen tumblers. Is it to be wondered at that this class can discern no impossibilities through its two hundred, eighty eyes? In its first year one half the class allowed itself to be trampled on. They were pushed out of the chance to give their dance. But not so with the other half. Soon they both were in the spirit of the thing, and when the second year rolled around, things began to happen. As I have said previously, the two halves combined to make one gigantic whole in the Junior year. To eelebate this union, the class helped in many succes ful activities: the Junior Prom, such dramatic productions as Huckleberry Finn , and various athletic victories. In the last year, the class, with its Midyear Prom. State literary contests, and plays, reached a great state of glorification, bringing us up to the present. As we glance about, we see outstanding personalities on all sides. There is Billy Meeks who never fails to be different. His weaknesses arc red Austins, gold shoes, bananas, and acting silly.

Page 30 text:

President JAMES TlCER Vice-Presidents -GORDON RUST Secretary-Treasurer. MARY ELLEN BURKE Parliamentarian.. .COURTLAND DAVIS Valedictorian . .COURTLAND DAVIS Salutatorian .... ... .. GERTRUDE AMORKY Sponsor Mr. LINDSEY

Page 32 text:

The honorable Francis Payne, whom Miss Kiracofe can remember as coming to high school in stove pipe pants, has finally decided that the school needs him no longer. He will move on with the rest of us. Then we have that helter-skelter Esther Cain who can actually do two things at once: her specialties are dramatics, music, and editing (the school paper). Then there is the one-man brain trust. Courtland Davis, and the top-man athlete. Do'Do ' Robinson. Some of the other great basketball or football heroes are Pete Wells, Puck Harvey, and Dickie Burrell. Don’t let me forget these: Robert Taylor Hatfield, the great lover of the Senior Class. Libby Shaw and Norma White with their wise-cracking, and Harold Fagehon. who feels at home on the auctioneer's platform. Marie Reynolds distinguishes herself by that Greta Garbo” expression around the hair. Mary Ellen Burke has changed an old adage to beautiful but not dumb.” What do big brown eyes remind you of? Shirley Major, of course. Margaret Petersilia with her pleasant personality is among the basketball athletes. With Evelyn Kempfer we think of her conscientious effort in everything she undertakes. Among our executives are Fritz Larkin and Jimmy Ticer who direct Senior affairs. There are still many, many more we can think of such as. Fred Astaire the Second in the person of Kenny Wood: the debaters. Anne Cowling and Vivian Ale: the cadet leader, Jeanne Spaulding: Lucile Curtis with her avoirdupois, curly headed Leslie Myers, smiling Frances Robinson, and Polly Stephenson, who denies that she rolls her eyes. With such a class so great in size, so varied in personality, a glance in the future is justified. Its combined years are two thousand, three hundred, eighty, which gives Methuselah something to worry about. Consider the wisdom that has seen so many years! Empires have risen and fallen, wars have been declared and won. fads have swept the earth since our eyes saw the light of day. With what an accumulation of experience and wisdom will it go forth into the world! The combined general average of the class is A-PIus. Where the component parts of such precocity will come to rest, only its prophet knows! Mary Jane Morrison, Historian.