Jefferson Township High School - Criterion Yearbook (New Paris, OH)

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SENIOR CLASS PROPHECY ln May, 1969, we, the Detective Agency of Moore and Wesler, were hired by a for- mer member of the Class of 1949 to find out the occupations and whereabouts of his old classmates. This is what we found. The enormously wealthy Mr. Virgil Petry called us to his office in the Empire State Building in New York City and told us to spare no expense in our search, as he had millions. It seems he made all his money by inventing a sure-fire grower for bald heads, but he's completely bald, it didn't work on him. Our first clue took us to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. There, by careful investigation, we found to our surprise that Berneice Martin was a strip tease dancer at the HotSy- Totsy Night C1ub. She told us to contact Laverne Diggs, who was with the Barnum and Bailey Circus at Cleveland, Ohio, because she knew the whereabouts of several old classmates. The next day we went to Cleveland. We found that Laverne, now Mrs. Paul DeBoo, was the featured tight-rope performer with the circus. She greeted us very cordially and gave us many leads in our search. We left Cleveland and started south by automobile for Columbus, Ohio. Upon reaching Columbus we stopped at a place called Bob's Beannery, and who do you suppose was manager of the place? Why, our old friend Bob Bottoms, of course, although, you would never recognize him, as he only weighed three hundred and twenty pounds. He fed us wonderful food and told us where to find Jim Clark. We went to a large church and to our amazement we were greeted by Reverend Clark. His fingers were covered with diamonds, it seems the collection plate pays well. He invited us to be his guests overnight. At his home we were met by his cha rxning wife, the former Marilyn Mann, who was also covered with jewels. They took us to the prize fight that night. As the gong sounded, there, attired in purple trunks, and coming out fighting was another classmate, Bill Markleyg known in the fight ring as Muscles Markley. Continuing our search the next day, we stopped at Dayton. Muscles had told us we would find Howard Ford there. Upon inquiry, we found that the huge, pink mar- ble Dimple Doll factory was owned by Howard. He always did like to fool around dolls. On we journeyed to our old home town of New Paris. There we found several of the Class of 49 . Our first stop was at the new school building. We found that the superintendent was none other than Jane Keller. She had married Myron Arnett and was the proud mother of twelve children. So you can see why New Paris finally got a new school building. June urged us to stay for the program that was to be given in the auditorium. To our great enjoyment, it was Jolly Juday and His Trained Fleas. Jim was touring the midwest with his flea circus. We went backstage after the show and Jim told us he was happily married and that his wife raised dogs to keep him well supplied with fleas. Going to the main section of town we found it great- ly changed. The main industry being the manufacturing of bubble gum, under the supervision of Dorothy Thompson Eales. She surely could demonstrate her product. We inquired about Charles Andy and were sent to the midget race track at Richmond, Indiana. The re we found old Charley in his Offenhouser, going round and round the track. He was almost as large as his car. He said he raced in the summer and sold Fuller Brushes in the winter. We wished him luck and continued on our way to Chi- cago, Illinois. 26

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We found Martha Eales running the Slippery Eel Night Club. Two of her fea- tured entertainers were Peggy Zurwell and Jean Arthur. They were billed as The Hula Hicks , their specialty being a sensational grass skirt number. As we were enjoying the show, we heard a disturbance and saw the bouncer putting a rowdy cus- tomer out the door. We thought we recognized the bouncer, and sure enough, it was Bud Stegall, While talking to Bud afterwards, he told us that he had gotten all his strength from eating Wheaties, three times a day. Traveling westward we passed through several states, but could find no further clues. Stopping in a small mountain town, we saw a man coming down the street pushing a push cart. He looked very sad and forlorn. We recognized him as Bob Copenhefer. He was the official garbage collector of Horseshoe Bend, Colorado. Having had an unhappy love affair, he had turned to garbage collecting to soothe his aching heart. Bob told us he had seen Joan Melody traveling through the town with a band. We traced her to Denver and found that she was the featured tuba player with a band called The Toothless Tooters. When not playing the tuba, she was featured in an act as a snake charme r. We found that our old friend Dick Steele had really lived up to his name, He was in jail in Carson City, Nevada. Seems he was raising canaries for a living, but in- stead of buying bird seed, he would steal it. He got caught and was to be defended in court by that up-and-coming lawyer, Lawrence Nickelson, known around the West as Dishonest Nick. I-le had only been married four times and was living in Reno, Nevada since he spent so much time there anyway. Also in Reno, we found the for- mer Donna Lou Brown working in a gambling casino. She was married to a gambler and they were really rolling in the dough. They were trying to get enough money to come back to Ohio and buy a farm so they could raise hogs. Our search had now narrowed down to two members. We started toward Mexico because we had heard that Lola Harshman was a bull-fighter down there. We found her in Mexico City and she invited us to watch her performance. She was very good and really knew how to throw the bull. It was quite a jump from the New Paris tele- phone exchange. One more now remained to be found. We traveled miles and rniles until we reached the Smoky Mountains. There we came upon a shack surrounded by chenille bedspreads, which were for sale. We stopped to buy one and were shocked to see that the aging man who hobbled out was LeRoy de Federico. He made chenille spreads and sold them for a living. LeRoy told us that he used to make mountain brew but couldn't keep from drinking it all himself, so he had switched to making bedspreads. Our search being ended, we returned to New York City with our report to Mr. Virgil Petry. And were rewarded with--you guessed it--one bottle of hair growerff 27