John Adams High School - Clipper Yearbook (Ozone Park, NY)

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SPIRIT VOICES BY WALTER STOREY 'x g , ll .V L. lsigft he blare of the bugle and the roll of the drums that echoed and reechoed across the earth's surface two decades ago has faded. The clamor and cry of the people caught in the turmoil of the war has receded, and the post-war excitement has calmed. But still the rumble of the guns and the horror and the grimness of the war have been carried over the years to us. They have been carried over by men who knew the war and died in it. They were the poets of the war. The outstanding three and the three destined to live the longest are Rupert Brooke, Alan Seeger, and Joyce Kilmer. They were poets, all of them, but contrary to the conception of poets, they knew how to fight-fight hard and grimly. While they were close to the sterner side of life, they had in them that spark of beauty and appreciation of beauty which distinguished them from other men. They, with their pens, created something of the war which has out-lasted and outlived the roar and din of the actual battle. The first one of this trio to pass on was Rupert Brooke, who was born at'Rugby, England, on August 3, 1887. He was educated at the school there, where his father was a master. From Rugby he went to King's College in Cambridge, where he won a Fellowship. The following year the Great War broke out, and in September, he enlisted as a sub-lieutenant in His Majesty's Navy. On the last day of February 1915, he sailed with the British Mediterranean Ex- peditionary Force, and he was never to come back. On April 23, at the age of 28, he died of blood poisoning. He was the first of the war poets to be killed. He was intensely patriotic and his devoti-on to his mother country, England, is best expressed in the stirring lines from his poem, The Soldier. 2641's-as :L.lnfn'n.-nQ

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the dean's office. Those in the know said they were making out the list of those who were to receive athletic awards. Then came june and a long line of athletes paraded through the Holwell auditorium to receive their team awards. But for Johnnie Thompson, sitting in the third row it brought back old memories. He looked at this ceremony with tear-misted eyes. Oh, to be in that line! But it was impossible. The team awards had been given out, and a hushed silence fell over the assembly as the students awaited the voice of their principal. And now, he continued, I have yet one more award to make, the Holwell medal, the highest athletic award this academy has to offer. I now have the great pleasure of presenting it to Mr. John Thompson for the greatest athletic assistance to his school during the past season. And as thousands cheered, the principal continued: A former athlete, who could not continue because of a great physical castas- trophe, this lad, here, assisted more than anyone else in bringing the championship to Holwell University. Let this show every one of you that you too can assist in ath- letics without actively participating. Thus the dean finished. When happy Johnnie limped off the platform into the surging crowd of students, they were anxious to grasp their new-born hero and lifted him to their shoulders in a parade of triumph. l It's empty-echoing and chilly. White tile walls gleam dully and merge into the far inky black. Clacking wooden heels on an iron stairway-a cough-rattling in the thin silence. A lady in furs shivers. The yellow light is bleak. The signals blink from red to green. The train roars to the platform Flicking grey and yellow shadows and slides away again. Once more it's empty-rather echoing-and chilly. Mary Browne 'l'i--aE- 1n..iiw1i.-ie25

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