La Porte High School - El Pe Yearbook (La Porte, IN)

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Senior A The day dawned at last! We were starting out on our first day as high school students. How many years we had waited for this chance. With mingled feelings of an- ticipation and trepidation we began our high school careers. Our first week was one of the most hectic of our experience. Hounded and hunted from class to class by fun-loving upperclassmen, we got acquainted with our rooms and teachers and became familiar with this new, exciting, and infinitely different high school life. However, before long everyone became engrossed in his own school activities and we became the forgotten men. so for- gotten in fact as practically to be ignored. After standing the indifference of the others as long as we could, we finally blossomed out with a freshman frolic to make the school at least know we were here. This event went down on the books under the heading of ’ success. SENIOR CLASS OFFICERS Harry Lenard, Moris Drake. Charles Yasl, lack Cockshott Our sophomore year wasn't much different from what any other class gees through. We joined the Girl Reserves and Hi-Y and were put through the last public all-day initiation the school has seen. Things went so far that year that public initiations were discontinued. The seniors tried to teach us how to dance by inviting us down to the gym and showing us what they knew by dancing with us. but our ineptitude must have dampened their en- thusiasm for the attempt wasn't much of a success. As the year drew to a close, we began to anticipate our next two years to be spent as upperclassmen. Two years of our high school life were over! With our third year came real responsibilities at last. Our first major problem was the election of our officers. Of course we had had them other years, but this was the first year they had any significance. Eugene Chalik was made our president. We plunged immediately into preparations for the Thanksgiving Dance. And did we plunge! In fact we landed on the bottom. But here at last was our first chance to show the school what we really could do, and we didn't want to belittle our opportunity. An Indian tepee with a ''burning' campfire was the main attraction of the dance. It should have been, considering the work it was to construct it. After is was all over we didn't have much else to do until our junior play, Come out of the Kitchen.'' went into production. Long will we remember painting and cutting out those colored Mammies given with each ticket purchased. Vera (14)

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Mr. Lewis is a good example of a person who utilizes all of his extra time for a specific end. If we couldn t catch him at home perfecting another of his ventures into the realm of the written page, chances are he would be out supervising work on his new home. For a moment as we lean on Mr. Ault's doorbell, we hear sounds coming from the radio. He assures us that the program is one of the concerts of classical music that he en- joys. The next victim of our invasion is Miss Essex. She is handy at many types of work and would probably be engaged in such handwork as sewing. Mr. Doty, on the other hand, might be busy with chess. It has been said of him that he grew a beard of two inches before making a certain move in a crucial contest. Upon visiting the home of Miss Walk, we are surprised to find that she is not living up to her name as far as physical action as a hobby is concerned. Instead we find that we in- terrupt her reading. Living up to her reputation, however, she entertains us graciously showing us her fine collection of post cards and photos. Not stopping, we go on to Mrs. Hotchkiss's home where the sign Out for the Day greets us. From this we can surmize that she is out obtaining a goodly number of freckles while baking in the sun by the lake. An interesting afternoon or even a whole day could be spent with Miss Jones going over her many collections. If during our stay we got itchy feet, she would be only too glad to go for a spin on a bicycle with us. While out in the wide open spaces, we might meet Miss Olson engaged in target prac- tice with bow and arrow. During this interlude, it would not be surprising for us to run across (maybe its more fitting to put it the other way around) Miss Hile galloping around on a horse. Miss Barrcs might also be found out enjoying the wonders of nature on one of her hikes. We might also happen upon Miss Dunlap amid a maze of paints and canvas. A likely theme would be a barnyard scene. Talking about barnyards, if we stumbled upon Mr. Hobbs, he would likely be engaged in his pastime of farming. Mr. Schulze and Mr. Ahrendt, the two unexcelled photographers, would be out shoot- ing in their off moments. The latest dope is that these two in order to get double benefit from their pastime have incorporated riflery and photography into one. The way they do this is to save all their used flash bulbs, and when a goodly number are accumulated, they take them outside somewhere and use them as targets. Miss Dick, acting in her role as amature photographer, is likely to shoot anyone who intrudes upon her solitude. The weapon in this case would prove to be a candid camera. When we reached the homes of Mrs. Vawter and Miss Young we would find them busy exercising their musical talents. We begin to wonder what would happen if we could get the two together. The versatile voice of the former and the skill at the ivories of the latter should make a good combination. A good place »o stop our delightful house-to-house investigation is Mrs. Russell's home. Once we attained admission she could rustle us up some of those delightful victuals of hers to put us back to normal, and perhaps entertain us with a round of bridge. After this thoroughly marvelous survey of faculty activities, we cannot help but draw one conclusion—teachers must be human like the rest of us at heart. It is too bad we don't get more informal companionship from them. Thsre's no doubt that a little more of this would help many students during their school careers. (13)

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Hedstrom portrayed that part in the play. With that howling success behind us, we marched on to the higher and greater things in store: the Junior-Senior Banquet and Prom. The theme was a park, you remember, and after whitewashing miles of fence, constructing and lug- ging around concrete lampposts, blowing and tying thousands of white balloons to repre- sent grapes, stringing the ceiling with leaves, and finishing the whole thing off with arti- ficial trees, with a band stand for the orchestra, we thought we'd really done ourselves up right. Mother Nature had her fun with a steady downpour of rain all day, but her humor played out by late afternoon and everything was fresh and clear for the big night. We'll never forget how Eugene Chalik delayed announcing that Jean Bowman had been elected our Prom Queen. After that was cleaned up and over with, we bade the seniors goodby and went home to rest up through the summer months for our own senior year. That fall, supported by other classes, we started things rolling by giving the annual Mixer Dance for the freshmen. After that we elected Harry Lenard to the head of our class with Moris Drake as vice-president. Charles Yast as secretary, and Jack Cockshott as treas- urer. The basis of our problems now was to raise sufficient money for all the expenses we would have to stand. Our after-game dances during the football and basketball season were well supported by the rest of the school, and we were well pleased with our success. Being a high and mighty senior we found isn't the life it's talked up to be. Things were just about the same. Of course we did have more to say about most things, but the uppermost thought in our minds was the little time we had left in which to do them. There v as no consolation in hoping we'd be missed. We knew we wouldn't be—there were too many to take our places to leave a lack anywhere. But what was troubling us was where would our place be after we left here? Would there be a vacancy to fill somewhere out in that big world? Some of this problem was solved by the vocational guidance project of the American Association of University Wom9n. Each person was given a battery of tests which consisted of a vocational interest inventory; a mental power test; a reading test; and an achievement test which diagnosed our accomplishments in mathematics, science, social studies, and English. The results of these tests enabled Mr. Hargrave, our counselor, to give us valuable advice as to the work in which we would be most likely to succeed. The senior play, What a Life, starring Wesley Kiley, was chalked up as a howling success. Then we started having our senior pictures taken and everyone was showing his proofs around and distributing name cards to anyone who would carry one away. About this time the Student Government was at the heat of its war over the sweater bill. The athletes naturally opposed the bill, and the record for this year is an interesting one to read. One thing that did go through in our favor was the seating arrangement in assemblies. We were given the best possible seats and were kept in a body. In the future now, the classes will progress from inferior seats to better ones as they advance in school instead of sitting in undesirable seats perhaps their entire four years. The Spring Dance was next in line and as this was our last chance at giving a dance, we put into it everything we had left and wound up our record with a grand finale. The theme of the dance was patriotism, with our red, white, and blue hitting you in the face every way you turned. With our programs flaunting our theme, we carry a fond remembrance of the success of the last dance to be sponsored by the class of 1941. With the Spring Dance over, we realized how short the time left to spend in L.P.H.S. was getting to be. The juniors were beginning work on the Prom and we were left sitting with nothing to do, so we threw all efforts in the direcion of the final fling we would have at the school, Class Day. Winding up with a program the school will long remember, we pass reluctantly through the gate of graduation, sorry to leave old L.P.H.S. of whom we had become so fond in those four years. Carry on, you underclassmen, and take good care of her. We put her in your hands. (15)