Momence High School - Monesse Yearbook (Momence, IL)

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30 THE SPHINX Our Country Blue are her skies and bright, Fair are her fields today, Hearts here with joy are light, Happy our children play. Fathers and mothers smile After their tasks are done; Here gleams for mile on mile, Grain in the golden sun. Here gentle stars above Look down on peaceful scenes, Here is a land to love, This is what freedom means. Streams that are pure and clean, Orchards now come to fruit, Land where no work is seen Born of the brawn of brute. Firesides with love aglow, Homes that with laughter ring, These are the joys we know, These are the charms I sing. Land of men’s honest toil, Land where no shell careens, Staining with blood the soil, This is what freedom means. Land of man’s love for man, Home of the brave and true, Land where the humblest can, His way, his goal pursue. Land where to God we pray Not for the strength to fight, But to be shown the way Ever to keep the right. This we are boasting of, These are the joys we know, This is the land we love, Our task is to keep it so. —Edgar A. Guest.

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THE SPHINX 29 lawyer on the globe. Well, anyway, he had a reputation and that’s quite a lot to say”. “Oh, looka here, just look at this pious looking chap. Such a serious expres¬ sion. He looks like an angel”! “Well, if it ain’t my old side-kick, Fred Wiltse, now the Reverend Frederick Peter Wiltse, a very inspiring minister, and he delivers very profound sermons. I must take you girls to hear him. It would just do you good to see him”. “Oh—how de-light-ful. Well, chan ging the subject, could you tell me who this girl is—the blonde”? “That’s Bernice Davis. She finished High and then one day she announced her marriage to Jonothan Anstrom. It was a charming little romance”. “And this decided brunette here, with a few freckles, is Loraine Wiltse, my cousin. She started to go to India with Lulu, but got no farther than Grant Park. She is still there, that is, her home is”. “Who’s the boy here, that looks so happy”? “That’s Albert Hunte, the once noted orator. He remained unmarried, preferring single and solitary bliss. He had lots of hard times remaining in that condition during leap years tho. Finally he got so he led a hermit life, to keep away from the “wild, wild women”. “The next girl here, is Mildred Fedde. She used to be my “sweet patootie”. She and Genola Walker went west on a ranch, where they rode wildly around the country shooting coyotes. It was a wild life all right. “Next is Jessie Greenawalt, here, the one that is grinning. She was a regular man hater. She was elected to the school board of Momence, being the only lady member. She used to slam the poor men every chance she got. High School boys sent to her got no mercy. “Margaret Hobart is this girl here with the wicked look in her eye. Don’t you recognize the name, kiddies? You ought to, because, why children, she is your Grandma Cooke”. “Sure we know all about her, but who is this girl with the big brown eyes”? “That’s Laura Martin, small, but—she made her mark. She is president of the “Hazel Nut Factory” in Momence. And here is Lila Kennedy, this, with the “Castle Bob”. She was a snake dancer at the Orpheum. Oh boy! she sure could dance”. “Hazel Farmer,here, this last girl surprised us all by choosing school teaching as a life vocation. As far as I know she is still teaching. Very fond of it. “And last but not least, Isaac Ernest Hardy went to the famous state of Utah where he became a Mormon. The last I heard from him he said he was coming to see me and bring some of his wives. “So this is the end of the finish of my class history, children. Not such slow class, after all, is it? Eh?”

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THE SPHINX 31