Petaluma High School - Trojans Yearbook (Petaluma, CA)

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THE ENTERPRIS E, ’15 up of countless seemingly petty tilings,—we shall go into the new build¬ ing ready to make the most of the opportunities it will present to us, and we shall before very long become justly known as the best High School in all California. Another thought comes to me in connection with our change from our old home to the beautiful new one where everything will be right to make our best development possible. I want you to share that thought with me, and to get profit from it. This old building has served us well, and I often think that it may have served us much better than we realize. We have developed ourselves into a fairly good school in this unsightly, inadequate building, and we have had many difficulties to overcome in order to do it. It has been remotely like Lincoln’s getting an education in spite of his lack of opportunity,—circumstances could not keep from him the education that he wanted. So the fact that we have had no athletic field has made us work harder to accomplish something in athletics; the fact that we had no assembly hall has not kept us from forming a wholesome, helpful school spirit, the fact that our class rooms were half their normal size and fewer than we needed, and were, more¬ over, badly ventilated, irregularly heated, poorly lighted, has not pre¬ vented us from trying that much harder to learn concentration of mind on the business of the class; the fact that our laboratories and shops and drawing rooms were small, crowded and poorly adapted to their use has not prevented our trying that much harder to do the good work we have done in them. We have grown by the difficulties we have had to overcome, and we have reason to be thankful for the difficulties that have called into play our straightforward manly and womanly effort. I think we may fairly claim to have earned our right to the new build¬ ing with its enlarged opportunities, with its incentives to better work, with its stimulation to our interest, and, above all, with its proper call upon our sense of responsibility. For, mind, if we are not a better school in the new building than we were in the old, if we are not steadily growing in manliness and womanliness, in self control, in knowledge of the world’s mental treasures, in actual desire to accomplish more and more in our regular school lessons, in public spirit and pride in our school and its good name, in regard for the rights of all our fellows, in deep patriotism,—in all the fine qualities and abilities that should mark the educated man or woman,—if we fail in any of these things, —15—

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THE ENTERPRISE, ’15 ments possible, we shall have to be hard at work here in the old build¬ ing trying to make our school better, to do our work better to achieve our daily growth in physical, mental, moral, social stature. If we propose to wait until we get into our new building before trying to be stronger and better, we shall not be stronger and better in the new than in the old old. The building has no miraculous powers by which it can suddenly invest us with a stronger character, a clearer mind or a more useful body. We shall get these things only by going after them; we must work for them consistently and evenly, as men and women must always work for anything that is worth while. We cannot postpone the beginning, for, if we do, there will not be any consummation, any The New High School Building—in Course of Construction. Let us then be careful to make our faithful effort every day to be worthy of the new building that is to be the home of the Petaluma High School. Let us not be careless of the old lest the new be too good for us. Let us try to have the very finest school we ever heard of right here in the old, inadequate building; one in which self control and self direction are the rule; where good order and consideration for the rights of others are always in evidence; where the wise use of time and the same development of our powers are constantly going on. Let us try to better our records in our studies, our conduct in and out of school, our relations with all the men and women, the boys and girls, whom we daily meet. If we do these things well—and all of life is made —14—

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THE E N T EEPRIS E, T5 tlien we do not deserve the fine building and equipment that our fellow citizens have generously voted for our use. T am not a pessimist,—I could not be after having been four years with the boys and girls and teachers of the Petaluma High School. Therefore I do not believe that we shall fail to rise to the increased res ponsibilities which the use of our fine new building will put upon us. I believe that when we move into our new home, it will be with a spirit of thankfulness to the old for the shelter it lias given us, and for the demands it has daily put upon us to control and direct our efforts so as to overcome its physical disadvantages; that it will be with a spirit of hopeful determination to make ourselves a better school by using to the fullest the lessons learned and the character gained in the old building, while grasping with a firm and hopeful hand the opportuni¬ ties that lie before us in our beautiful new home. —16—