Phillips Exeter Academy - PEAN Yearbook (Exeter, NH)

Page 32 text:

Memoirs of the Class of 1952 HUC. VENKTF, Etc. TNK5 1-:FW To TWG f HHRKNETSS FLRN ll o'??l, f .J e F I S 6, , ? A V f' I N i SS H The 'uiefws expressed in these memoirs do not izeeessarily represevzt the feelings of all the mevitlaers of the Senior Class, but they do 1'ep1'ese1zt the feelings of the Editors of the Pemz mid, we feel, tlaose of zz represevztntive vzumber of Seniors. Every Senior Class, in pondering its accom- plishments over a four year period at Exeter, seems to develop a sort of inferiority complex. The class of '52 has rather less of an inferior- ity complex and rather more justification for one than most of its predecessors. Our class has been, in general, a do-nothing class-its leadership has remained through four years in the hands of a very few and, although some of these leaders have been more outspoken and have accomplished more than those of some other classes, the class as a whole has never developed enough interest to make a move to back them up. Too many of our members have, through four years here, re- mained in a perpetual state of suspended ani- mation. As a group we have absorbed a cer- tain amount of knowledge, less piety, and al- most no virtue, and have managed to live as best we could. Few of us can, as yet, appre- ciate all that Exeter has probably done for us, many of us are more conscious of what Exeter has done to us. As to what we have done to or for Exeter .me -f'Why, not much of anything, except put- ting the school generally on the rocks. The person quoted wishes to remain anonymous, and should. The memoirs of past classes have told of the typical Exonian, moving into Dun- bar or Webster as a small, frightened prep q Huc Venite Pueriwj, emerging four years later from the sloughs of Easy street, a cyn- ical, disgusted senior f Ut Viri Sitisnj. Ac- cording to one faculty member, the fully indoctrinated four-year boy, upon graduation should be a ucynical, unsentimental, intellec- tual snobf' Some of us, by taking advantage of the opportunities offered by the Academy, have achieved, for better or worse, this Exeter end. Others of us, now but a few days from graduation, are still biding our time as we have done for four years, accepting the three things which Exeter, superhcially, offers us- heated rooms, three meals a day, and assign- ments. Thus, our generation now passes away into the limbo of alumni, the school, for better or worse, abideth forever. The prep school boy, as a species, is sup- posed to be a wily, devoted little Creature who tries to avoid the inevitable and get away with whatever he can, however, he generally reveres his divirza mater-the school. Many of us, however, out of character, consider our school not as a divine mother, but as an insti- tution. As such, it has had its good points -

Page 31 text:

Robert .-X. Lloyd VICE PRESIDENT Christopher D'.-Xnmnda CLASS AGENT

Page 33 text:

its miraculous unsullied reputation, its fine old tradition, its generally above-average instruc- tion. lt has also had its bad points- its occa- sional pettiness, its lack, in many cases, of harmonious student-faculty relations, its atti- tude of infallibility. Most of us, however, have survived both good and bad, as for the rest- R. I. P. Our prep year was sensational. We arrived in 1948 just as the student bank fizzled to its inglorious end. Some of us held on to fand lostj our own money, and the more timid taxed the banking facilities of Messrs. Mayo- Smith and Schuller for our weekly pittances. Under the auspices of the Herodotan Society, we helped elect Dewey in a mock presidential election, and we watched him Hzzle. Now that we were fully and irrevocably enrolled in the Academy, another cut in the mainten- ance staff was announced and the tuition was raised from 151250 to 31400 a year. Andover quietly rolled over the football team, 28-7. This enabled our Andover counterparts to dispose of their prep hats, we did our share to help them. With much publicity in the Exoniml and accompanied by the usual hazy architects' drawings, the prospects of a Robert Benchley Memorial Theater rose-and fell. For the first time in history, our hockey team shut out St. Paul's, but that was hardly any of our doing. Our mid-morning peanut-betweens almost became non-existent as our favorite hangout, the Grill, lost much monies and almost died. Bull Hurd moved into the Spa, on Williams Court, where we first became acquainted with Squamscott f'tonic fthe flav- ors often changed but the quality remained the samej, and Harold, Lord Sham, opened an establishment of some strange sort on Cen- ter Street. We saw our first Alumni Day, legally cutting Chapel and picnicking on hot dogs and bananas in the cage. That afternoon we watched our baseball team, too, gracefully bow to the Blue. As our first quarter fin- ished, we tried to leave Dunbar and Webster cleaner than they had been when we came, some of us were even seen stopping to f'wash our wastepaper baskets in the corridors the night before departure. Friday morning there was found on the VVebster bulletin board a small proclamation of mysterious origins, set- ting forth boldly some opinions of that dormi- tory and its keepers. Ave' atque Vale. The next year, some of us returned, aug- mented by a large number of new arrivals who were as vet unitiated in the Exeter sys- tem. We soon learned to adapt our games of corridor soccer from the wide spacious halls of Dunbar and Webster to the narrower, tile-floored ones in Cilley and Amen. Some few of us even got across the yard and hung around with our idols, the Seniors, mainly because, hard as they tried, they couldn't completely escape us until eight o'clock in the evening. A select number of us, awed by the famous lower schedule, learned to study, but many more of us con- centrated our nickels and our talents on the pinball machine at the Spa. We marvelled over new asphalt walks, and we were in- formed that they were only a part of a new 'Lthree year planf' Then, too, there were the miniature snowplows, newly purchased to keep these walks clear in the winter. We received a visit from Ampromfi Ato Bandoh, Crown Prince of Ashanti, but even he could not help us against Andover. At one time we held the lead, I2-6, but as we drove for- ward for the third time, the team was broken both physically and spiritually as the Andover line held for four downs on their three yard line. We got a great deal of publicity to draw us to the Fall Dance. A few of us went .... ' -1 BOT' - i 1 I ..L.. l..x fl..i .LM 0 Av- I ...L lr all-AWD a JR?