Quincy High School - Goldenrod Yearbook (Quincy, MA)

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The Golden Mod. Vol. I. QUINCY, MASS., SEPTEMBER, 1891. No. 1. THE GOLDEN ROD Will be Published Monthly During the School Year in the interests of the QUINCY HIGH SCHOOL. SUBSCRIPTION RATES. For the Year, . 50 cents ] Single Copies, . 5 cents Address all communications to ARTHUR V. CURTIS or S A RAIIO. M GOVERN, BUSINESS MANAGERS. EDITOR I AJl7 GENERAL EDITORS. Eva G. Reed, Lelia H Sprague, “This flower is fuller of the sun Than any our pale North can show; It has the heart of August won. And scatters wide the warmth and glow Kindled at summer's mid-noon blaze, Where gentians of September bloom; Along October’s leaf-strewn ways, And through November’s paths of gloom.” IN the fields and by the roadside the beautiful golden rod, em- blem of encouragement and pre- caution, is blooming; and today its namesake, The Golden Rod of our school, is sent forth for the first time, carrying with it a message of greeting and good-will from' the pupils to all who may receive our offering in their homes. May it prove as worthy of their attention as the lovely, sunshiny flower whose name it bears. s this is our first attempt, Our Venture was among the names proposed, but al- though that tells a little story in itself, the name of our national flower was unanimously chosen. As we have previously men- tioned, the name is emblematic of encouragement, so when we are weary and discouraged, when we are about to despair of accomplish- ing some task, we may think of our Golden Rod and take heart once more. We wish our paper to be at once instructive and enter- taining, and we hope that it will awaken our citizens and also the pupils to a new interest in the school. By establishing and edit- ing this paper we also hope to ac- quire a more thorough knowledge of the English language and an idea of the manner in which a pa- per is conducted. Each subscriber will receive ten numbers, one pub- lished each month of the school year. We are much gratified and encouraged by the ready response made by those who have been asked to subscribe, and we thank them for their aid We owe a par- ticular debt of gratitude to our special committee, Dr. Sheahan, for by his efforts our subscription list has been greatly increased. Perhaps our friends will be inter- ested in knowing that the size of our paper depends entirely upon the number of subscriptions which we receive, and we hope that they will continue to extend their sup- port and good will. R. After greeting all our friends most cordially, and introducing The Golden Rod to the public, we think it only appropriate to give our readers a brief description of our school. First let us walk up High School avenue into the large yard, and view the building. One will undoubtedly say, “It is not very attractive looking.” Very true, but he must remember it was erected in 1851, so it has resisted the wear and tear of two-fifths of a century. Our rooms are not fur- nished with oak or chestnut, but as the result of our labor we have succeeded in adorning our walls with a few pictures and busts of some of our distinguished states- men and orators; also with two silk flags, and these we count more precious than highly polished fur- niture. Our Miller grand piano is an instrument of which we are all proud, and it presents a very at-

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THE GOLDEN ROD. tractive appearamce on account of the bountiful supply of flowers which evier dwers its surface. s. We still retain our principal, H. W. Lull, and one assistant, Miss Souther, a graduate of ’78; but on the evening of July 2, most of us bade farewell to Miss Pfaffmann, '77, who has taught in the school for seven years. As a token of our respect and esteem, we pre- sented to her complete sets of George Eliot and Thackeray, beautifully bound in calf and mo- rocco. Miss Pfaffmann’s place is now occupied by Miss Winifred Stone, A. M., a graduate first of the Farmington Normal, then of Maine Wesleyan College. The force has been increased by the election of Miss Madeleine Fish, who has been teaching in Wake- field, and is a graduate of Fram- ingham Normal. On account of the great increase in numbers of our pupils, from one hundred twenty-nine to one hundred fifty- eight, it has been found necessary to have an extra assistant. In ar- ranging the week’s program, the great question was “Where shall we put the classes?” But with the use of store and ward-rooms, we all find at least a chance to sit down. It is very evident that a new building is needed, and it now remains for our city or some of our interested philanthropists to con- sider the matter seriously. s. A young man was heard to re- mark, only a few days ago, that a girl has no need of a knowledge of Civil Government. The young man evidently forgets that the time may come when the girl, grown to womanhood, will have an equal right of suffrage with him, in which' case she will require a thor- ough knowledge of the subject in order to vote intelligently. There is another reason why a girl should study Civil Government. Is it patriotic to know nothing of the method by which order is pre- served in our land? Certainly not, and therefore we maintain that every scholar in the high school, girls as well as boys, should take an interest in the government under which he lives. In taking up the subject this term, we first sought a reason for having any government whatever, and came to the conclusion that man has not yet reached that high state of civil- ization which must be attained be- fore he can live peaceably among his fellow-men, restrained by no law save that of his own con- science. R. We have been very much inter- ested in the election of a governor. In looking up his requirements we found that according to the origi- nal law he must be possessed of property to the value of one thou- sand pounds, or nearly five thou- sand dollars, and that he must pro- fess the Christian religion, besides being obliged to inhabit the Com- monwealth for seven years imme- diately preceding his election. We think that the first two require- ments must now be obsolete. Special mention was made of the terms majority and plurality in connection with elections. In this state a man is elected if he re- ceives a plurality, that is, if he re- ceives more votes than any other candidate; but to represent fairly the people he should receive a ma- jority, or more than one-half of the total number of votes cast. On the other hand, if a majority vote were required to elect a candi- date, it might often happen that no one would be elected, and the necessary new election would occa- sion much confusion and waste of time. . R. A few days ago we had a little experience in voting. We had as- sembled to choose a name for our paper, and six different titles were proposed. When the votes were counted, the total number was found to be one hundred forty- eighc, and of these the greatest number received by any one name was sixty-five. A new election was therefore called, and the sec- ond time the total number of bal-