Richmond High School - Shield Yearbook (Richmond, CA)

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Foreword Music plays an important part in the lives of people in the nation, more so in the busy life of the modern teenager to whom music is his means of expressing emotions and feelings. With this in mind, we, the 1958 Shield Staff, chose music and dancing as our theme. Young America, being a melting pot of nations, had no actual musical heritage which was distinctly its own. As a result, our music poured in from all countries and from all races. To portray America's musical progress, we placed the division pages in chronological order dating from the early Waltz, which was popular during George Washington's time, to the present day Bop. We chose the Waltz for the Seniors, because it symbolizes the dignity and pomp of graduation. Graduation is an extremely im- portant turning point in our lives; it is a time when we file away the goods and chattels of our childhood and become adults. For Activities we needed something vibrant and alive. What could be more suitable for this than the Charleston? Gay, exciting, this dance conjures up the colorful flapper era, as well as our own memories of our Sophomore Hop, the Junior Prom, and the most important of all—the Senior Ball. As a salute to the American people, we chose the Big Apple of the 30's for Organizations. Because of the unflagging courage of these Americans during the depths of depression, group activities and organizations sprang up and flourished. To express the vibrancy of youth, we chose the Jitterbug for our classes; it suggests young people laughing together, enjoying new experiences and new knowledge. A fast exhilarating Mambo represents Sports, the high spirits, the tenseness of the game, and lusty voices urging their team to victory. Football, swimming, basketball, and other sports are the Hi-lights of Hi-life. The Bob portrays advertisements, for it reflects the industry and energy of the American people, who have created great markets. Our heritage of popular music comes from the many great races who built our nation with a song in their hearts. From the Atlantic to the Pacific, music echoes through the Shenandoah, up the Blue Ridge Mountains, and across the Rockies. This book reflects the story of music and the great part it played in the creation of our nation.

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Dedication For thitry-seven years Miss Gertrude Weatherby has satu- rated the students of Richmond Union High School with literature, confounded them with syntax and soothed them with kindness. She in turn has been variously saturated, con- founded and soothed by the permutations of youth's eternally surprising capacities and attitudes. The outcome of this lively interaction has been, on the one hand, that Richmond's youth have long borne the aristocratic Weatherby stamp, and on the other hand, that Miss Weatherby herself has remained indestructibly young in heart. Furthermore, Miss Weatherby has also come to symbolize in her gracious person and in her masterly teaching skills the finest traditions of the teacher 's craft. This is not to say that Miss Weatherby can be summed up in the words ''teacher of English, ' for she far exceeds so simple a description. Perhaps she can be most aptly characterized as ''the daughter of a hundred Earls, ’ in whom courtesy, gentleness, charm, humor, and a deep love of beauty are inborn and irrestible. But lest one get the notion that Miss Weatherby is as ethereal as some Mariana of a moated grange, it should be said that she has a side which is more or less down-to-earth. For example, she is a bread-maker par excellence. Also, she has been known to raise genuine tomatoes -from seedlings tenderly nurtured in her clothes closet. She has knitted count- less socks for soldiers. She gardens with vim and success. She has bounded twice over the byways of England and Europe, and has made Hawaii a place of pilgrimage. She has also transmogrified her cat, Mr. Todd, into the semblance of a gentleman, if not a scholar. And so on. In one sense Miss Weatherby is a shining product of Richmond Union High School, for our's is the only high school in which she has taught. To be sure, she taught in an ele- mentary school for three years in Ogden, Utah, where she attended high school. But at the end of these three years she left Utah to attend the University of California. In April, 1921, while she was still undergoing teacher-training at the university, she was summoned to R.U.H.S. to take the place of an English teacher. So immediate was her success, al- though she was barely a fledgling teacher, that our school promptly claimed her for good. Needless to say, this case of love at first sight has fulfilled its promise throughout the years, to the huge benefit of all concerned. At various times since her happy advent at Richmond High, Miss Weatherby has done yeoman service as librarian, as chairman of C.S.F., and as chairman of the English department. To her students Miss Weatherby's most memorable aca- demic feat has been to get them safely over the fastnesses of English A; her most precious feat, to plunge them into the magnificent sea of English literature whose depths and shal- lows she knows by heart. But probably the most lasting impressions which Miss Weatherby has made upon her thou- ands of students are the supple grace with which she swims against the tide of stubborn learners, and again, the con- summate ease with which she moves midst the alarums and excursions of our thronging high school world. Now, in June, 1958, Miss Weatherby has chosen to end her great affair with Richmond Union High School. What heartbreak this means for her we have no way of knowing, except to gauge it by the mixture of joy and sadness we feel by our own leave-taking as graduating seniors. Because she, like ourselves, is a product of Richmond Union High, though infinitely more wise and polished, and also because she has captivated our hearts as thoroughly as she has enriched our minds, we, the Class of June, 1958, dedicate to her our Shield. May she, about to conquer new worlds, be heartened by this token of our high regard and boundless gratitude, and know that although we no longer go forward hand in hand with her, we continue onwards toward the ideal goals which she, by word and grand example, has pointed out to us.