Rowe High School - Viking Saga Yearbook (Lakeville, OH)

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Senior Prophecy As personal director of the newly formed Traveling Teachers’ Association I hurriedly packed my hags and caught a taxi for the Los Angeles Airport and not stopping to catch a breath boarded the Transcontinental Clipper for Washington, D. C. I remembered that just twenty years ago to the day I had graduated from Rowe High School, and to my surprise on the front page of the Los Angeles Gazette I saw that Kay Graff is the star in the new movie “Their Breath Was Taken, ’ a role which back in 1945 would have been played by Charles Boyer. Evidently Kay was cashing in on his appellation of “Casanova” Graff. Turning to the society page I saw that Pauline Cole’s novelty band “Pauline Cole and Her Hicks from the Sticks” had made their debut in Farnham. So Pauline is the successor of Spike Jones who back in 1944 directed radio’s number one novelty band. Look, on the sport page a picture of—yes sir, sure enough—Lois Wallace featured as the all-star guard of girls' professional basketball team, the “Killer-Dillers.” It was reported that during the season casualties were low—only two hundrey fifty one (251) bones broken all told. I arrived at Washington late the next day. As I climbed into a taxi, I heard a vaguely familiar voice in the distance shout my name and on turning around I saw Johnny Ericksen loping One Thought. One Word Can Set in Motion toward me. Johnny is in Washington pulling strings and cutting miles of red tape as a last step toward those four stars on his shoulder. Remember way back in 1945 he promised to be a general? On approaching me I saw that his uniform was none other than that of an elevator starter. He and I chatted for a long time and he told me that Dick (Dainty) Chambers had taken the position as master cake decorator in “The Dainty Wainty Bakery” in Chicago. He also told me that Delores Da is, now Mrs. Jim Mitchell, is living in Washington so I got her address, made it a point to go visit her. I had to call in the evening as she is “Lefty the Riveter” in the “Junk and Trash” airplane factory there and Jim is doing the house work and taking care of their ten children. I dashed over there that evening and she told me more of the class of ’45. It seems that Mary Lu Torrence has taken the position of chief tester for “Chewie’ Gum Company, an easy job for Mary Lu who was an inveterate gum chewer since high school days. Howard Irish is the nation’s number one crooner. He made 15,000 girls faint in one evening. In 1945, Frank Sinatra had tried for this goal but Howard really made it. Dorothy Holbrook had joined the Russian Guerrillas in World War III and was fighting as a sharp shooter against the Eskimos. Delores told me that a couple of nights before she had received a visit from Cliff Osborne. He was in Washington on strictly business. He had come to see how his chances were on becoming a politician and readily agreed that he had the ability to argue if that’s all the qualities that were needed.

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Richard Chambers, Clair Bunnell, Tom Kantola and Richard Olson made the varsity basketball team. No little excitement was stirred up in the latter part of our year when our little Conneaut Township became the incorporated village of Lakeville. We juniors got into many a discussion over this plan and cheered it to the end. As we preceded the seniors down the aisle the night of Baccalaureate we at last realized that we only had one more year in this beloved high school. In starting this our last year of high school we found that one of our classmates, Pauline Kostura. could not be with us because of a severe accident which had happened to her during the summer. Many others of our former classmates did not show up so that our number was now reduced to twenty-seven. We were reminded of term papers and scrap books the first week of school so that we would have no excuse for not having them in on time. The former President, Secretary and Treasurer were voted in again and Gordon Turner was made Vice President. One bright sunshiny day the senior room seemed to be in a chaos with many students standing up to the windows gazing up into the sky, shouting and laughing. A group of the seniors had bet Cliffy he’d get sick in an airplane and so A1 Gardner was giving him everything in the books. The result—Cliffy got kind of green but he won the bet. Around November any senior could be seen stalking through the hall with a very angry expression. It seemed that there was a presidential election going on and we were taking it quite to heart even if we couldn’t vote. Arguments for and against both candidates were heating up the senior room and many a nice friendship was almost broken up. John was outnumbered but put up a great fight. Then of course there All Its Pleasures and Its Griefs were a few quiet people like Louise Carey, Dot Holbrook and Dorothy Snow who didn’t assert themselves one way or the other. After the returns came in and we found we would still have the same president we had had since we started to school everything went back to normal and the class was again on good terms. On the heels of this election came our nice long vacation, due to an overabundance of snow. As it has been said, “Our dream of a white Christmas became quite a nightmare.” As we came back to school and began pounding our books again to make up for lost time we were very much discouraged to find the war was really knocking at our back door. Most of our boys had to sign up to fight for Uncle Sam. Then our dear Uncle decided he needed two of them more than we did and took Gordon and Kay to fight in his navy. With this loss fresh in our minds but knowing they would want us to carry on we embarked on our senior play. “A Little Honey ’ was chosen by our committee and with Mrs. Kitchen directing and Dorothy Cook, Altha Bates, Alex Elonen, Pauline Cole, Mary Lu Torrence, Duane Loomis, Howard Irish, Delores Davis, Catherine Cole. Lois Wallace, Marjorie Tinney and Allan Ritari playing the parts the audience seemed to enjoy its presentation as much as the cast and director did its preparation. We tried several times to put on an assembly but something interfered with our plans every time. The rest of our days passed swiftly until now, thus, although we share regret at leaving the sheltered walls of our Alma Mater mingled with elation at having completed our assigned task, we end our school life with this declaration of independence and for the support of this declaration, with firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor, and hope to become alumni of whom Rowe High School w ill ever be proud.

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It was setting: late so I returned to my hotel and there sitting in the lobby was Alex Elonen. I walked over to him and asked him how he could leave the farm long enough to come to Washington? He told me he had sold his farm and is President of the Women’s Style Center Association, and I learned he has a suite in my hotel. He said his chief model is Catherine Cole. She was modeling in New York City at the time so I was disappointed that I didn’t get to see hei. I hurried to my room and turned on the radio to hear a new program. It was it’s first night on the air. I listened very attentively to Allan Ritari’s Vitamin B show. You would certainly have to take Vitamin B pills to stand up after hearing his jokes. I could see that Allan was still making up his own jokes. Turning off the radio I retired for the evening as the next day I was to go back to my old home town, Conneaut. I reached Conneaut the next night and couldn’t wait until the next day when I could go to see some of my old classmates from Rowe. I dashed over town the next day bright and early, and in Newberry’s I found Jane Hibler behind the taffy counter. She is so wound up in her work that she has placed an advertisement begging for helpers (men only.) She told me that Gordon Turner is her candy taster. He had studied so hard back in school and in the U. S. Navy that his brains had become so overworked that he sought escape from all the little sound waves. Louise Carey is now a hair stylist and has her own Salon on Main St. I left Newberry’s and went out in the street and there I met Mrs. Robert Parker but she still looked like Dorothy Cook to me. I asked her what she? had been doing. She told me she had fifteen children Therefore He Spoke, and Thus Said He at home to keep her busy. She said that Bobby is working on an invention to melt snow so he wouldn’t have to shovel at the Nickel Plate anymore. If his invention is a success she is going to get that washing machine he had promised her. She also said that Dorothy Snow has gone to Hawaii to take dancing lessons and has closed the “Blue Arrow” which she had taken over back in the summer of ’45. She told me Dorothy Norton had finally succeeded in starting her bachelors’ home down on the lake front called “The Dilapidated Bald Heads.” I jumped in a taxi and scrambled right down to see her. I stumbled into her office at the busiest time of the day but she took a few minutes off to talk to me. On her desk lay Richard Olson’s fifth application to get in her home but he has too many outside interests so she said she didn’t think he woul 1 qualify. She told me Tom Kantola and Duane Loomis had gone to college to try to discover the germ that makes women fickle. I gathered from this that the women were still their main problem. I also found out that JoAnne Wright and Margie Tinney, both old maid school teachers, are on a jaunt to Mexico. While staying there they met a couple of Mexicans and had married them and from the last reports they were raising hot tamales. On the way home I passed by the place where Marcy’s funeral home used to be but I saw Clair Bunnell’s name on the neon sign. It seems he has built up quite a business for himself on his ambulance driving—runs 'em down and drags ’em in—. The next day I went to the huge impressive Conneaut Airport and again boarded the clipper. The memories of the red brick school house and the class of ’45 were never to be forgotten.