Sir Adam Beck Secondary School - Lacedaemon Yearbook (London, Ontario Canada)

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CONTENTS DEDICATION EDITOR ' S MESSAGE ADMINISTRATION LACEDAEMON STAFF FACULTY GRADUATES CLASSES ATHLETICS LITERARY ACTIVITIES SPECIAL EVENTS ADVERTISING AUTOGRAPHS

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DEDICATION June, 1967, marked the end of an era for Beck. Mrs. Evelyn Chaffe retired. For a quarter of a century, Mrs. Chaffe had been secretary at Beck. When she began at Beck, she was the only secretary; in her last year, she was senior of three secretaries. During her twenty-five years of service, Mrs. Chaffe had seen the school in- crease in enrolment from three or four hundred, into the thousand students it numbers today. This change in size meant that, for Mrs. Chaffe, relationships with students that had at one time been familiar grew impersonal. She could no longer know all the students by their first names; they became statistics, names that didn ' t have faces associated with them. The growth of the school could not dampen her interest in anything at Beck. Mrs. Chaffe was always the first to point out the successes --and failures --of Beck students in their chosen fields, wherever they might have roamed. Mrs. Chaffe always had great faith in Beck students, which was rewarded. Countless times she lent her students lunch money, or bus tickets with which to get home. It is commendable for Beck that she was always repaid. The rapid growth of the school since 1961, along with the growing numbers of children of former Beck students who were enrolling, caused Mrs. Chaffe to feel that it was time to retire, or, as she put it, Time to call it a day. She says, however, that she will never really leave Beck, as, Your interests have become mine. We dedicate this book to Mrs. Chaffe.

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EDITOR ' S MESSAGE It is difficult to write a yearbook editorial. The editor wants so much to write a significant comment on life, or on youth, that will still be valid in twenty years or forty years. The problem of most editors, myself included, is that they lack comments which are universal, or timeless. They can comment on the Vietnam War, or on the Middle East Crisis, but what is said derives its meaning from our acquaintance with the context of life today. The type of leading article found in a newspaper or magazine becomes unacceptable when placed in a year- book. A yearbook is a memory book. Its prime function is to serve as a souvenir. If in the years to come this book causes you to remember a certain unjust detention, or the remark Mr. Franks made about your gum in biology class, it will have served its purpose. It follows that an editorial in a yearbook should com- plement the book ' s purpose by stimulating your memory of the school year and its events. The sheer number of events, however, along with the fact that this editorial is written in the Fall before any major events have happened, make it impossible to accomplish this purpose. Most editors, when faced by this double dilemma, write editorials which be- come thank -you notes to those who aided in the production of the book, or worse yet, they write editorials which become a montage of platitudes congratulating graduates for their successes thus far, and wishing them luck and courage to face the trials to come. If we avoid this stereotyped kind of editorial, we are left with only one thing to say: Remember Beck; remember 1968. Remember the joys and remember the tears. Most of all, my now -middle-aged classmates, Remember Youth !