South Philadelphia High School for Girls - Portal Yearbook (Philadelphia, PA)

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I FEEL NOW THE FUTURE IN THE INSTANT. 0 -Macbeth fl EY A HUSH had fallen over the laboratory, All that could be heard was the bubbling of the mixture in the test tube suspended over the Bunsen burner. The laboratory technicians, Dorf othy Ciarlante, Anna Caligiuri, Dorothy Vece, and Jeanette D'Amico, quietly left their work to go to where Professors Henrietta Ciarance and Cathy DeFonso were working. Perhaps this would be it, the end to all their years of work. The hush of expectancy grew as Pro- fessor DeFonso added the last ingredient to the already bubbling mixture. Suddenly, there was a terrific explosion, and all were sent hurtling through the air. Up and up they went who knows how high. June Williams, stationed at 40 degrees north and 75 degrees west, saw them and sent out an alarm. In answer to the call for aid came Claire Christopher in her trusty little helicopter. Some' how she manuevered her ship so that she was below them and caught them on their downward trip. They were safe! Having recovered from their fright, all were quite comfortable. Jeanette, looking out of the window, saw a beautiful little town below. The others went scurrying to a window to see what had brought forth such an Oh of delight from her. It was wonderful! Little white houses with green lawns spread out before them. Wide streets were bordered by tall green trees. In the center of it all there was what seemed to be a campus, with many onefstory buildings, a swimming pool, a tennis court, and an outside lunchroom with tables topped by brightly striped umbrellas. All looked down amazed, each mo' ment finding something new to Ooh and Aaah about. Claire smiled knowingly and prof ceeded to say that this was Southern City. They eagerly accepted her invitation to go down and look it over: and no sooner said than done, they landed at Southern City's airport. Having to go back on duty, Claire took them to the office of the president of the airlines. Alf though the president herself was away attending a conference, her secretary, Marilyn Frank made everyone feel most welcome. She called the may' or, asking her to join them. While awaiting her, Marilyn proceded to tell how Southern City came to be. When the war ended a little after they had graduated from S.P.H.S. 'way back in '45, most of the girls married those boys who came back home. They were young, and full of ideals, but more than that, they had a plan to make their dream of an ideal community come true. They knew it would take a lot of work and not a little sacrifice, but they still felt the final achievement would be worth it. Word was sent out for all who could help and would be will' ing to assist. Sylvia Brill, Rita Bonanni, Pearl Zeluck, Rita Bisceglia, Eleanor Ciletti, and oth' ers drew up the city's first charter, a really dem' ocratic one that guaranteed equal rights to all, and made it work. Rae Cicchitti, Nataleen Bail' er, Mary Levy, and some of the other girls who had wanted to be interior decorators or designers turned to the outside, to the job of making this city of theirs just right. They laid the plans of the city and designed low cost houses which would be attractive enough to all people. This was a new growing town, and to this town came many storekeepers, writers, secretaries, teachers. and families, the real backbone of the commuf n1ty. But, at this time, her honor the mayor enteredg and they found it was no other than their old friend, Rita Bisceglia. With all the talking about old times, all at once, nothing much was getting done. So, led by Rita and a group of her assistants, they set off on a tour of Southern City. It was almost amazing to 'see how many people of the town they knew. They started down Annex Avenue to the shopping district. Cecilia Forte's Nut House was doing a tasty business. Helen Ziserman had her own specialty shop with gifts for all occasions, while Helen Clifton was head buyer of cosmetics for the Wav-ee Beauty Salon whose specialty was the Threadgill Cut, an original hair style created by Ellen Threadgill. Concetta Spadafora and Betty Cullen were operating their own international trading offices. Working in their offices were secretaries Dorothy Toner, Gloria Venafro, and Joyce Winokur, while Marie Infante was doing a very good job as head bookkeeper, assisted by Florence Goldberg and Ida Triglia. Right next door to their office the visitors saw a very mod' ernistic building. In the show window was an enlarged painting of the Perma Girl , who was as popular as the Varga and Petty girls of ten years ago. Going into the building, they found a staff of artists and writers bigger than they had ever seen. All of this was the behindfthe' scenes reason for the good advertisements and peppy slogans that were being used. Regina Perna, creator of the Perma Girl was installed in her own office and doing very well. She off fered to take them on a tour of the building, and they quite gratefully accepted. Shirley Mos- klowitz, an artist, was going over plans for her next poster while Mildred Davis was suggesting some of her famous gags to suit it. With Ruth Cohen as a model that project seemed pretty well organized by former Southernites, and so they moved on. Of course, even an ad' vertising firm had its business end to hold up,

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GOD, IF THY WILL BE SO, ENRICH THE TIME TO COME WITH SMOOTH FACED PEACE WITH SMILING PLENTY AND FAIR PROSPEROUS DAYS -King Richard Il fk W xiii X 1 L E Hy!

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so that Rose Petragnani was doing just as im' portant if not as exciting work when she kept that end smoothed out. Elvira De Mayo was her private secretary while Katherine Endriss and Eva Dolhansky were typists and clerks. As in every business, bookkeepers were neededg so Norma Snyder, Martha Sparrow and Lena Pug' lisi were keeping things straightened out. Walk' ing down the street, they met Mary Weinberg who was doing a series of articles on Southern City and was on her way to visit the high school. They decided to make a day of it, and they all troopcd into the school. Any resemblance it bore to the old Southern was purely accidental. Cf course, the school still used the same seal with Noblesse Oblige' written upon it. In fact, it was inscribed over each escalator. Vida Bayani was also visiting, and she joined their group. There were many old friends to be seen. Louise Batti was teaching history using a method employed by the best of the old Southern's teachers. Since that teacher had left school and married, Louise was doing a fairly good job of following in her footsteps. Carolyn DeNota was also a history teacher using the same plan. Elizabeth Castiello was an English teacher, Edna Watson was head of the physical education def partment while Thelma Spahr was a gym teacher and coach of Southern's championship basketball team. Frances Arra was another gym teacher. but her specialty was coaching the state chamf pionship swimming team-Southern's of course. They were lucky enough to see a show put on by Shep and Rose , the top comedians of the country. Yes, it was the old pair of Eleanor Shepper and Rose Tramantano still keeping them rolling in the aisles . Clara Newlin and Gladys Prater, survivors of Southern's Modern Dance club, did some interpretive dances. At the school, covering the show as a reporter, was Evelyn Milone, from Southern City's newspaper, who had been sent out by Rita Valente, city editor of the paper. On their way back to the center of town, they saw some of the married gals from Southern. Judith Rosoff was wheeling her little boy in his coach as those redheaded twins of hers danced merrily on their way. Dorothy Pero, Helen Reasner, Norma Pestich, and Jean Minicozzi formed a quartet of young matrons as they strolled down the street. Mildred Pa' citti was driving her red convertible coupe down the street accompanied by Jean Pacitti, Marjorie Gattuso, married to her former boss, and Mrs. Rita Coletta on their way to the Y where Sonia Sokoloff, director, Betty Schultz, gym teacher, and Rose Tomarchio, secretary worked. All were leaders of the Y that was doing such good work in helping young people. On the rest of the trip downtown, they learned of some Southernites who were not in Southern City. For example, Rita Anello was now a pattern designer for Vogue , while her model was Grace Gambino. Hollywood, too, had met and appreciated some from their rank. Clothes by Novello heralded the approach of some very nice styles created by Pearl Novello. Dress def signer Anna Serody was making her own place out there, too. Annetta Day, vocalist with one of the famous name bands, was making a pic' ture at M.G.M. while Esther Pogach was acting over at 20th Century. Helen Persia and Rita Nacchio had settled down out in California en' joying the warm weather and oranges, while Carmela Monastro had picked Florida for the same reason. However, many had been bitten by the wanderlust. As far as was known. the following were last seen shoving off from some place to go to some other place: Betty Rhodes and Victoria Perrone, Evelyn Nardello, the twins fMildred Diodato and Olga Grecoj, Shirley Barish, and Betty Mikelberg. But some others were travelling with a purpose. Estelle Rubin, foreign correspendent, could be seen dashing any place in the ChinafBurmafIndia area in her little jeep. Dorothy McMullen was -a correspondent, too, attached to the U.S. Marine Corps in the Philippines flucky gal, that she isj. Dolores Wil- liams was looking around for material for a sec- ond book which would be a sequel to that one which had already made her famous, June Sprin' ger, superviser of the Western Union Telegraph Co., waved as they passed by. As they ap' proached the mayor's oliice, her secretary, Vir' ginia Tankard, called them. The longfdistance telephone operator, Doris Hauber, had relayed a message to them to report to the airport. Their departure was rather rushed, and they bade farewell rather sadly. The airplane hostess, Marie DeSimone, asked them to board, and when they did, she introduced them to their pilots. They were Alnora Lepley and jean Scarangelli! They took off and were on their way. Suddenly, some' thing happened. The motor stopped, and they started to fall! Down! Down! There was a scream and then there was a lot of noise-a clanging sound. They were on the ground, and a crowd had gatheredg but the plane was missing. Alnora and Jean weren't with them either. Anna asked where they were, but the doctor, Esther Orloff, told her to hush and not to worry. Doctor Adele Goodman ordered that they all be taken to the hospital: and the nurses, Rose Campo, jean Va' lence, Lorraine Lane and Gloria Montanaro, hurf ried to fulfill her orders. They all leave the hospital tomorrow to go back to work. They certainly hope it won't take another explosion to have them all meet again. It would be wonderful to really see each other again. And perhaps there is a chance for after all the world is small, we'll meet some- where along the way! Eighty-four