Southwest High School - Sachem Yearbook (Kansas City, MO)

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The bare walls to the south await the south Wing, Which, with the steady growth of the district, may soon be needed and Will complete the original plan.

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has forty-five chapters in high schools all over the country. Throughout the halls and in the cafeteria, students of this society have painted attractive murals that add much to the heauty of the school. Cluhs and societies have heen very active as they have offered much of interest to the students. The 1-li-Y and Y-Teens have pre- sented a program comhining recreation with service to the community. Hestia, the Chess Cluh, and the Engineers Cluh have catered to the individual interests of the students. Stu- dents interested in writing or oral expression have found much to their liking in the six literary societies, most of which have existed since the early years of the school. A high point of each year has heen the annual lnter- Society Literary Contest. Always hotly contested, this yearly hattle has proved no easy mark for any cluh. The service organizations, of which the Student Council and the Bed Cross Council are the largest, have given many oppor- tunities for student participation in school affairs. One of the out- standing contrihutions of the Student Council was the street- car shelter at Sixty-fifth and Brookside. The Bed Cross Coun- cil has each year, since 1940, col- lected over one thousand dollars to advance the henevolent worlc of the Iunior Bed Cross at home and in foreign countries. 1ts memhers have truly hecome world citizens. Because of the lack of an audi- torium, the senior play of 1926 and the first commencement exercises were held at Westport High School, and the first Liter- ary Contest was held at Border Star School. Since the comple- tion of the auditorium in 1927, Southwest students have offered evenings of entertainment and morning assemhly programs in their own auditorium for fellow students and for the community. OT to he neglected are the athletic achievements of South- west students. Our first athletic triumph was the winning of the city and state tennis singles cham- pionships hy a Southwest hoy in 1926. The foothall and haslcet- hall teams, however, did not at first fare so well hecause of the lack of gymnasium equip- ment. During the first year,

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games were played with out-of- town schools because we had not yet entered the city league. When Coach House realized the necessity of obtaining sweaters for the football team, he called a sporting goods store. Finding that orange sweaters were all that could be obtained in sufficient quantity, he ordered them, later, it was decided that black goes well with orange: thus the South- west colors were chosen. Since that first year, the lndians have distinguished themselves in 1n- terscholastic League competition by five championships and three co-championships in football, four championships and one co- championship in basketball, and seven championships in track. The Southwest R. O. T. C. battalion, first organized in 1925, has received honor ratings twenty-four years, and was espe- cially honored when it was cho- sen as the honor guard for Gen- eral Ionathan M. Wainwright upon his visit to Kansas City in 1945. The battalionis annual military ball, a high-light of the year for the cadets, was featured in a five-page article by Life Magazine in 1945. Some sorrow has come to Southwest during these twenty- five years. ln World War 11, Southwest contributed its share of its alumni to defend the cause of liberty, and eighy-seven of these young men gave their lives for that cause. Of its faculty, three members died while in act- ive service-in 1934, Miss Ada lonesg in 1944, Miss Ursula Ash, and last spring, Mr. George Peterson, vice-principal. All of these had contributed their best efforts to their country and to Southwest. C-O0 On looking hack, we realize that these first twenty-five years have heen, for the rnost part, glorious anal worthwhile ones, packed with achievement for Southwest. May we and those who will follow in our footsteps make the ensuing twenty-five years as successful as the first have heen, and may our school rise to even greater stature as the years go lay.