Tower Hill School - Evergreen Yearbook (Wilmington, DE)

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h e Tower CDial summer it's rather stale. Then, when you jump in it, dust flies thick and fast. I do not care for these modern barns, so eiiicient and shining. My favorites are of red brick, stone, or painted white. I know of a barn, where, if you raise the dust, the farmer chases you out, ibut, then who wants to lie in his dirty hayll Again, like a dream, comes the memory of one barn, so vague, so far away. I seem to be once more the small child sliding glee- fully down a waterfall of shining golden hay to the rough barn floor below. There are several other barns I'll remember long. One is filled with tired but eager, small girls, who are not quite daring enough to jump off the top beam, into a pile of hay beneath them. Finally one leaps, and soon there are several of them at it. Now they're sprawled in the hay, now climbing up the cobwebby rafters to jump again and again. Sometimes they land so that both knees come up and soundly knock their chins, but they're up and begin- ning again. That barn was fun. Then there is my own barn. If you climb up into the hay- loft and peer out through broken shutters, you can get a glimpse of the woods in their colorful beauty. They are really more lovely when you ride through them on horseback. What I especially like is to find myself among a grove of maples-the kind that turns a wonderful golden yellow. It seems as though the leaves were glowing with light and warmth as a bit of lingering sunlight might. Barns are grand places to think in. If one has some tough problem to struggle with, one can accomplish a lot in a hayloft 3 and by the way, an apple, or its equivalent, to munch, is a great aid. They're also secure nooks to talk with your best friend, they do not repeat what they hear. The downstairs of barns are intriguing if one knows the inhabitants. In one barn, the horses will, if you run your hand through the oats, beg for it in the most weedling of neighs. These barns are the most vivid in my memory, but out of the many barns one can not say just why one is fond of certain of them. ELIZABETH NORMAN, '35. BITS FROM NINTH GRADE AUTOBIOGRAPHIES I DON'T remember my first day of school very well but I can remember the first little primer that Miss W-- gave me. I thought that you had to read the whole thing at once so I started out. I would read quite a few pages and then I would have to stop for lunch or something. Next time I could read, I would start at the beginning again. I kept doing that for an awfully long time until I must have read the first pages hundreds of times and the last pages not at all. I can still remember the first pages by heart. I like country day awfully well and I al- ways have. I suppose it is because I like sports. I think it would be an awful handi- cap not to be able to play any athletic games. When I was in the first or second grades I used to be scared to death to have to go to gym, but now I love it. I like this school awfully well and nearly everyone in it. In fact I don't see how any- one would ever want to leave. I hardly want to graduate but I don't want to get left back and I don't want to lose the people in my class so I guess I do want to graduate after all. serine 201i

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he is to his community. One is rated by one's gossiping capacity and here is Where the telephone makes its appearance. The lucky person who chances to confide the first bit of eye-opening, sit-up-and-take-notice scandal to the next luckier person naturally uses the quickest and handiest method, the 'phone. I recently overheard what seemed to be a soliloquy enacted by an elderly member of our household: Hello-is this you ?-Well -my dear, you have no idea how shocked I was-how utterly mortified-and oh, how un- bearably disgraceful it all is! What in the world shall we do about it ?-Why, why- think of her family name and her social standing-she was such a nice girl! What's that? Oh! Yes, I'll tell you what I heard if you will not breathe it to a soul-no, not even to Marg. Keep it strictly confidential -and you know, I really shouldn't tell you, but then- And finally this victim of the telephone complex imparts her tale of scan- dalous woe through the wires to her long- suffering auditor, who, in turn passes on this strictly confidential bit under bonds of like promises. And that is one danger of our old friend the telephone. One can so easily let slip what one shou1dn't while off one's guard. Younger members of this gossiping age utilize the instrument for the same motive, but in a more subtle fashion. I find that I am often guilty of conversation such as: Yeah!? Well, what d'ya' want? 'Zat so? Why I'd hope so! Un-um. That's just like him- the lousy nut- What's his big idea? Now, you lay offa that stuff. Yeah. O. K. Be seeing ya. My conversation is, however, rarely so brief. Last year my nightly routine consisted of an hour and a half of study, and from one to two hours of 'phoning. This period was di- vided into sessions with several different members of the likewise affected. A hard and heavy rule which almost broke my heart .sis 'Tower will School and deprived me of my main joy in life was laid down at the beginning of this year. My father, having stood one year too many of the meaningless nothingness of my prattle, decreed there would be no 'phoning after sev- en o'clock. Now my evenings are spent in complete quietness and gloom after the seven o'clock dead-line. My heart still skips a beat, then stands still for one short moment as I hear the familiar jingle of the bell-but alas, if it chances to be for me I must suffer in silence and ponder on into the dusk as to who it could have been, while my heart re- gains its former composure. Of course, you know, no one would take advantage of the short period between dinner and seven, no, the urge does not move a soul until along aboutf eight, and then it is in vain. You, who have not used your 'phones to the best of your ability and too you, who have used them moderately-I advise, urge, and plead with you to put them into constant operation. Talk into the foolishly small, in- tricate black mouthpiece for your own amusement, to please others, to keep in touch with all around you, and even for practical uses-and get the kick and spice out of the mystery of a shapeless, dementionless, in- definite, bottomless voice. Its mere magical uncertainty will attract you. No, this won- derful modern institution will never be for- saken. ELIZABETH TAYLOR, '35. BARNS I LIKE barns, old barns, but clean, inhabit- ed ones, not the musty and neglected kind. They are a specialty of mine in the fall and winter, though not in the summer, for it is so hot that the bits of hay seem to sprout bris- tles and stick to you, making a hay loft an unpleasant lounge. In the fall the hay and straw is nice and fresh and sweet, but by

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I don't believe that I shall ever forget the dress I received for my fourth birthday. It was my first colored dress, a pale blue. I had a little hat to match. On my birthday Mother dressed me in it and put me on the table while she dressed to take me for a walk. Lying on the table beside me was a pair of scissors. I quickly pulled off my hat and dress and began work. By the time mother came to get me all that was left were small pieces about the size of a dollar. Not long after this episode we had the dining room pa- pered. My father was coming home that night and it was to be a surprise. The sur- prise came to mother when she came in the room and found me licking a hole about three inches long through the wall paper. -I -JF -Ili -BK- I was around the age of five when our family took a motor trip up to Canada in an old Ford, a swanky model at that time, the kind that is about a mile from the ground. We had many experiences on that trip both pleasant and unpleasant. One not such a pleasant happening, but one which I thought was terribly funny was the time we decided not to stop and eat, but have a picnic lunch. We bought quite a few things, among which were some chocolate cookies and a jar of olives. Later we found that that combina- tion didn't rest well in one's stomach. We were sailing along at the rate of twen- ty-five miles an hour when my sister com- plained of not feeling any too well. I start- ed to laugh. Soon daddy said he was a little car sick and wanted to stop. At this I burst out roaring. We hadn't gone very much fur- ther till I began to realize that something was wrong with me. As it turned out I was worse affected than the rest of them. -1- 'I' I' Al' -Q21 Tower c.7'fill 5611001 At the end of the camp season they had a mock trial where I was tried for the supposed offence of having pushed our swimming in- structor, who weighed a couple of hundred pounds, into the water. I was innocent of the whole game as well as the crime. When they began to question me in severe tones I stood it as long as my seven years would al- low and then burst into tears, to the great confusion of the entertainment. However, that was not the end of the affair, because I have been teased about it ever since. About that time I wrote a composition about The Life of Rocky Mountain Goats. I must have seen one of the senior composi- tions and been greatly impressed with its length, anyway, I thought it would be nice to have mine at least two pages long. To my dismay I soon exhausted my subject, so I be- gan to repeat, and this is how it went, The Rocky Mountain Goat eat lots of grass and lots of water, and lots and lots of grass and lots and lots of water, and lots and lots and lots of grass and lots and lots and lots of Water, and so forth, increasing on the grass and Water until I had got to the bottom of the page. I had fulfilled my desire, I was sat- isfiedg nevertheless, I think I have learned, in my later years, to think of more than just my desire. Q 5 -X' -I- The first day I ever went to school I got there before most of the other boys and girls. I was playing with a small broom when a large crowd of pupils arrived. As they came in the door, I rushed at them with the broom held like a lance. The broom hit one of them in the face. This was a poor beginning, but I soon became friends with the crowd. ii 'Ill' -If -I-