Westerly High School - Westlyan Yearbook (Westerly, RI)

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Tiif. Senior Year Book — 1945 President's Address Parents, Faculty, and Fellow Classmates, here and in the Armed Forces: We, the Class of ’45, are about to leave our beloved classrooms and take our positions in life, which at present is one of uncertainty and disagreements among nations. Three all too short years ago we met together as timid Sophomores, but since that time, we have risen to the rank of Seniors. We have now completed our high school education and are prepared to receive our diplomas after twelve years of stress and struggle. For many of us it will be our final day together. Some of us will soon enter the universities of this country in order to further our education, others will find positions in business and industry, and some of us will join our classmates who have sacrificed the remainder of their education to serve in the present conflict in the hope of freeing the world of further barbarous attempts to destroy our democracy. At the present time we have classmates serving on every battlefield in the army, navy, coast guard, and marines, and in the shipping lanes of the merchant marines. But school life is not all on the serious side. We will long remember the proms, shows, concerts, and athletic contests we witnessed and participated in while at Westerly High School. The humorous remarks and actions of our classmates will remain with us for the rest of our lives. We, the Class of ’45, think that the athletic teams of 1944-45 were the greatest teams in the history of Westerly’s athletic system. We will long remember and be thankful that we had the opportunity to be instructed by such a brilliant all-around athletic coach as James Federico. In our minds he will always be the “coach of the year.” The basketball team of 1944-45 especially deserves a great amount of praise. Although they lost the final game, that is all they lost, because they showed the people of the State of Rhode Island that sportsmanship comes first at Westerly High. The happy and prosperous days of our high school life are over, but the memory of these days will forever inspire and elevate us, the Class of 1945. JOSEPH KEEGAN, President, Class of 1945 -«e{ 8

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Tin: Sknior Year Book — 1945 CLASS SONG We sing thy praise, oh Westerly, Our Alma Mater, hail! Our love for thee, so deep and true Our loyalty, ne’er fail. Tho’ from these halls we’ll soon depart Upon our several ways, We’ll always keep within our hearts Fond mem’ries of bright days. From vale and hill up to the sky Our praises rise to thee; Thy honored name will never die, All hail—dear Westerly! —Susan Murphy, ’45 CLASS POEM Today is ours, as mournfully We bid farewell to high school days And start along the paths of life, Each careful in his choice of ways. So much depends on what we do, The future of democracy Is in our hands and we must fight, And die, to keep our nation free. CLASS MOTTO Sine Domino, Frustra Omnia— Without God, all is in vain The flame of youth will burn and dim And leave but ashes smouldering, But dreams we have will yet remain Within our hearts re-echoing. And, if we pray to God for help To do our task and prove our worth. When life is o’er and we depart We'll leave a better, wiser earth. —Vera Parry, ’45 CLASS COLORS Blue and Silver 7 ►“

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Tiif. Senior Year Book — 1945 Class History One decade and two years ago, we, the Class of 1945, brought forth upon ourselves a new life, conceived in intense study and dedicated to the proposition that “there is no royal road to knowledge.” Twelve years have flown by since that first day when, innocent and unsuspecting, we skipped eagerly to school, with curls and pig-tails, red apples and our little hearts just brim full of childish enthusiasm. (Ah, the folly of youth!) Since then we have engaged in terrific combat, testing whether our class, or any class, so steeped in knowledge could long endure. We did. We are met on a battlefield of that great twelve year war .... a final battlefield . . . . graduation day. Let us pause momentarily to cast a retrospective eye o'er our little regiment, the class of nineteen-hundred and forty-five. Before launching into a factual account of our past, allow us to abandon our extreme modesty just long enough to say that from the very beginning, our class has been outstanding. When in the eighth grade at Junior High, some of our class members—namely Lawrence Matarese, Marilyn Frechette, Alec Houston, and Joe Keegan — played leads in the beloved Gilbert and Sullivan creation, “H. M. S. Pinafore.” And then in our last year at Babcock, our ninth grade basketball squad blithely upset the lordly sophs (class of ’44) of Westerly High. The autumn of ’42 saw us timidly approach Samuel E. Ward High School Building. Green? Oh, man alive, were we green! ! And scared, too, because, you see, we had heard all about the terrible tempered Mr. Maxwell. We tip-toed up those 10,000 stairs; up into the peanut gallery where dwelt the lowly soph, and slipped meekly into our seats. It was somewhat of a blow to find ourselves among so many strangers, but we soon learned that these quaint classmates we had acquired hailed from “rural” districts such as Hope Valley, Richmond, Charlestown and the more urbane (wow!) Ashaway. Our slate of sophomore class officers was: President, Frank Coy; Vice Presi- dent, Joseph Keegan; Secretary, Marilyn Frechette; Treasurer, Sally Briggs. As a rule, sophs are apt to be ignored in the whirl of school activities, but somehow we were different. After the first few English assignments, the Class of ’45 was represented on the Senior Board. We were represented on the football, the basketball, and the baseball teams. Our boys weren’t first stringers to begin with, but they worked hard and played hard, paving the way for future championship teams. In the spring of our sophomore year we were urged to participate in the Martha C. Babcock Essay Contest. “You probably won’t win,” cooed our upperclassmen, fondly patting our little heads, “but it will be good practice!” So, reluctantly, we entered, and no one was more surprised than we, at the outcome. First award went to Sally Briggs; second to Doris Bradshaw and third to Pearl Maki. The sophs really had a heyday. Before we knew it, the year was over and school had adjourned for a couple of glorious months of rest. The faculty had certainly earned it, for they had come to know the trials of school life during war time. It was with a bit more self-assurance that we launched our Junior year. My, but weren’t those sophs a silly acting lot! We spent the first week of September in ’43, shaking our grave heads sadly, and muttering “WE never acted that way.” Junior class officers were: President, Thomas Salimeno; Vice President, Simon Majeika; Secretary, Sally Briggs; Treasurer, Corinne Palm. Being a Junior is knowing the joys of -4 9 is—