Yeatman High School - Yeatman Life Yearbook (St Louis, MO)

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time ago. Never thought to see it again. Did you know jim Allen? He was ushering down at the Orpheum the year before you came. I settled back in my chair. VVhen Phronie begins this way, it means a story, and thereis no use trying to stop her. It can't be done. I always did like jimj' resumed Phronie, reminiscently, even thought he wasn't much account. Yet he was honest as daylight and the funniest kid to talk to. If he only hadn't been so darn lazyg He and indolence were twin brothers. The kid was bright enough, but he hated work and life seemed to have cast him for the title role of 'A Fool and His Money Are Soon Partedf Yet, he didn't blow all his money in on himself, mind you. That was the redeeming feature of his weakness. It was only that he and the little penny-in-the-slot savings bank hadn't even a bowing acquaintance. VVell, Jim went along this way for some time, and then-he met the Girl. 'KShe was a sweet little thing, one of my former pupils, and she and Jim fell head over heels in love with each other after their first meeting. For the next few weeks jim nearly drove me crazy with talking about that girl. Every time he'd come near, I knew I'd have to adore the name and listen to the praisesi of Maidie. If it had kept up much longer, I'm afraid I should have EIC- tually come to dislike the child. Of course, after all this, I was able to take it very calmly when Jim came to me, about a month later, and announced that he and lllaidie werelgoing to marry. 'I haven't got a cent to my namef he said, cheerfully, 'but I know that if I had Maidie to encourage me and a little money to get started on, I'd get along all right in no time. You know I never can save a blamed nickel-' One Hundred Four 'No, you can't Iim,' I encouraged. 'But if I once got started-Listen, Phronie, if you'll just lend me four hundred so we can get married and settle down, I'll pay it back within a year's time with in- terest. I swear I will, Phronie. You see, Maidie's father doesn't like me, so if we're going to be married at all, we've got to skip tonight while he's out of town.' Oh, well, what's the use? How could I dash cold water on all that enthusiasm? I knew very well Jim couldn't save a cent and they'd probably be unhappy, but I knew, too, they'd be ten times unhappier if they weren't married, so I took my four hundred from my stocking and told the youngsters to run along and elope with the cash. i'That was twenty years ago. I never heard from the kids after that night. It didn't surprise me, for I knew jim's failing too well, yet-I couldn't help feeling a little disappointed. I Yesterday I received this cheque. It was from Jim Allen, and with it a long letter. He and Maidie had never written because, what with sickness. babies--there were four of them-and misfortunes generally, they had been kept poor, and were ashamed to write unless they could return the money. They have just begun to grow prosperous. The babies are growing up and -here Phronie chuckled delightedly- what do you suppose those two silly youngsters did? Named their first baby, a girl, after me! Imagine the poor child going through life with a name like that tacked to her. Shes eighteen now and looks like her mother, so she must 'be pretty. Say, come to think of it. you needn't bother about that investment. just make out -a bond for her with the money. It might sort of compensate her for having to he a 'Sophroniaf Phronie added, apologetic and a little ashamed.

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OF THE SALT OF THE EARTH GERTRUDE LYNN XVALTHISR-june, 1917 H HAT new office boy of yours said you were too busy to seeleven 'a client, but, as Im not in that tr' class, I just blew in. It was not necessary for me to look up to know that my visitor was none other than Sophronia Stubbs. As she herself had said, my old friend Phronie could hardly be called a client. ,She has too much of the milk of human kindness in her nature ever herself to become in- volved in a lawsuit. But in all my years of legal practice I have not had a more loyal supporter than Phronie. Whenever one of her friends-and they are legion, ranging from the poorest on the East Side to the richest in the W'est End-is in need of a lawyer, she never rests until she has landed him at my shop. Phronie is not sensitive about her age and will cheerfully admit to being about fifty years-young. Her own troubles, and more particularly the misfortunes of her friends, have not failed to leave tell-tale lines upon her face. but lines which are softened by the kindly gleam of blue eyes and are almost lost in her genial smile. She is a magnificent figure, tall, commanding, rather masculine. Her suits are always plain and mannish and never by any chance does she wear a hat that is in style. Such trivial things as clothes she affects to scorn, yet I have known her to waste a whole evening helping a young girl friend doll up for a party. For all her matter-of-factness and masculinity, Phronie is really a sentimentalist at heart. 'When I first met her, she was playing the piano in the old Orpheum Opera House. It was while I was working my way through law school, and I used to usher at the Or- pheum in the evenings. In her youth-that is, whenishe was about seventeen-Phronie had taken music lessons for as much as six months and had learned to play the Sack NValtz, The Maiden's Prayer, and The Battle of Praguef' This completed her musical education, and thus equipped, she had undertaken to teach the unsuspecting innocents of the poor district' in which she lived, at twenty-live cents a lesson, also to play the Sack Waltz. Phronie never labored under the delusion that she was a musician, but to her devoted disciples she was ever a genius. After hav- ing, by teaching, created a demand for pianos, Phronie now took to selling them to supply that demand, and, in time, became head-saleswoman of a piano iirm, but that was later. At the time I first met her, she was helping to eke out an existence for her- self and her old father by adding to her pedagogic and .salesmanship activities the thumping of the tin-piano instrument which passed for a piano in the Orpheum orches- tra. She and I often laugh at the thrilling melerdramers we used to see there. The thought of matrimony had never en- tered Phronie's mind-that is, so far as it concerned herself. In respect to other peo- ple, however. she had all the old match- making dowagers and chaperons beaten a mile. lVell, to get back to my story. Phronie breezed in, and after having in- quired minutely into the well-being of each and every member of my family, broached the real object of her visit. She had just had paid to her four hundred dollars, and came to consult me about the investment of it. Funny thing about this money, she in- terrupted in the midst of my explanation of how we ought to invest it-Phronie is feminine in one quality, she will get off the track of the subject in hand- Funny thing. I had kissed this money good-bye a long One Hundred Three

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LIFE IN THE. PORTABLES ROBERT FISHER-June, 1919 -,ii HEY were more intimately known ix! L as is 53,5 as' The Dog Houses, an appro- iyg' priate appellation bestowed upon them by an admiring public. VVhen viewed from a distance, they could easily have been mistaken for the residences of some pampered Canaries. On closer observa- tion, however, they appeared more like hideous monsters fattening upon a diet of small children, a ludicrous aspect produced by the arrangement of the doors and win- dows, together with a pronounced bulging of the sides. This effect was further height- ened by the bird yellow and grass green tints applied to the door and window frames by the master hand of the janitor. The chimney of one room slanted crazily to one side, giv- ing the structure a waggish look. In the yard at the rear of the buildings was a long trough, upon which stood a half dozen wooden buckets. Out of these, children. dogs, and other animals quenched their thirsts. These receptacles had a clumsy way of tumbling off the trough and drenching children who handled them too carelessly. The buildings and equipments were grow- ing old, and, as is often the case with the aged, had many eccentricities, some of which I vividly remember, especially one little trick of the furnace in No. 12. The pupils are sitting quietly at their desks, when suddenly there comes a loud creaking and rumbling. The teacher, quite used to the symptoms, rises quietly, and says, Stand! Get your wraps. The manoeuvre is carried out with the quickness and precision which is the result of long training. The pupils are soon standing near the door with an air of great expectancy. XfVith a loud roar, the furnace belches forth an enormous cloud of black smoke, which quickly fills the room. The janitor is sent for and the windows opened. A-fter a time, the smoke all passes away, the children file in, and all is quiet again. Who knew how soon the experience would be repeated? The janitor of the institution was a man of superior abilities, for, aside from pushing a broom, he had followed the professions of minister and physician. His practice of the latter had come to a sudden and untimely end by some neighborhood jokesmith's fast- ening his trade sign upon the cemetery fence. His name was something like Griller. He was usually attended by a mob of small boys hooting, Griller, the Duck Killer! Griller, the Duck Killer. They were always rewarded by a look of supreme contempt from this dignified official. ' At last came news of the building of a new school and vague rumors of a spanking machine worked by steam. Then, after a long period of waiting, we saw the portables taken apart piece by piece, and hauled away to grace some other growing community. One Hundred Five