As I “Liked” all the back-to-school photos on Facebook this year, I was relieved to be done with lesson plans and grading essays, but I was also grateful for the many memories of my school days. I asked others to share their school memories.
Here are quite a few of them:
It Was Another World
(Naptime Photo: Facebook: The Vintage News)
Marguerite Kerstetter
Before walking to school every day, I gathered eggs and milked the cows with my sister Alice.
There were no school buses. Alice and I walked to school every day, even in deep snow. I once rode the factory bus to school.
Sometimes the teacher sent me to the community store during recess to buy her a snack. The two classrooms served first through fourth grades and sixth through eighth grades. We called them the big side and the little side. Each room had a pot-bellied stove. Teachers had to arrive early to light the coal stove in each room so the classrooms were warm before the children arrived. Even with that early warming, we fought for front seats closer to the stove on the coldest days.
In school, we memorized parts for plays. Teachers sometimes put on fun plays on Friday afternoons. School was over after the plays.
When someone got sick, they had to stay home. Superintendent Mr. Zeiders came and put a quarantine sign on the door.
Each school day began with the Pledge of Allegiance and the Lord’s Prayer. The teacher then read a Bible verse. Some of those verses stayed with me.
We had Dick, Jane, and Sally reading books, and we memorized much of what we learned. We had to memorize Longfellow’s poem, “The Ride of Paul Revere.”
Physical fitness training took the form of baseball competitions between local elementary schools. Every two weeks, we left school after lunch and walked several miles to the other schools. Schools took turns hosting the games.
Linda Hosler
Mom made me a black-and-orange dress to wear to school. She also made a pair of black pants to match the dress. When I got to school, they sent me to the office and told me to take off the pants because girls weren’t allowed to wear them. I refused to take them off, saying, “My mom made these, and I’m not taking them off.” I wore the pants for the rest of the day, but I didn’t wear them to school after that.
Sheryl Smith remembers
Eating paste!
I learned to read!
I swallowed my milk money when I fell from crossing the bars. We always put our money in our mouths to keep it safe.
I dragged home bulletin board discards when the seasons changed!
Kristin Ann
When I was little, we went to kindergarten every other day. My brother was a year younger than me, so I went first while he stayed with the sitter. I loved my first day. I took my shoes off at the door and put them neatly in my cubby.
The next day, I went to the sitter like always. On day 3, my mom woke me up for school. I was confused. “But I already went,” I said. Apparently, I thought I only had to do it once. My mom told me I had to keep going, and I replied, “You mean I have to go every day for the rest of my life!?” And there I was, about to start another school year. Every day for the rest of my life.
Note from Deb: I think Kristin is currently in her 20th year of teaching, so she is still going to school.
Debby Jaeger remembers
Riding to elementary Catholic school with my cousins in my uncle’s beer delivery van!
Haley Scott Cometz added
Lying on those woven rugs we all had to buy for naptime
Karen Zimmerman
I went to a one-room school one mile from home. I rode my bike on nice days and walked when there was snow on the ground. My Mom took me on rainy days.
Rose Bellaire
The teacher was respected in the classroom
Treasures and Terrors
Deb
As a student, I never lost the excitement of early September because, on the first day of school, each student got a new box of eight large, flat-sided crayons. I loved the smell of new crayons, and the unused tips that would soon turn into broken pieces and dull points.
Terrie Sikula remembers
Riding the bus, sitting in the back and bouncing high every time we hit a bump. I had the best friends through high school. Prom and other dances were fun. We had funny teachers, including Mr. Bird, who looked like a bird. Teachers smoked outside. We wore ugly gym uniforms!
Note from Deb: Our Grade 7-12 gym uniforms were almost indecent - maroon and gray horizontal stripes with a full-front zipper, and short shorts attached.
Teresa Wagner
I remember falling on the playground and scraping my knees. The teacher on recess duty would take me inside and put something on my brush burns. I don’t know what it was called, but I still remember the smell.
Amy Helling
Watching the bus go past the end of my driveway on the first day of kindergarten!
Note from Deb: I still have dreams about missing the bus!
Patricia Bell recalls
Walking through the woods to catch the bus. The snow was up to our knees, and there were a lot of foxes roaming around!
Matt-Jackie Matter enjoyed
The last day of school for the year! Getting out of jail for three months-freedom at last!
Denise-Chris Loughlin Boaz
At my elementary school, if you were on the first bus, you would go to Mass (aka child care). The sisters were our teachers, and we loved them. You were lucky if you were chosen to help them in the kitchen. My favorite Sister instilled in me a love of music. She played guitar. I am still involved in music ministry every Sunday. If schools could only go back to the structure and discipline of that time…
Linda Slayton Granath
When I was in kindergarten, around 1957, a kid put his head through the back of a wooden chair and couldn’t get it out. I remember the janitor holding the chair as they walked down the hall to saw it off.
Deb's note: The chair was cut off, not the kid's head.
My daughter Katie Poling remembers the day her bus flipped onto its side into a cornfield. Katie, her brother Ron, and their two cousins, Heather and Bud, all rode the same school bus. I remember my friend driving me to the scene to make sure my kids were okay, and my dad telling someone, “All my grandchildren are on that bus!”
Sandy Brown remembers
Smelling yeast rolls in the school hallway before lunch, cursive writing, picking a musical instrument, and my first crush.
I rushed out to the playground to get the activity I wanted: hopscotch, tetherball, or the swing.
Note from Deb: I remember trying to get the inside position of the merry-go-round, so I wouldn't fly off when they spun it too fast!
