Subject:
B Wing
Eddie Burton
Class of '66
Hey Tommy, I took two classes in that B wing that I remember. One was mechanical drawing and the other was typing. Boy am I glad I took typing. Almost every job I've had in the past 7 or 8 years has called for lots of computer work which requires typing skills that I still have. I was the only boy in my class.
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Subject:Tolerence
Susie Wohlschlaeger Schlette
Class of '66
I'm like you, Tommy. I have a memory of John Purdy that I think of every time I see a story on tv news about another child at a school being tormented for being different. We were already on the school buses waiting to leave school but were held up because there was a fight on the parking lot. The one being beaten was John. His one loyal friend, as far as I remember, was an English girl whose name may have been Ann. She was yelling and crying trying to get whomever it was to leave John alone. I remember feeling afraid for John and embarrassed for Ann because she was causing such a fuss. Like you said, most of us have grown up to be caring, socially responsible people who abhor this type of behavior. I only hope John knows how sorry a lot of us are and that we hope he went on to be a happy, successful adult. At least John was an appreciated artist in Mrs. Hedden's class.
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Subject:B Wing
Skip Cook
Class of ’64
Seeing the diagrams of “A” wing and “B” wing brought back lots of good memories…not enough memories to remember the functions of every one of the rooms however. Hearing about the “evacuation” of “B” wing, took me back to either 9th or 10th grade when I was in Ms. Dorothy Vernon’s home room. My teen age admiration for Ms. Vernon must have been evident because she would always save me a treat from the previous days baking class in Home Ec. I still marvel at Ritz Cracker pie by the way.
It was science fair time and for my project I made a volcano. It was perhaps the ugliest thing constructed during the 20th century. In the middle of a scrap piece of plywood, I heaped plaster of paris to about a foot high. The mouth of the volcano was a mason jar lid. I then painted the entire “volcano” with brown paint, and with great creative pride, threw in some red streaks to simulate lava flows. As I think back and visualize it now, it was “ugly to the bone”.
I scraped the outside off some sparklers and placed that concoction in the mason jar and lit it with a match. It was a pretty good show but didn’t have what I thought was enough smoke for a volcano. With the addition of some sulfur, I was much more pleased with the results. Please remember that when the volcano “erupted” at home, I was in the backyard.
I proudly hauled that thing to school and took it in to home room. I was beaming when Ms. Vernon complimented my creation. She then asked me if I would demonstrate how the volcano erupted. So, right there in home room I stoked it up. As with many things in a young man’s life, I didn’t think the request through. I proudly heaped the sulfur and sparkler mixture into the jar lid, struck the kitchen match, and away it went. Sparks shot in the air, smoke billowed from the volcano….and filled Ms. Vernon’s class room….and soon filled “B” wing thus resulting in an evacuation.
I don’t recall ever seeing Ms. Vernon after graduation, but she will always remain one of my favorite teachers for her efforts in the geologic sciences as well as Ritz Cracker pie. Hope to see everyone in August.
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Subject:August 30th Get Together
Don Blaise
Class of '64
Judy and I are planning on attending the August 30 picnic. Thanks always for your work with this site. I have really enjoyed the memories form “B” wing and the classes I had there in shop and mechanical drawing.
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Subject:Dummy
Collins (CE) Wynn
Class of ‘64
Boy, I sure felt like a dummy when I read a note where the Mechanical Drawing room was mentioned. I was focused on the “boxing” angle from shop class to the point where I forgot everything else. Some of us have talked of how very important the typing skills we learned in Mrs. Parks’ class were to us. I have often said that of all the things I learned in high school, the ability to type has been the most useful. Practically every day from 1964 on I have had reason to sit at a keyboard and bang out a document – either for personal or professional reasons. Perhaps equal in value to typing skills, the classes I took in Mechanical Drawing also meant a great deal throughout my life but for more esoteric reasons. In that class we learned about perspective and perception, lessons that served me well. In the era before computer animation and design, the ability to look at an object and rotate it mentally while trying to figure out how it would look from a different angle was a skill hard to master but worth the effort. Even now I find myself still doing just that during idle moments. From the vantage point of upside down and backwards things, physical as well as social, can appear considerably different.
And, of course, there was the humor component fueled mostly by that master showman, Harold Tuck. To this day I still think of the phrase “Slightly Used But Not Abused Mechanical Drawing Equipment For Sale”. It seems I recall this phase appearing in an issue of Lee’s TRAVELLER until it was pulled by higher authority. Because the class was active in that we were actually doing something, it was easy to move around and talk back and forth during class. Harold used this to his advantage in locating “unclaimed” equipment which was then marketed. God Bless You, Sir!
PS. Looking forward to seeing everyone August 30th.
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Subject:Guestbook
Melissa Martin
Class of '72
I graduated in 1972.Lived in Huntsville from 1965 to fall of 1972 .Attended Mastin Lake Road Elementary, Davis Hills Jr High, and Lee High School.Hung with the Conklin boys, Shepard boys, Steve Scott, Ray Locke, Mary Staluka, "Black River Circus", Billy Hill, Bill Hill and his sisters, Jim Brigman, Kathy Stinson, Myra Hunt, and many more that I see in my mind but cannot place names.
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