My Elementary School Years: Teachers and Other Memories from My Stafford School Days

Today is Presidents Day, a holiday that was actually created in 1968 on the third Monday of each February. When I was in elementary school it seems we celebrated both Abraham Lincoln's birthday (February 12) and George Washington's birthday (February 22*). At this time I don't recall either being a national holiday, but some feel the name Presidents Day diminishes George Washington's role as founder of our country and the day should be returned to its rightful owner.

Having just finished the book Coach by Michael Lewis, it got me thinking about my own early influences. This will be a summary of my elementary school teachers. Do you remember all your teachers? What impact did they have on your life?

Kindergarten: Mrs. Strickland
I was about two or so when our family moved into a new development in Maple Heights, a suburb on the East side of Cleveland. I can't imagine a more ideal place to spend my early years. Stafford Elementary School was a half block away. There was a wonderful park with a public swimming pool two blocks to the south adjacent to the football stadium where the high school team played. Beyond the school was a forest and beyond that the new Southgate Shopping Center. 

Mrs. Strickland, my kindergarten teacher was one of two teachers who taught kindergarten. For some reason, the rumor was that Mrs. Novak was not the teacher you wanted, that Mrs. Strickland was much nicer. I believe my brother got Mrs. Novak two years later, which will be confirmed when he reads this.

The classroom seemed spacious, half of which was fairly open. There was a large carpet which, if I remember correctly, was unrolled each morning at the start of class and rolled back up after. On the other side of the room were some tables where we did crafts or learned how to write to 100.

Mrs. Strickland herself seemed tall and gangly. She was much older than most of the teachers I had at Stafford. I remember her demeanor as caring, not overbearing. 

My most memorable experience from that year was when a sixth grade student was brought in to our class to spend part of the day with us. Evidently he was being punished for misbehaving. This was a humiliation for him, obviously. What I recall is that we were working on writing to 100 and had been given graph paper and instructed to fill in the squares from 1 to 100. He was a very big kid and seated at my table and had to do the same assignment. He was very quiet and cooperative, though it must have been a humiliation. I remember almost nothing else from that year except that Mrs. Strickland seemed very nice. 

1st Grade: Miss Blackjack

I must have really liked Miss Blackjack. I have a vivid picture of her in my mind, wearing a black dress and a smile. She was quite plump, as in chubby, and I sat in the front row with my desk butted up against hers. Somehow I have it in my mind that she told my mom that I used to swing my legs and kick her in the shins when she was sitting at her desk. 

First grade was great because we got to go to the library and take out books. This was a very big deal for me. There was one book that I especially liked which was about a family or bears, I believe. I took that book out so many times that I was taken aside and asked to think about how many other books there are besides that one. For some reason, as long as I kept enjoying it, I wanted to keep re-reading it. 

Beyond that, I actually have no other memories, just the feeling of that being a good year and that Miss Blackjack was warm-hearted and nice..

2nd Grade: Miss Enden

This was my first grade picture.

I really liked Miss Enden, too. She was young and pretty, and seemed to enjoy teaching. If I recall correctly, Miss Enden got married during Easter Vacation and her name changed to Mrs. White. (This may have happened to Miss Morse, my fourth grade teacher as details are fuzzy. One of them had their name changed at Easter, and the other got married at the end of the school year.)

From second grade several memories stand out. The first was how we had three levels of reading--bluebird, redbird and something else. I was supposed to be in the advanced reading group, but when I saw what the middle group was reading, I requested to be changed to the lesser reading group. I believe that my parents were even consulted about this, though I can't be sure. 

A second memory is how we used to have regular Spelling Bees. I was surprised that when it narrowed down to few kids up front, they were all girls except me, or me and Kevin Flanagan. (Kevin, as it turns out, would later be class president his senior year in high school.) I would be in New Jersey by that time. It wasn't till I got to college and had a good friend who was an awful speller, but had been a valedictorian in high school, that I stopped judging peoples' intelligence by how accurate their spelling was.

A very painful memory from that year was this one. We used to do quizzes and then grade them ourselves. It was done in this fashion. When we finished the quiz, she would have us put our pencils away and pull out a red crayon to correct with. That is, we'd put an "x" by the wrong answers. Afterwards she would take our papers and record our grades in the grade book.

On one occasion I noticed that I had forgotten to write my name on the top as instructed. I snuck my pencil out to write my name, and she evidently thought I was correcting a wrong answer. Clearly I had violated the instructions since it was red crayon time. She said, "Eddie, tear up your paper and put it in the trash can." I was so humiliated. The worst, however, was yet to come. 

Miss Enden would have us put out heads down for a "rest period" while she recorded our scores in the book. Her desk was across the room and it looked like she was focused on writing in the book, so I stuck my tongue out at her. (I have no ideas where we learn these things.) Well, she saw, and said, "Eddie, please come over to my desk." Everyone's heads were down so I don't think anyone knew what this was about except me. I was one inch tall, and she said I would have to stay after school every day for a week. 

Clearly my humiliation must have shown. And for a week I stayed after school with Miss Enden, emptying the trash, tidying up things, taking the erasers down to the boiler room to be "cleaned" (which meant banging them together like cymbals until the accumulated chalk was knocked out.) She made it as fun as could be, actually. I'd already been punished. I've never stuck my tongue out at anyone again.

The highlight of that year came in the spring. My grandparents were planning a trip across the country by train to visit my aunt and uncle and my cousins outside Reno. They hoped to bring me along, and Miss Enden approved. I was an A student (with the exception of my handwriting) and the trip was a memorable and formative experience of my childhood.

3rd Grade: Mrs. Deuker

Despite her severe sounding name (Doiker) she was a fine teacher with a special challenge. For whatever reason, we had a mixed class of second graders and third graders that year. She was not particularly pretty--somewhat gangly, with horn-rimmed glasses--but she handled the situation well. The third graders would work on assignments while she worked with the second graders on their material. 

Some things we all did together, like Show and Tell. I never realized then, till my experience in Toastmasters, that Show and Tell was an opportunity to develop impromptu public speaking skills.

On one occasion, one of the second graders--Ronald Jerome--brought. robin's next to class for Show and Tell. His seat was in front of mine, and before doing his talk he went to the bathroom. When Ronald came back, he forgot that he'd placed the nest on his chair, so he scooted in to his desk and sat on it, breaking the little robin's eggs he planned to share. 

My most vivid memory of Mrs. Deuker came at the end of the school year. She asked for volunteers to help clean the classroom. Kids who took the school buses had to catch their buses. I didn't so I stayed and helped clean up the last two days of school. We had an aquarium in the classroom that year with guppies, and she said I could have the guppies because I had been a good helper. My parents bought an aquarium and the ozygenator, and I had my first experience with tropical fish.  (Thank you, Mrs. Deuker)

4th Grade: Miss Morse

Topps Civil War card. The dramatic artwork made an impression. 

Miss Morse had black hair and a kind, warm face. I recall very little about her other than that I believe I had a crush on her a little bit. Fourth grade is the year I began to have a sense of history. We had a large American Heritage book about the Civil War in the back of the classroom by the windows. When we weren't busy doing other things I  would go back and study the maps, photos and illustrations. I'm thinking that around this time Topps came out with its Civil War card set. 

Fourth grade was also the first year I began to notice myself taking an interest in girls. There were two girls I liked, though they were very different from each other. The one was the most popular girl in the class, outgoing and a little flirty, and the other was quiet, wore glasses and seemed shy. The popular girl was Patty and it seems like the boys flocked around her for some reason. The other was Nancy Kyle. Something about her turned my own heart mushy. 

On one occasion there was a class outing at the ice staking rink. The announcer proclaimed the next skate to be pairs with boys and girls. I immediately ran (the best you can with ice skates) and hid in the locker room. A couple classmates evidently knew of my crush--and maybe it was mutual?--and tried to bring me back outside, but I was in the corner on the floor kicking my skates so they would be injured if they tried to grab me. 

Before the next school year Nancy and her family moved to Wisconsin and I never saw her again.

5th Grade: Mrs. Murphy
My recollection of Mrs Murphy is a middle-aged woman, medium height, neither skinny nor heavy. I have few memories of that year other than this singular one.

I had a metal-bodied pen and I used to put it in my mouth and chew on it. I distinctly recall teeth marks on the barrel. One day, Mrs Murphy told me to stop putting my pen in my mouth. I'm not sure why I did this, and I do not recall anyone else being singled out for that. Well, the next day I was doing it again, so she told me I had to write a 500 word paper on why I liked putting my pen in my mouth. 

I put a lot of thought into it and really enjoyed explaining how the metal had an interesting flavor, etc. Instead of this being a punishment, it was almost like a reward. Very possibly the beginning of my writing career.

6th Grade: ? ? ? 
I can't even remember my 6th grade teacher at all. I don't have a name. Was it a he or she? It's fuzzy but we may have had a couple teachers, the home room teacher and then a science teacher. 

In November JFK was assassinated. That Friday afternoon there was an announcement over the school loudspeaker that we were to all go to the auditorium for an assembly. My class was one of the last to reach the auditorium and I was one of the last in the group. The doors to the front of the school were on my left and I stood there watching one of the janitors lowering the flag to half mast. I watched him as he returned to the foyer where other janitors were standing and this old man was weeping. Minutes later I learned why. It was like a numbness came over us all.

That weekend, our family had the television on to watch Lee Harvey Oswald get taken from the jail. The cameras were rolling and the nation would get to see first hand the alleged killer of our president. Suddenly a man broke into the screen and shot Oswald, an unforgettable image from an unforgettable weekend.

At the beginning of that school year we were invited to take up instruments to play in the school band. I had won a Grotto Circus Contest a couple years earlier and had money in the bank. My parents let me buy a used trombone with some of the money and I practiced with the school orchestra. Our performance in the Christmas concert was appallingly bad, evidently, so that afterwords the bandleader chewed us out rather furiously. I walked out that night with tears streaming down my cheeks, vowing never to play the trombone again.

Four weeks later our family moved to New Jersey, the most dramatic transition of my life till I went to college. Three weeks after that, The Beatles were on the Ed Sullivan Show. 

* * * *
* Here's a surprising factoid that I just learned. The National Archives states that "George Washington was born in Virginia on February 11, 1731, according to the then-used Julian calendar. In 1752, however, Britain and all its colonies adopted the Gregorian calendar which moved Washington's birthday a year and 11 days to February 22, 1732."

I'll bet you didn't know that!