Memory Monday # 3

     This very imposing looking building is where my sister and I went to the first and second grade. It housed one first grade class and one second grade class on the first floor as well as the seventh and eighth grades.  As you went up these stairs, the first grade room was to the left and the second grade classroom was to the right.  The yard was full of playground equipment...slides, teeter totters, and swings.  The rest of the building held  the entire high school...9-12. On the other side of town was an elementary school that held grades 1-6. This arrangement was to keep the youngest students close to home.  We didn't have hot lunches...everyone either brought lunches or went home for lunch.  Since the apartment we lived in was only two houses down from the school, so we walked home for lunch!

Higbee High

       In 1945, when WWII ended,  my dad came home after being stationed in Europe for nearly two years.  My mom didn't have a car so when he was discharged and sent home by way of St. Louis, Missouri...the nearest   city to us...she borrowed my grandmother's car to go get him.  Even though I was just four, I have a very clear memory of him coming home.  When he arrived, my sister, second grade, was at school  so  he put me up on his shoulder and we walked down to the school to get her.  It was recess so all the kids were outside playing. He was in uniform and with me on his shoulder, all the kids began to shout, "Judy, your dad is here!!!"  With Judy in hand, me on his shoulder, and all the kids racing around us, we made quite a parade going up those impressive steps to tell her teacher that he was taking her home.  Coming home from the war to a small town was a great celebration for the whole town.  Judy's teacher just happened to be  mother of a good friend of my dad's who was also soon coming home and had probably taught both my mom and dad, too....she would be my second grade teacher also...a story yet to come.