Random Thoughts from a Random Memory

By Edward Master

Little did I know that some day I would be living at the same site as my former junior high school. Does it bring back fond memories? Yes and no.

I certainly do not miss changing classes and walking from building to building in the cold, the snow, the rain. Being outside was okay in nice weather. Otherwise, no way.

Classmate Jim Oliphant and I worked together for a few years at the government facility, the mine, a data storage site in Boyers. We often commiserated about our days at the Parker Junior High School. We were there because the school district didn’t have anything better. The junior high school was a leftover from the days of nonconsolidated schools. This site was at one time home to Parker High School, back when every community had its own school. We had elementary schools in St. Petersburg, Foxburg, Emlenton, Parker, and Perryville. The high school was in Emlenton. The junior high had to be somewhere.

From what I recall, there was quite a debate about exactly where a new school should be built. Finally, land from the Fox estate was obtained, by hook or by crook I’ll never know. The shovels went to work and the first senior class in 1966 graduated.

The junior high in Parker became history. The days of Principal John Pager were long gone. No more waiting in the rain at cafeteria time. The Quonset huts as classrooms disappeared. Classrooms which doubled as the cafeteria disappeared, too. The long trek to the old grade school was history. No more down the hill to gym class or to art with Lila Hamilton. No music lessons in the gym anteroom. I still feel Dick Say’s wiffle ball bat.

Jim and I too often remarked: “How did we learn anything?” We did though. Through rain, sleet, snow, whatever. We learned enough to become doctors, lawyers, and Indian chiefs. A few took up teaching as a trade. Through a few (not many) snow balls and skids we would don overcoats and galoshes, pull down our caps over our ears, button up and go to class. The days after the mansion burned down were probably the worse. That boiler blew up when I was in eighth grade. A quick reshuffle and away we went.

My eighth-grade home-room was in the old grade school with Betty Shoup. I had her for English, too. What a trip.

I think a house sits where the gym did. The gym was the smallest within PIAA regulations. It had mats on one wall and over the stage on the other. We were lucky no one was injured. Let’s not discuss the locker rooms if that’s what you called them.

I guess the junior high served its purpose. It got us to a senior high school, a brand spanking new one. The junior high is but a memory. Thank goodness only a memory.