The Class of '57 In the Beginning

By Cecil Houk

The class of '57 had to have its start somewhere; for me it was in the school at Foster, Oregon. The original buildings are gone now, but I still remember them. Foster has become a part of Sweet Home, and most of the family home site is now covered by the water in the lake behind Foster Dam. I sure wish I owned that land now.

To see and read more of my articles about Sweet Home see my I remember ... series.

I can't locate a group photo taken at Foster School when I was in the 1st grade, so I'm including a photo that was taken a year earlier when my brother was in the first grade. I would have been in this picture too because I went with my brother Douglas on his first day of school, but Mrs. Marker (at the far left in the photo below), discovered that I was only 5 years old and sent me home. The entire school is in this photo; the 1st grade is in the front - the 8th grade in the back. This photo was taken on the front steps of the original 2 story school house.

The entire student body of Foster School in 1944. My brother is 5th from the left in the first row.

That day I started my own school with the help of Maralyn Martnick; she lived across Highway 20 from us. I had a free standing blackboard that had been a Christmas present in 1943. It wasn't very big, but we had plenty of chalk of various colors. We really didn't know what we were doing, but we did get a start on our ABC's. My little neighborhood school didn't last very long, and we were soon back to doing what 4 and 5 year olds do.

In September of 1945 I was allowed to enter the school, and I stayed there for the first, second, and third grades. The School had a total of 4 classrooms in two buildings. There were really only 3, but the auditorium in the newer building did double duty. The student body photo above was taken on the front steps of the original 2 room school house. The 7th and 8th grades were in this building. The younger children were in the building behind this one, and split grades 1-3 and 4-6; with the 1-3 grades in the "real" classroom. That room was heated by a "Spark" oil heater as I recall. Or was it "Stark"?

I said the auditorium did double duty when in fact it was used for many things. Fund raising carnivals were held in it. The State Health Department gave us shots in it; boy did I hate that! Another fund raiser that I haven't heard of since was something called a "box social". The ladies in the area would prepare meals for about four persons, and put them in fancy decorated boxes. Then the men would bid for the boxes in a public auction held at the school in the early evening. The highest bid got the box, and the lady who prepared it would serve it to (and share with) him and his children. I don't know what the proceeds were used for, and I can't remember for sure what my mother prepared; it could have been fried chicken. I do remember that my mother used a round hat box decorated to look like a cake.

One thing the class of '57 did in school in 1945 was to recite the pledge of allegiance at the beginning of every school day! Something that has put a Fallbrook, CA, brat in the headlines recently because she refuses to do it. The lady on the right in the school photo above (Miss Patch), had an answer for her. It was about 4 inches wide, about 3 feet long, and 1/4 inch thick! And from personal experience; it hurt like hell! Too bad they can't do that today.

One thing the class of '57 DID NOT do in school was shoot each other. The newscaster Paul Harvey recently made a comment about this, and I would like to quote him (or paraphrase). "Kids started bringing guns into schools when we kicked God out."

There was no such thing as bilingual education for the class of '57 in 1945. We were taught to read using phonics, and I remember Dick and Jane; the story in movie was more fun. We were taught arithmetic using "old math". I was in a coffee shop a few years ago when the electricity failed. The young lady at the cash register was struggling to use a handheld calculator to add up the checks. She could not compute the 7 3/4% sales tax. We were taught to write and spell. Well, in my case they tried; even I can't read my own handwriting at times. We were taught to respect the rights and property of others. I now have bars on my windows and doors; my front gate is locked. Cans of spray paint are now locked up in all the stores in my area.

I remember the smell of that blue Scripto ink. Ball point pens were so bad in the early years that they were not allowed in schools. I had one that was made by Parker, and it was really messy. By the time 1957 rolled around they had been perfected and were required; the Scripto bottle with the built in ink well was out.

There were no Xerox machines for the class of '57 in 1945, but we did have the hectograph. This is a metal pan the size of a sheet of paper (8 1/2 by 11 in this case), about 1/2 inch deep, and filled with a special gelatin. You could write or draw on a piece of paper with an indelible pencil. You then place this on the hectograph, and rub it to transfer the image to the gelatin. Then you place a sheet of clean paper on the gelatin, and rub it to transfer the image back to the paper. This was a slow process, and was limited in the number of copies that could be made. I still have some of the things that were done using this thing. In case you need help identifing items in this drawing it's a witch on a broom - flying across the sky in front of the moon that has a face on it.

Drawing made on a hectograph. Colored by a 6 year old expert. Me.

The class of '57 didn't have stereo's in 1945, but in 1947 we got a new teacher (Mrs. Kennedy), and she brought her wind-up victrola to our classroom. Did you know that the grooves on some old 78 RPM records wiggled back and forth, and some up and down? I didn't either, but Mrs. Kennedy had two pickup heads, and knew which one to use for each record.

Mrs. Kennedy in 1947. She's changing shoes for a foot race.

Some of us didn't have a radio in the family car in 1945; that was an extra cost option. Today it would cost extra to buy a car without a radio. Some cars have high end audio systems as standard equipment. The stereo system in my 1988 Grand Am cost more than my father's 1936 Ford 4 door sedan!

The class of '57 looked forward to birthday parties in 1945. I think today most of us would rather that they didn't occur so often. Or come around so quickly! The photo below was taken in front of our house in Foster on my 6th birthday celebration. The house was located on the North side of Highway 20 (about a mile East of Foster School), at Riggs Hill Road.

It seems that every picture my mother took of the front of this house was a double exposure. My brother Doug and I are sitting on the steps just outside the living room. The kitchen is covered up by the double exposure. If you look closely you can see that to porch goes around the right side of the house. The (dry) well and pump were in the corner. There were roses along the wooden walkway between the house and the road (HWY 20). Next to the roadway on either side was a red rambling rose which I have never seen again.

This is the best photo I have found of the Shea house

Because of the shortage of glass at the time we moved into this house, the broken windows on the second floor were not replaced. This part of the house was used only to hang the wash on rainy days. The photo above was taken before electricty found its way to us.

You had to have one of these to buy liquor

The year 1945 was a very important year for the class of '57. It brought the end of World War II, and the beginning of our formal education.

The Story

The Class of '57 In the Beginning

part 1

part 3

part 4

part 5

part 6

part 7

The Pictures