FTV: The Best of the Rest

 

     A while ago I dedicated this space to one of the most inspirational teachers I had back in the day, the late Don Aronson (R.I.P.).  Digging back in the old memory files dusted off a lot of other memories that made me think, “Okay, what else did you pick up along the way and who did you acquire those pieces of knowledge (and skills) from?  This will be more or less in chronological order beginning with my first year in school circa 1958-59 and will obviously be more of a highlight reel than a comprehensive compendium of everything (I think) I learned along the way.  The names won’t resonate with anyone who wasn’t in my educational sphere back then, but I am sure many of us shared similar learning experiences, just at different times and in different places.

     I really can not put a name or even a face on my Kindergarten teacher because we had a bunch.  Whether it was a maternity leave or some other circumstance, we had a rotating cast of teachers for our morning half day sessions.  I do remember giving my mother a jaunty wave the first (and only) day she walked me the block up Norway Street to Whitman Elementary.  I also remember naps taken on floor mats, a pushy kid who wouldn’t let anyone but ‘his friends’ use the sandbox in the toy room, and my first public display of vomiting (at least it was in the cloakroom).  As far as what we learned, we didn’t really get into the A B Cs of it all (as they do now in K) until first grade.

     Mrs. Burke always drove a black Ford sedan and parked it in the same spot on Norway Avenue just west of the school.  She was a very nice older woman who recognized that I was one of the younger kids.  Having a late September birthday meant I started Kindergarten when I was four, going on five.  Years later, my dad said she had called and talked to them about some concerns she had about my behavior.  It took one ‘discussion’ at the dinner table to let me know what was expected of me, younger student or not.  A follow up phone call confirmed I had made the necessary corrections.  

     We had our own restroom in the back corner of the room and I remember her saving me some embarrassment one day.  I had used the facilities and could not for the life of me get my pants zipped up.  She knocked on the door and asked quietly if I needed help.  Problem solved and as far as I could tell, no one else in class had even noticed my extended absence in the BR.  She kept me after school one day (the first of my two public school detentions) to finish an assignment and that lesson stuck.  My brother particularly enjoyed knocking on the window and laughing at me still being in my seat when he walked by heading home from JH.

     I liked Mrs. Burke but I really liked my second grade teacher but for some reason, I am having  a hard time with her name.  I believe it was Mrs. Knauss but do not quote me on the spelling.  My second year teaching in Ontonagon, I had an appointment with my long time dentist in Marquette.   His assistant that day looked really familiar until it hit me who she was.  I asked if she used to teach at Whitman and when I told her my name, she said, “Oh, Kenny, I remember you.”  I did not get around to asking when she got out of the teaching game (obviously she had) but she seemed rather tickled that I had become a teacher myself.

     Whitman had enough students that there were two classes for most grades.  We became more aware of this as third grade approached.  Mind you, I do not recall who the other teachers in some of the grades were but kids started a whisper campaign early on about Mrs. Mileski:  “She is old.  I hope I don’t get put in her class” (and so on).  I asked my dad about the hub-bub and he simply said, “I work with her son Mike at the State Police post.  She is a nice lady.”  When the fall started and I found myself in her class, it was interesting because her grandson was in my grade and he was also in her class.  Yes, she was obviously older than the rest of the staff and she was a strict, no nonsense educator, but I didn’t have any problem with her.  I did wonder what it was like for young Mike to have his grandmother for his teacher.

     Whitman was beginning to get overcrowded so fourth grade was interesting.  By my fifth grade year, they needed to add a second class for one grade but did not have enough classrooms.  The library shelves were moved into the main hallway that year and the library itself was turned into a classroom.  To ease the crowding during my fourth grade year (before they moved the library), they tried something innovative.  All the fourth graders who lived within walking distance of Whitman had a half day of school that ran from 7:00 am to 11:30 am.  We had a similar half day arrangement in Kindergarten.  When the Kindergarten kids from farther out were bussed to school for the afternoon section, the bus riding fourth graders were brought in to have class from 12:00 noon until 4:30 pm.  An extra bus run was added to get them home after their day ended.

     The teacher, Mrs Olson, warned us on the first day that our shortened day meant we would be getting homework.  The first couple of weeks did indeed include taking home work each day (perhaps she was just trying to get us into the groove) so I made it a habit to eat my lunch at home and then get right on it.  In all honesty, most of us found if we kicked into high gear at school, we rarely had to bring work home.  It was kind of interesting because we already owned our second Ski Doo and the NMU campus had not yet spread all the way to our house yet.  I remember many a winter day snowmobiling that 40 acres of rolling field (former farm land) as soon as I was done shoveling the driveway.  Occasionally, I would get close enough to the school to see the other kids out at recess and think, “Boy, I wish every year was like this!”

     My other deeply embedded memory of fourth grade was taking a field trip to the Bunny Bread bakery that was located on Washington Street at the south end of Lincoln Avenue.  We were promised a donut at the end of our tour (inducement to behave?) but I never got to enjoy mine.

It turns out I was seated on the bus with Mrs. Olson’s daughter.  In the eight blocks between the school and the bakery, she got a funny look on her face and upchucked her entire breakfast on my lap.  Mrs. Olson was a strict teacher, but at that moment, she had the same look of horror any parent would have on their face after seeing their child vomit on a bystander.

     She quickly dug up enough stuff to clean me up while Margaret sat there rather oblivious to what had happened (no doubt because she felt worse than she looked).  Mrs. O asked if I would rather stay on the bus during the tour and I declined.  The other student’s body language during the tour said, “Yes, you smell like vomit” but in retrospect, staying on the bus would have meant being in a confined space that smelled like vomit.  By the end, the donut had lost its appeal.  Fortunately, we got back to school just in time to be dismissed so I walked the block home to get changed.  Maybe I imagined it, but Mrs Olson didn’t seem so strict for the rest of the year.  I reminded Margaret of this episode at either our ten or twenty year class reunion and she said she didn’t recall it at all.  I did, but I can see that with her being the ill one, who would want to remember that?

     On to fifth grade and back to a normal, full day schedule.  Mrs. Zeeman was another younger teacher and she no doubt did a fine job.  There are really only two things that stand out in my memories from that year.  On the negative side, we were standing in a line by her desk to have her check an assignment.  I made the unfortunate error of chuckling when she had a humdinger of a sneeze.  She fixed a steely eyed gaze on me and said something along the lines of, “What is it you find so funny about someone sneezing?”  On a more positive note, fifth grade was my first year being released from class for drum lessons every other week.  We practiced our rudiments with the high school band director, Mr. Paterson, on a formica table top in the nurse’s room and not on a real drum.  Thus began my ‘drum crazy period’ (which actually has never really gone away) where I began pouring over Ludwig drum catalogs and hinting to my parents that I might need to purchase not one drum, but an entire kit sometime in the future.

     The only year I obsessed a bit about who my teacher would be was between fifth and sixth grade.  Word got out that my old third grade teacher, Mrs. Mileski, would have one section and Don Aronson would teach the other.  I have already chronicled why I held out hope that I would be assigned to Mr A’s class (FTV:  Mr. Don Aronson et al 9-25-24) and a lot of that came from hearing my sister talk about him.  Unbeknownst to us, they had decided to give us a mini-taste of ‘changing classes’ before we got to seventh grade by swapping classes one period a day.  Mrs. M taught Social Studies and Mr. A was the designated Math teacher for the year.  The only rub I had with Mrs. M came when she asked the class, “What should I do with little Mr. Drummer Boy?”  Drummers usually have a lifelong habit of ‘drumming’ on any surface they lay hands on and apparent.y I was no exception.  Another lesson learned about when tapping out rhythms is appropriate and when it is not.

     The best part of being in Mr. Aronson’s class was occupying the last seat in the back of the middle row of desks.  Just behind my desk was a door with a half pane of frosted glass that led into the principal’s office.  If Mr. Barber needed a note to be delivered to the staff or the secretary needed help hauling something, I would feel a tap on my shoulder.  No matter what we were doing in class, I was permanently excused to be the office ‘gopher’ (as in ‘go for this, go for that’) – as long as I caught up with my missed work when I was so engaged.  

     Drum lessons continued throughout sixth grade but we got to go up a notch on the practice ladder.  First, we had a couple of sessions when Mr. Patterson would gather all of the sixth grade band kids together to try (yes, try) and hash through an actual song.  Near the end of the year, 

we were put on a bus and taken to Graveraet Jr High where we joined all the other seventh graders to be.  This was our first introduction to the Jr High band instructor, Mr. Smeberg, and it gave him an idea what his new band students would be like come fall.  Having spent the last seven years in a one level school a block from my house, traveling to the three story former high school a couple of miles away would prove to be an interesting two years.

     My last year at Whitman (1964-65) was also my brother’s senior year at the newly built Marquette Senior High on Fair Avenue.   Graveraet was the high school for his first three years and by the time I got there, it had only been the Jr. High for two years.  By then, the old Howard School where Ron had gone for Jr High had been torn down to make way for a high rise apartment building.  The one thing I missed by not going to Howard was a chance to slide down the long tubes that served as the fire escape system.  Ron said it was fun unless some joker ahead of you closed the doors at the bottom and held them shut.  Obviously, this was frowned upon, but to the misfortune of those coming down the tube after the doors were closed, it did happen.

     Though Principal Ralph Barber wasn’t one of my teachers, he still played a big role in our education at Whitman.  Impeccably dressed in a suit and tie, he was a kindly, white haired gentleman who never raised his voice.  He liked to be involved with the school programs (especially the Christmas pageant and other musical productions) and as far as I could tell, he was always at the school.  The one time I remember seeing him actually be annoyed happened when I was in the boy’s bathroom.  A younger student came in after me and for some reason climbed up on top of the urinals and was walking back and forth to the stalls when Mr. Barber came in.  His furrowed brow told me he was not happy with what he saw.  He pointed at me and simply said, “Go back to class.”  I complied but I took my time, curious what he would do with the kid he caught using the bathroom like playground equipment.  No yelling or fireworks ensued.  The last I saw of them, the perpetrator was hustling toward the office with Mr. Barber in slow pursuit.

     The change to Jr. High in the fall of 1965 meant big changes from what we were used to.  More teachers, hourly class changes, and eating lunch in the school cafeteria (a first for me who was used to trotting home for lunch every day at Whitman).  There are more stories that I can cover in this space but I can at least pay tribute to them by name and subject.  Seventh grade core subjects were taught by Mr. Summers (Social Studies & English), Mr. Straton (Science), Mrs. Johnson (Math).  We also had gym with Mr. Soli, band with Mr. Smeberg, drafting and metal shop with Mr. Marana, woodshop with Mr. Berg and a semester each of art (Mr. Meyers) and vocal music (with a different Mrs. Johnson).  The only one of this list that did not make much of an impression on me was the math teacher as it was just business as usual – practice sheets, quizzes, and tests – nothing that exactly stirred up an groundsell of love in me for math.  I did fine, but she managed to turn math into a chore.

     Eighth grade was similarly structured with gym and industrial arts but graphic arts (with the same teachers).  Vocal music was replaced with a study hall (the only one I had between grades 7 and 12).  This SH met in the dimly lit Kauffman Auditorium and it took a lot of effort to not simply slump back in the comfy seats and snooze.  Mr. Marcihol covered science and Mr. Tiziani was the math teacher (allowing me to avoid the other guy who had a nasty reputation).   Mr. Gil introduced us to the (now) long forgotten skill of diagramming sentences in english.  God bless him because he also introduced us to Thor Heyerdahl and Kon Tiki.  It is a good thing because I was always interested in history (and have read all of Hyerdahl’s work over the years).  The history teacher that year piqued even less interest in me than the seventh grade math teacher.  How do I know this for sure?  I always liked history but she made it so dry that I can not even remember her name.  I can still clearly see her face in my mind, but come to think of it, she may have been just an upper torso. She never got away from her desk that I can recall – perhaps spending my time drawing flying superheroes in my spiral binder of notes kept me from noticing.

     With that, I again say ‘thank you’ for all the experiences my public school teachers doled out to me between 1958 and 1967.  Maybe I will revisit high school one of these days, but not today!

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