This photo of the Class of ‘49, “The Forty-niners,” accompanies Willard Robinson’s Memories below.
Front row (left to right): June McNeal, Mary Rumsey, Martha Knapp, Sally Bainbridge, Ellen Weirch, Frances Zaleski, Arlene Springer, Beverly Shannon.
Second row: Merle Haas, Ed Thornburgh, Donald Kirby, Maybell Reiff, Doris Weaver, Janette Parmeter, Joyce Jensen, Marjorie Hilliard, Advisor Mrs. Pauline Kirby.
Third row: Kenneth Rimes, Kenneth Kline, Willard Robinson, Jerry Adams, Leo Schmidt, Carol Wright, Marilyn Brown, Jean Williams.
-photo courtesy of the Marcellus Area Historical Society
Marcellus Memories #8
by Willard Robinson, MHS Class of ’49
As our class started the freshman year in high school in 1945, our class number increased from the 14 we had in the seventh grade to 24. This was because of students in the one-room country schools in the rural areas around Marcellus were ready for high school. They were bussed to the Marcellus High School and joined with the in-town students. These rural schools functioned well into the 1950’s when they phased out and a Consolidated Marcellus School District was created. Over the next years, our class had a few that left and a few added, but our class ended up graduating with 24 students.
In high school I became a “student”, meaning that I became really interested in learning and found I could do well. In grade school I was only slightly better than a C student, but now I was getting A’s. I liked chemistry, physics, and the advanced math courses and they were taught by Oliver Jensen. He was a very good teacher and did this, as well as being the Superintendent of Schools. One course I wished I had taken was Spanish. It started being offered in our freshman year in place of Latin. The course that gave me the most trouble was typing. I could learn how to do it but always got nervous on the “timed tests” and made errors. I got my only C and it lowered my grade point average.
One memory I have was going rabbit hunting with our coach Mr. Hungerford in my Junior Year. When we had snowstorms that closed school, he would call up my friend and classmate Donald Kirby and me to go rabbit hunting. He had a tough old car and would plow through the snowdrifts to a farm about three miles north of town where he had permission to hunt. I had a 16-gauge double barrel shotgun that my father taught me to use. We usually got several rabbits. I had also been taught how to dress them out for cooking. I don’t remember how these hunting trips got started but I always thought it was a unique experience.
One of the highlights of high school were the Junior and Senior plays. I had a significant part in the Junior play, meaning I was on-stage a lot and had plenty lines to speak. In the Senior play I had a minor part. I found those plays provided a good bonding experience for the class.
When it came time for the “Forty-niners,” as we called ourselves, it was no surprise that Joyce Jensen was the valedictorian of the class and I found myself as the salutatorian but with a much lower grade point average than Joyce. For our Senior class trip, we went to Niagara Falls by taking a boat from Detroit. It was the farthest I had ever been from home.
The Forty-niners really became a close-knit group. We had class reunions every five years. Our last one was the 60th year since graduation in 2009.
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