St. Mary's Elementary School

As my website is a reader-driven enterprise, I am responding to the interest expressed by those who have chosen to share feedback on their interests. Near the top of the list, believe it or not, are inquiries into, “Who is this guy?”

There also seems to be a keen interest in the warm, fuzzy stories of my youth, as well as the ones that are not so warm or fuzzy. Nostalgia abounds.

So, while I gave a fictional account of life in Ohio in the 1960’s in my latest novel, Philips Park by Dan O’Connor, told from the perspective of youngsters, aged 11 to 19, I am intending in this vignette to share similar reflections in a non-fiction format.

#No, I’m not going to give away the store, so to speak (or get myself into trouble), by linking fictional characters with people I actually knew, but, rather, share some observations about growing up in Ohio from my own point of view that you might find of interest.

When my dad told me I was moving to Ohio in 1951, I was only five (5) years old. I had no idea what to make of the forthcoming experience. I was not anxious to leave my birthplace, Logansport, Indiana, because, most notably, it contained two rivers, the Eel River and the Wabash! Those were two giant considerations for a young boy, who loved the magic and majesty of the ebbs and eddies of those two estuaries.

“How many rivers will there be in the town we’re moving to?” was a top question.

“None, except for a little stream or two,” was a very disappointing answer, concerning Lancaster, Ohio, my new home.

I also didn’t want to leave my cousins.

When we arrived in Lancaster and moved into 425 Boyd Street, I was certain to mark the occasion with a memorable experience. At that time (no longer), there were two decorative, cement walls (very short—maybe 3-4 feet high) on either side of the front steps, perpendicular to the house. For some reason, I was taken by the prospect of jumping off them backwards with my face toward the house and my back toward the street.

Probably the first time I jumped, my feet hit the ground, my body lurched forward and I hit my forehead on one of the walls just above my left eye. It was the day we moved in. As an added treat, I got to visit the emergency room and get two stitches. So, on top of moving into a new city, I also got to experience, first hand, the excitement of sirens and ambulances coming and going from the Fairfield Medical Center. To commemorate this event, I still have a scar above my left eye that I can show you, even today, if you ask.

Starting school was the next big occasion. There is no kindergarten in my history. So, the first day at St. Mary’s Elementary School was my first day of school.

Before I get to that, however, I want to spend a few minutes on television, not appearing on TV, mind you, but about the concept of television. Until we were preparing to move to Ohio, I had never heard of television. We had listened to the “Pickle Hour,” a weekly radio mystery that was sponsored by a pickle manufacturer and I greatly enjoyed that. In fact, I miss it, just writing this today, since I don’t think we ever listened to another episode after we left Indiana. We listened during the dinner hour, which was an added treat—the family sitting around the table in suspense, as opposed to the relative boredom of small talk.

My dad explained, “They’ve got this new thing called TV. We don’t get it here in Logansport. Well a few people do, but they don’t get good reception, since the TV stations are in Indianapolis. You’ve got to be really near the TV station to get a good signal and it’s seventy (70) miles from here to Indy.”

“There in Lancaster,” my dad continued, “it’s only 30 miles to Columbus and they get a really good signal there. When we get to Ohio, we’re going to get ourselves a TV!”

I had no idea what he was talking about.

But, I soon learned. My favorite shows were Howdy Doody (including Buffalo Bob and Clarabelle), I Love Lucy, What’s my Line? and The Lone Ranger. At my age, I hated the Ed Sullivan Show, Sid Caesar and The Hit Parade. I just found them boring and a misuse of our sole TV that might have otherwise have been tuned in to some good cartoons. I loved Jerry Lewis, hated Dean Martin, but seldom got to watch Jerry or listen to country music, because my mother didn’t like them. Oh, and the Disney show on Sunday evenings—seldom got to watch that either, because my mom thought it was silly.

Cartoons, now there was something I loved. On Saturday mornings, they were on all three channels. Yes, three channels, not 500, like we have today. But, on Sunday mornings, the cartoons got whittled down to one channel and not only that—they were those animated Mickey Mouse cartoons with stick figures and music with no speaking voices. Boy was I desperate, so I watched them anyway—before church usually. There was no competition for the TV at that hour, so I fought off boredom with cartoons that weren’t graphic enough to work up a full blown laugh. An occasional snicker was the best I could muster by watching them.

Now for school: My sister took me the first day. I can still visualize it. There was a nun checking us in, when my sister and I strolled up to sign in—on time, I might add. I think she left a little early that day to take me. It must have been important. It’s the last time I remember my sister being on time.

We were told that we’d be divided up into boys and girls and separated the first year. I couldn’t have cared less. In fact, the idea of all boys appealed to me—more playmates. Now, here’s a question that perhaps one of my classmates can answer. I remember that there were 42 of us (all boys) in my first grade class. Yet, the class picture, below, shows both boys and girls. How is this?

I can still remember, the nun, Sister Henrietta, told me to sit at a desk behind someone I’ll always remember as “the fat kid.” I doubt he was all that fat by today’s standards, but in those days, that was his moniker.

My memories of the St. Mary’s Parish blend in such a way that chronology no longer makes sense. I want to get straight to the entire living in a parish experience, as viewed from another angle.

On the positive side: I have a metaphorical image of two large, masculine human hands, not the size of a star basketball player’s, but each the size of a house, palms up, cupped and held together. Whether or not these were the hands of God is a story for another day. But, whatever they were, we (everyone in the parish) lived inside them.

Whether or not the isolation, we often felt as Catholics was generated internally or externally is a subject I will likely pick up and toss around in the religious discussion venue another day. But, given that isolation, there was also a benefit. We all thought we were one day going to heaven, assuming we didn’t commit a mortal sin, either after our last confession or without the benefits of either the sacrament of Extreme Unction, or an act of perfect contrition.

Anyway, it was like a huge scoreboard in the sky and we were all young enough and innocent enough to figure we were destined for the pearly gates of heaven, manned by St. Peter, so long as we didn’t hang out with Protestants. Morale was high. Our prospects couldn’t have seemed better.

The negative side: The comments about Protestants are a perfect segue. The nuns, who are probably all dead by now, used to infer that Protestants were evil. For example, we, as Catholics, we were told, believed that Peace came to men of goodwill, whereas the Protestant mantra, or so we were told was, “Eat, drink and be merry,” with a “while the sun shines,” overtone. Unfortunately for these Dominicans (or was it the Sisters of Charity at my next school? The experiences of these two venues tend to blend in my mind after all these years), I remembered all of what they told us—especially on those occasions when they went “over the top,” such as this.

Ah, yes, for example, the story about the little Catholic boys and girls, who were killed on their way home from school by Protestants, just for being Catholic. But, we were reassured that this would constitute martyrdom, and that if you became a martyr, you went straight to heaven, no matter what. Even the giant scoreboard in the sky couldn’t keep you out.

And, then there was the corporal punishment. But, alas, I’m now at 1,500 words and that is my self-inflicted limit for one article. What you have just read (after a brief period for comments, corrections and additions by my classmates and childhood friends) will be posted, along with my other Periodic Perspective articles at the Periodic Perspective Home Page and again in my biography section: Dan’s Biography; when you get there click on Dan’s Youth.

I’d also love to hear about your experiences in this or similar venues. That’s why we have a comments section, should you wish to share with “the class,” so to speak. Note that all of my full length articles are repeated in my blog section: http://www.danoconnor.com/blog2 , from which you can get an RSS feed, if you wish.

Voila! The class picture: (Do you know which one is me? And, who is standing next to me? How many can you name?)