Charleston Elementary School Memories Part 2

Here's a photo of my kindergarten class at Charleston Elementary School. Mrs. Ellis was our teacher for that 1964 - 1965 school year. (Click on the photo for a super-size view.)

That's me standing next to Mrs. Ellis. (My Mom helpfully drew an arrow pointing to me. That's because we have a lot of old family photos where we don't exactly know which person in the photo is the family member – and she didn't want to have the same thing to happen again!)

Anyway, I remember Mrs. Ellis very well. She was very nice, a little stern, but a warm person.

I remember one time when we were about to have our milk and cookies, and I forgot to wait until the prayer (!) was over and just started to dig in. She made it a point to let me know that I made a mistake, and I felt really terrible about it. (I must have, if I still remember the incident after all these years!)

Mrs. Ellis was very encouraging regarding my artwork, and kindergarten was where I really developed my love of drawing. I would basically try to recreate all the cartoons I saw on TV in crayon from memory. I still have a lot of those school drawings today, and it's funny to see how much of an impression TV had on me back then.

On my report card (shown at right) Mrs. Ellis gave me good marks: all S+'s for the first session and all O's for the second. In her remarks about my progress, she noted that "he is interested in his work and feels satisfaction with his results. He plans his work carefully and works with sustained interest. He is able to express his ideas clearly and definitely using color in a dramatic way."

That's better than the last review I got at work!

****

Looking at the class photo today makes me smile, and brings back memories of carefree childhood days.  

Even though my family moved nine months after this photo, I regrouped with most of the kids years later when we all ended up at Masson Junior High School. A few had stayed in the public schools all the way to junior high, but many had gone to parochial school.

Since graduation, I've managed to keep track of a few classmates. Many of them were at the 20th and 30th Class Reunions for the Admiral King High School Class of 1977. Facebook also comes in handy to smoke some of them out!

Some classmates still live in the area like me. Bill Milks (top row, far left) is a great guy and the owner of Milks Mower Sales & Service on Cooper Foster Park Road in Amherst; he always takes good care of my lawn mower and me.

If any of my old classmates – or anyone who had Mrs. Ellis – reads this, please post some of your memories or thoughts!

Next: One of my favorite teachers: Miss Reiber