The most fun I remember having in Henderson’s field was the track meet we
had that summer. Out of odds and ends we built sawdust pits for the running and
standing broad jumps as well as uprights and crossbar for the high jumps and pole
vault (the poles were bamboo rug-inserts). Other equipment, such as the shotput,
discus and javelin were fairly easy to simulate. Here was one type of sport I enjoyed,
although I certainly didn’t excel.
During that whole summer vacation, I learned firsthand that a paper boy’s job
can be hard. A classmate, Bob Reinhard, asked me to serve his route while he was
away at his family’s summer place. I jumped at the chance because I could use the
money. The route was Greene Street starting at Chase, from which point on one side
of the street many of the houses were perched quite a way up on the hillside. This
meant either walking up many steep steps or throwing the papers up from the street.
I tried both. Walking won out when it was clear that my pitching arm had never
improved. Then there were the heavy Sunday papers, which made an excruciatingly
awkward burden for a still rather delicate young man. Worst of all was the
combination of summer heat, exertion and side effects from my hayfever medicine.
I hated the job. The lesson I should have learned was that I was not cut out to carry
newspapers. But I didn’t learn the lesson and took on the job again the next summer,
but by then I was able to cope with it better.
v. - Junior Year, 1937-38
Mrs. Anna Higgins, my home-room monitor, was an attractive, patrician
matron. Kindly but unsmiling. She was my English teacher as well. It was the first
English course which I recollect with any clarity or pleasure, from which I conclude
that Mrs. Higgins must have been a good teacher. I did well.
After aceing two years of Latin, perhaps confirming my bent for languages, I had
eagerly anticipated French I. (I never forgot the nonsense rhyme Allan Trevaskis taught
me when we were little kids - heaven knows where he picked it up: Parlez-vous français?
Une tasse de café. Très bien, merci. Oui, oui.) Mrs. Florence Warfield was our wonderful
teacher; a great part of her success was her delightful personality and good humor.
I belonged to the French club, “Les Francophiles," which met periodically at
members’ homes. Whether it enhanced my learning of the language is doubtful, but
it did give me an added social outlet and the opportunity to see how some of my
peers’ families lived. And I hosted my first party when the club met at my house.
Through Mrs. Warfield, I started corresponding with a French “pen pal," Angèle
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