Kuenemann, of Mulhouse, Haut-Rhin, France. We had a delightful exchange of letters
- I received nine from her - over a two-year period. Angèle wrote mostly in French and
I struggled to write in French also, an arrangement definitely to my advantage from the
standpoint of improving my French. (In 1945, during occupation duty following World
War II, enroute to a vacation in Switzerland, I had the opportunity to visit Mulhouse. I
called at Angèle’s address but learned that she had married and had moved to another
town to escape the anticipated bombing of Mulhouse, only to experience worse
bombing in the new town. I never learned her fate.)
French I was a rewarding course. I diligently memorized my conjugations
and my idioms and practiced my pronunciation and fell in love with the language. To
cap it all, on my report card Mrs. Warfield thoughtfully recorded for posterity:
“Highest rank on French exam. F.G.W.."
My first major endeavor as an upper classman was the last thing I would have
considered on my own: Public Speaking. But one day early in the school year, there
I was in the presence of Miss Mary Murphy, grande dame of the school library and
demanding coach of declaimers and debaters. My friend David Weiss had suggested
my name and, admittedly flattered, I agreed to see Miss Murphy for a tryout. Now,
David indisputably belonged there. He was the most informed and articulate student
in all the classes we shared. He would hold forth on a point in, say, history class with
such conviction and flair that you had to be impressed whether you understood him
74
Angèle Kuenemann, pen pal from Mulhouse, France.
