I’m a seventh-grader at Keating. It’s spring, 1954. I have been on the playground prior to first period and someone, I don’t remember who or how, has upset me. Now I am at my locker, fuming, twirling the numbers on my combination lock, and someone has tapped me on my shoulder. I must think it is the person who has just given me a hard time, and I jerk my elbow back in anger, but what it encounters is soft, like girl flesh. Who…?
I don’t remember a lot about the Keating years. It was a difficult transition for me from elementary school. Without ever trying I had been popular, at least among the boys, at Carlile. Now all of these kids had come together from different schools to form this large one, and, since I was quiet and shy, I was mostly unknown. Although I was nominated for a class office I wasn’t elected. I had only a few close friends, some old and some new, and didn’t realize that this was true of most of the other students.
Strangely, I have little recall of the teachers, the people who should have been influential in my life. I remember Tom Keach, a no-nonsense guy if there ever was one. Mr. Davidson, the music teacher, who I now suspect was gay even though, to my knowledge, he never wore yellow and green on Thursday. He was a smart man who taught us much more than music. Coach Slack was a typical coach. He wore tight white t-shirts, sent us out to play football or basketball, and that, in my memory, is about all he did. I remember him telling us, “Mothers call me and say, ‘why did you give my son a D? He tries.’ I tell them, if he tries in math class but doesn’t know what 4 times 10 is, does he get an A?”
There was a tall, thin teacher, I think his name started with W, who took us on a field trip to the Molly Kathleen mine in Cripple Creek, where his father still worked as a miner. Some of you remember that. And another male teacher who had the unenviable task of being the “Health” teacher, to teach us boys about sex without really teaching us about sex. I think a woman teacher had the duty of teaching the girls about sex without really teaching them about sex. Once in that male class some anonymous boy let a toxic fart that could have caused asphyxiation at the other end of the hall. Those of us in the room were holding our hands over our faces, gasping and laughing. Nothing is quite as crass as a fourteen-year-old boy. I believed that the fart was an editorial comment on what that boy thought of the subject and the teacher. The teacher, Geron? Something like that, tore into us although obviously we were not all to blame.
And then there was Dorothy Wambaugh. She was my seventh-grade homeroom teacher and taught Colorado History. Now, as something of a history buff, I can’t believe that I thought Colorado History was boring. Perhaps it was because all I really wanted to do was look at Miss Wambaugh. She was a young, pretty, short redhead with large breasts. She had a warm personality that made us believe that she liked and cared about us, although she had a temper and occasionally ripped the entire class, causing us all to stare quietly at our desktops. I was her teacher’s pet.
I don’t know what I did to deserve her favor; I only know that I enjoyed it. I don’t remember what it was she did that made me think I was her pet, but a person can tell when he is a favorite. Naturally, I had a huge crush on her. So that morning when I jerked my elbow back hard into her breast, and she, surprised, asked me why I was so angry, I mumbled unintelligibly in great shame and embarrassment. She wasn’t really hurt and she laughed it off, much to my relief, because the last thing I wanted to do was to harm our intimate relationship.
Not long after, just before school ended, Miss Wambaugh told us that she was getting married and leaving the state. I didn’t even know she was dating! She wouldn’t be back the next year. I couldn’t understand how she could leave me after all we had meant to each other. I never forgave her. I wonder what became of her.
Jerry Miller
January 9, 2008 at 5:21 am |
Jerry:
Had you had money enough for Wambaugh’s huge, huge emerald engagement ring, she would have picked you. I know she would have! Wasn’t she gorgeous? She suggested that the motto for our class be the word “perservance.” Until seventh grade, I’m rather certain that that word had never been in my vocabulary, much less the understanding of its meaning. I’ve thought of her many times because of it.
Cordelia Smith’s second period lessons were also invaluable. “I think that I shall never see . . . ” or “When earth’s last picture is painted, and the tubes are twisted and dried . . .” Unlike Wambaugh, Cordelia looked the teacher part, but I came to like and appreciate her a lot.
Carl Wilkerson. Was he the miner’s son?
l.
January 9, 2008 at 5:12 pm |
Jerry, I also remember getting into a lot of trouble because I walked down the hall with a sign (POW-Prisoner of Wambaugh). It was good for a laugh and a trip to the office (who was that pricipal?) and a uncomfortable evening in front of my dad . Bob
January 10, 2008 at 3:18 am |
C’mon Gerald, fess up! You were the “anonymous boy” who giant-farted in the boys’ sex ed class.
I’ll bet you never farted, not even once, in delicious Dorothy Wambaugh’s homeroom.
yer ‘ol pal, Ray
January 14, 2008 at 3:43 pm |
Laurine, you are right. It was Carl Wilkerson. I will pay a dollar to anyone who can come up with the Health teacher’s name.
Bob, the principal was “Old Man” Leo Scharton. His daughter, Sharon, was in our class. Old Man Scharton was probably all of 45.
Ray, don’t be accusing me. Weren’t you in that class too?
Does anyone have any pictures from Keating? Did we take class pictures? I don’t have any.
January 14, 2008 at 4:41 pm |
The boys’ Health teacher’s name is (drum roll) Coach Trevithick.
No, Jerry I was not in Coach Trevithick’s class when you farted.
Please send cash for my correct answer. No coins please.
Thank you, and goodnight.
Ray in Okinawa
January 22, 2008 at 11:52 am |
Jerry,
Seriously, I am fairly sure coach Bob Trevithick taught Boys’ Health at Keating. I remember him very well: short, athletic, crew cut. I think he coached football, and maybe other sports. I looked in our Central annual and found Harold Trevithick, who taught shop. Harold was not a coach as far as I know, but I do believe he was the older brother of Bob Trevithick. Of course I could be right that Bob Trevithick taught Boys’ Health at Keating, and still he might not have been the teacher in your sex ed class.
I do not remember Dorothy Wambaugh at all, in spite of her apparent beauty. I have no memory of seeing a short, red-haired teacher-beauty with large breasts at Keating. I do remember her name, however.
I do remember Coach Slack as a rather primitive dude, short and with huge biceps. I think he was a little quirky, as he seemed to enjoy actually physically hurting male students by pinching their middle shoulder area (trapezius muscle) to the point that the student would sometimes be forced to drop to his knees. He did this as a discipline to let you know he was not pleased. He pinched me a number of times. Actually I think he did it just to have fun.
Speaking of quirky, I do remember fastidious Mr. Davidson who, as you said, was probably gay. I also remember you previously wrote something about the time he confiscated a squirt gun during class (maybe yours), and stomped it to bits in front of the class. I wish that I could have seen that!
I never had Dorothy Wambaugh as a teacher. My Colorado history teacher in the 8th grade was Tom Keach. I liked him okay until the day when he (apparently) became very upset because I was talking as he was teaching. He walked up to my desk and, without warning, literally pulled me out of my seat by my hair. Swear to God! To this day I regret that I did not take some kind of action against him. It really hurt. In those days I guess teachers could get away with that kind of crap!
On the event of my mother’s surprise 80th birthday dinner in Pueblo (wife Kemme and I actually traveled from Germany to attend in 1989), I had occasion to meet Tom Keach again, since he was invited to the dinner. When we met again, I just shook hands, even as I thought very seriously of reminding him then and there of the hair-pulling incident. I doubt if he would have remembered it.
I am hoping for another chance to meet Tom Keach, and hear what the hair-pulling bully of junior high boys has to say. Now that I am grown, I doubt that he would say much.
Make my day, Tom.
Ray
January 22, 2008 at 11:47 pm |
Jerry, et al.,
It is 8:45 am in Okinawa now, on Wednesday, January 23. I just phoned Tom Keach in Pueblo, where it is 4:45 pm on Tuesday, January 22. I am not making this up.
He was very pleasant and, as Jeff Arnold has said to me, is a nice guy. He denied pulling me up out of my seat by my hair in his 8th grade Colorado history classroom. But he did. He denied it in a nice way, so I forgave him, even though he denied it.
I even said, “God Bless You, Tom” knowing full well there probably is no God, certainly not a personal God……..but I digress.
I love to digress. I would rather digress than do almost anything else.
Tom seems to be leading an active and meaningful life at age 79. I believe he lives with his wife Louise, who answered the phone.
God Bless,
Ray in Okinawa
June 20, 2008 at 4:31 pm |
I remember Tom Keach at Keating Jr. High, and I remember him the same way Jerry does, as “no nonsense,” which might put it mildly. By the time I started at Keating, which was after all of you had graduated from Central, he was assistant principal. Someone asked who was the principal at Keating. It might have been Scharton (can’t remember first name) who was principal when I was there. He looked like he’d probably been the prinicipal since the beginning of time.
I do remember the name of the principal at Carlile Elementary when I was there, who was Leo Fisher.
July 19, 2008 at 4:58 am |
Jerry,
The health teachers name was Caldwell. You owe me a dollar.