Mrs. Weadock retired the summer between my fifth grade and sixth grade, so I had Mrs. Bowers for sixth
grade (Coach Joe Bowers wife, believe it or not.).

However, Mrs. Bowers may have run into ill health the next year and Mrs. Weadock may have come back to fill in. 

LEEDY:

Incredibly I have no outrageous Blanche Leedy stories to tell.  I guess if you were a good student and behaved yourself she was good to you.

She did ask me to be patrol captain in 5th grade at the end of the year and I hated it. I was not leadership material in elementary school.

SPEAKMAN:

Fortunately the next year we had the new principal, Mr. Speakman, who had been in Korea and had hearing aids at a young age from combat-induced hearing loss.  He kept kids in line.

We tried hard all that first year to find a good nickname for him, because "Blanche the Avalanche" was so great, but we were unsuccessful.
 

One  time all the guys in 6th grade had a giant snowball fight on THE FRONT LAWN (forbidden territory) right after school, by design. We thought we were really something hot. 

First thing at school the next day, however, Mr. Speakman took care of business by boarding each and every guy in the class except David Cottman. 

SOME VERY SPECIAL MOMENTS:

I remember the tiny bathroom in the kindergarten room, but mainly because that was where I had to wait for about a half hour one day. 

I had felt sick and raised my hand. When I told the teacher I felt sick she said "Come up and get into the bathroom." I made it just to her desk and then, overwhelmed with nausea, barfed my brains out into the big metal wastebasket right beside her desk in front of the whole  class. 

There was a huge reaction and one of the girls in the front row commenced to get sick right on her desk. 

I was confined to the restroom until Mr. Briggs, the janitor could come and take me home.  Imagine that. Today no kid would be sent off in the janitor's pick up truck, but that is what happened, and I was mighty grateful.

MISS NELSON:

I think Miss Hilda Nelson was about as 4th grade teacher in the "Old School" mold that anyone could ever have. 

She was always considered tough, but never mean, and I think everyone understood her fairness and desire for us to learn.

I remember how she often would talk about the letters she would receive from some of her former students who were now doctors, lawyers, businessmen, etc. She would say something like "Maybe one day if I live long enough you'll grow up, too, and understand how important all these things you are learning will be for you in life." 

My reaction was kind of a humorous feeling of "Right --  if I ever get out of here, the last thing I'm gonna be doing is wasting my time writing letters to some Old Maid Bag of a retired schoolteacher.  Ha!" 

There have been times when my sister, Cindy, and I reminisced about her and her class when I wish I could have done just that however. 

One thing about her that has stuck with me all my life is that she gave me the lowest grade on a report card that I ever got at any level..... a C- in writing.

She told my mom, "I've seen some bad handwriting in my time, but his is some of the worst. He really deserves a D, but he does try hard, so I didn't have the heart to give it to him. My best advice is get him in a typing class as soon as you can. With penmanship like his, it's the only way he'll ever make it through college." 

That is how I wound up in a typing class in 8th grade with me, Paul Koch, and about 26 girls who all wanted to be secretaries. I never regretted learning to type, and Paul Koch and I had a blast together in that class.
 

SMOKING:

I forgot that Blanche the Avalanche smoked, but once Dennis mentioned it, I remember what a big deal we all made of it back then.