School Story
I remember the daily chapel service and some of those given over to cultural enrichment, such as Mr. Beasley
reading us The Spirit of St. Louis. I don't recall the story, probably thought it was boring at the time (were we in fourth or fifth grade?) but what I took away was the importance of reading and sharing a book.
One of my favorite stories is from our senior French class. Once a week we had to prepare a conversation in FRench on a topic such as President De Gaulle and the Fifth Republic.
Madame Seewoster was our regular teacher but a special conversation teacher would come in for these lessons. The topic assigned one week was "The man you want to marry." Either we thought the question too embarrassing or else we were budding feminists because we were outraged at having to create a profile of our future husband. So we decided to say that the man we wanted to marry must be rich, come from a prominent family, belong to the right clubs, go to the right schools, have a second house in Florida or Michigan, and so forth. When the conversation class got underway, several of us responded with such descriptions. The teacher started shaking her head and becoming ruffled and unnerved. She turned to Betsy Buermann (Elizabeth Andrews) and said, "Betsy,
what about you?" clearly hoping that Betsy had some
sensible values. Without hesitation, BEtsy responded in
flawless French, "Ah, but, Madame, one cannot live by bread alone." The teacher was so upset by that comment, that she left the room in a huff and perhaps some tears. Mme Seewoster then scolded us but we felt we had made the point!
Another memory is of the yearbook where there was always a full page advertisement from a big company
which printed the statement in big letters, "Educate a man and you educate an individual. Educate a woman and you educate a family." At the time it made sense to me. Now when we study American history in the 1950s, I use it as an example of the social expectations for women.
