August, 1989
My college days were very happy days. I truly enjoyed studying…there was so much to learn! The middle teen years of tears and fears had given way to the calm of Webster College. Our small all girls college was a warm, friendly environment. I liked school, I enjoyed my subjects and most of my teachers. I was attending on a full scholastic scholarship, so I had to keep up my grades but I had been well prepared by Ursuline Academy with its college prep requirements such as four years of Latin. (I wonder if there, are any Latin teachers left?) The Library was a favorite quiet spot to study. In my mind’s eye I can still recall its warmth. Also my home environment had been one in which studying came first, excellent grades were expected.
At Webster College (WC), seniors took freshmen little sisters under their protective care. We had special assemblies, parties, picnics, and many formal dances. These were the days of hats and little white gloves for the proper young lady. It was a time to be closest friends with Lois Hillner (Niehoff), Anne Webb (Krieger), Dot Koziatek (Baniak), Pat Abbott (Biby), and Rosemary Weismantal.
My best friends studied Dietetics, one of the best majors at our college. I chose math (not too popular in an all girl’s college). After graduation I worked a year for Southwestern Bell Telephone Co. as an economic statistician. I really enjoyed that job. Math became my major, with minors in English and Education. I researched and wrote a paper to convince the College that Math is utilized in the Arts .e.g. perspective in art and length of strings on musical instruments. This allowed me to get an arts major in Math. I enjoyed the French language but now wish I had taken Spanish. (One of these days I’ll enroll in a Spanish class at Santa Monica’s emeritus college.) I had classes in English Lit and Shakespeare by a terrific teacher, Sr. Mary Louise. (Coincidentally years later she taught my daughter Barbara at Santa Clara Univ.) I was so inspired by her that my greatest desire in 1948 when I visited L.A was to go to the Huntington Library and see the famous Shakespeare Folio!
Sr. Helen Clare, my very highly degreed Math teacher was so inspirational. While under her influence I started a Math Club, our goal was to encourage women to enter the math field and to research jobs available in math for women. It was a jubilant day when I was asked to join the National Mathematics Fraternity PI MU EPSILON.
We took our education classes from a crazy very old male professor who was so boring…The books he used told us about the marvelous methods being used in California. In Missouri you did your class observation in year 3, and student taught for 6 weeks in year 4. Thus you graduated with a teaching credential. I did my student observation time at Webster High School, a public school near our college. (Back in the 60’s the prominence of drugs at Webster High School, along with others including Palisades High made national news.) My student teaching assignment was six weeks of geometry for girls at Nerinx Hall. I would get so nervous on the day the observation teacher was to attend that I’d visit every bathroom within range! I went into that classroom all fired up with “new methods.” What a disappointment to learn that the class contained 25% quick, smart learners; 50% slower, “It’s a class I have to take” students and 25% dorks who proclaimed “I just don’t understand math and I won’t try. ” I was supposed to keep them all happy! My student teaching of geometry told me High School teaching was not for me. Yet today I enjoy volunteering as a teacher of English.
My Dad always said he was sending me to college to make a good marriage. I resented his statement; women’s lib was 20 years away but the seeds were being planted. I proved him right by marrying one year out of college and having 6 children; a pattern followed by the majority of my classmates.
My parents were pleased when I was elected to Kappa Gamma Pi, whose goal was to provide a nucleus of women leaders for the Catholic church. I guess the studying was worthwhile because I was able to graduate Magna Cum Laude. I might have achieved Summa, but by my senior year, Michael was looking more important than books!
A Memorable Notre Dame Weekend
Only a Catholic raised in the area of Indiana, Illinois and Missouri (and maybe Iowa) could have loved Notre Dame University as we did. In the ’40’s Notre Dame was still an all male school and had a super football team. I can recall one elementary teacher who closed our Friday after school prayers with: “Now let us pray that N. D. wins its football game this Saturday!” The thrill of my college days was an invitation for a weekend at South Bend, the home of Notre Dame. A friend, Mary Catherine, was invited by her boyfriend, Paddy, to a football weekend and her parents insisted it be a “double date” weekend. So I was invited to go along. I joyfully acquiesced. We boarded the Illinois Central train for Chicago. Our conversation highlighted our anticipation. As the train pulled into South Bend, we looked out at a sea of male faces. Oh no…Pat, my date, was 6’tall! We went to a boarding house which was converted to a girl’s dorm for the week.
After freshening up, we four toured the campus. I was impressed. (Remember, I lived at home while attending a small women’s college.) So this was quite an adventure for me. There was the Knute Rockne Memorial Field House, Sacred Heart Church and the beautiful outdoor stone Grotto to Jesus’ mother Mary, the golden dome of the University, the Lake…a girl’s college was across that Lake. Today both schools are one.
Friday’s highlight was the Parade and Rally. That rally was splendiforous! The Saturday game against Purdue was a thriller. The weather was so cooperative…it was so cold we just had to huddle under blankets! We had terrific seats and in the jargon of the day, N.D. won natch!
A very elated group attended a Victory dinner and a western style dance. We four had had a rollicking weekend. Mary Catherine and I hated to get on the train and wave farewell to Paddy and Pat. Sunday we spent with my brother, Richard, seeing the “cold” windy city and famous Michigan Blvd. Then home to St. Louis and memories of a marvelous weekend.
[editor’s note: Little did she know that her grandson T.J. who was 8 years old when she wrote this, would attend Notre Dame, graduating in 2004 and that his wife Nicole would attend that “girl’s college across the Lake” which did not merge with Notre Dame, but chose to retain its independence when ND went coed.]
Our Summer of ’47
A phone call last Saturday night (in 1989) from a lady inquiring if I was the bed bug expert! “What, who, OH it’s you Dottie, and Annie and Lois and Rosemary calling from St. Louis to wish Mike and me a Happy 40th Wedding Anniversary.
Dottie said, “Do you remember Lake Taneycomo in the Missouri Ozark mountains?” Indeed.
We five college friends had rented an old cabin at this lake. For my generation this was quite an adventure similar to this generation’s back packing through Europe. We had to take a train half across the state to Springfield, and then a bus into the Lake Taneycomo area. What a wonderful week we planned…sunning at the beach, tennis, horseback riding, playing bridge, dreaming about our futures, and just being lazy and independent. It was still during WWII and rationing existed. We had fun flirting with young Johnny to get a little extra food for our ration coupons.
To go to Church on Sunday, we dressed up with the required young ladies attire of the day, white gloves and hats. We took the ferryboat across the lake to Branson where there was a Catholic Church. Later in the day we went to a movie. It was probably a propaganda type movie about the war. Hooray for our side; boo the Japs and/or Germans.
But back to my bug story. When we first arrived at the cabin we drew straws to decide who got which bed. Lois woke up the first morning with hives all over her. We future nurses of America decided she was allergic to the water. The second night Lois decided to move out on the bed on the screen porch. The third night I accepted the challenge and braved Lois’ indoor bed. I climbed between the clean sheets, a bit uneasily. Was it my imagination or did I feel a crawling, creeping creature! I leaped out of the bed, switched on the lights and “Voila” the lower sheet was covered solidly with brown bugs. Within two blinks of an eye, they had ALL disappeared. Into the wooden bed frame, I supposed! Would the other girls believe me?
Let me quote from our Rhymes for the Cottage, sung to the tune of an old camp song:
The beds at Taneycomo they say are mighty fine
But how the heck should we know the bugs move in at nine.
The men at Taneycomo they say are mighty fine
But none are over seven or under ninety-nine.
The little church at Branson they say is mighty fine
It’s built to fit a dozen but they squeeze in ninety-nine.
chorus:
I don’t want no more of Ozark Life
Gee Mom I want to go, Hey mom I want to go, Gee mom I want to go home!
Thank you bridesmaids and best man for calling on June 11.
Elaine's Memoirs 