Photo by Roger Mc Conochie, date unknown.
The aroma of cleaning fluids has dissipated and the building itself has vanished, hauled off in trucks, fire escape and all. The iconic tree has trapped its last ball in its wide-reaching branches. Perhaps it was cut up and whittled into statuettes of former teachers and students. The grounds have yielded to houses and backyards for residents unconscious of the many human years spent in that orange-brick building. In what is now the air (in classrooms) or under the ground (in the basement with its little gym-floor, stage, and furnace-room retreat of the only male staff member).
A few years ago one of our schoolmates, Roger McConochie, handed me a photo of Mrs. Grant’s first grade class. He and I met at the 50th reunion of the Glenbard West High School class of 1960, an event that included an impressive number of Hawthorne alumni. (He also gave me two colored photographs of the school itself, which I put in a place safe enough that I can’t find them.) As unofficial conservator, I post this series of memorabilia. It supplements my appreciation of Hawthorne School in Along the Waccamaw: A Yankee Discovers a Home by the River (1990).
Floyd, Virginia
September 30, 2013
Here is a note from Nancy Johnson Furey (Glenbard West High School, class of 1960):
I have such fond memories of Hawthorne School, as three generations of my family graced those brick walls and scary fire escapes.
When my father, Bernard, came to this country from Sweden at age six, he lived in a two-room cabin on Crescent Boulevard by the DuPage River just west of Finley Road. He walked from there to Hawthorne and back every day and his favorite teacher was none other than Frances Crisler. Then there was me; thank goodness I only had to walk three blocks. As you know, Miss Crisler was then our principal. A generation later my two daughters were also students there. I was their third grade room-mother and became good friends with their teacher, Mrs. Waytena, with whom I still keep in touch to this day.
Thus a long history and wonderful memories of that special school are with me always. (2013)
Mrs. Alice Grant’s First Grade Class, Hawthorne Grade School,
Glen Ellyn, Illinois (1948-49)
An as-remembered-roster follows the class photograph. Pupils were identified by Roger McConochie with the help of Randall A. Wells and probably Marjorie Craddock & Alan Grindal, 2010. Corrections or further identifications are welcome. randallawells@yahoo.com
Back row, left to right:
- Linda Miller
- Sandy Alabaugh
- Bonnie McChesney
- Nancy Johnson
- Karen Stevens
- Sandy Cottingham
- Mary Lynne Marquess
- Unknown
- Betty Kutilek
- Unknown
Middle row:
- Stuart Stone
- Unknown
- Jim Weissenborn
- Art Langeloh
- Dick Fauquet
- Tom Hollinger
- Dan Boyer
- Peggy Williamson
- Anne Moore
- Mrs. Alice Grant
Front row:
- Craig Standen (?)
- Stuart Dunkel
- Unknown
- Unknown
- Roger McConochie
- Jim Wright
- Wayne Winder
- Lee Lantz
###
Howard Sarah 4th grade class 1951-1952
Hawthorne Grade School, Glen Ellyn, Illinois, 1951-52 school year.
Roster 2013, randallawells@yahoo.com
Corrections welcome.
Back row, left to right:
- Mary Lynn Marquess
- Nancy Johnson
- Lee Lantz
- Barbara Sorenson or Sorensen
- Tom Lane
- Craig Standen
- Dick Fauquet
- Shannon Cobe
Center row:
- Miss Sarah Howard
- Randy Wells
- Betty Kutilek
- Harry Strong
- Wayne Winder
- Monty Bates
- Stuart Dunkel
- Philip Spencer
- Stephanie Vega
Front row:
- Janet Oury
- Kim Cowlin
- Tom Hollinger
- Sue Hesterman
- Karen Westrom
- Robin Eddy
- Doris Scannell
- David Murphy
- Bonnie McChesney
Note: This photograph may seem only tenuously linked to the long-ago past. But I can still feel Miss Howard’s sudden and vexed fingers on the arm of my yellow sweater as she pulled me from the other side of the stage.
Hawthorne School, Glen Ellyn, Illinois
By Randall A. Wells
Dear Former Classmates—
I hope you will enjoy these questions about our grade school. In 1947 I started kindergarten there and transferred to Forest Glen for sixth grade. These questions reflect my idiosyncratic memory and that invite you to remember some details of your own. I offer this questionnaire in honor of those years in our neighborhood school. (This list appeared in 2010 and grew in 2013.)
1. Name three songs from any songbooks.
2. Name one book on the classroom bookshelf.
3. Name one book that a teacher read aloud to the class.
4. Name one word on the annual vocabulary and general knowledge test.
(Disclosure: I remember one because I was irked that David Murphy knew it.)
5. Name one framed painting (reprint) on the wall of a classroom.
6. What was the manufacturer’s name on the drinking fountains? (Two words.)
7. Who was “The Littlest Angel”?
8. What was the name of the character on the weekly (?) classroom-radio-program whose voice sounded electronic or like a train whistle?
9. Name one piece of music that was played on that same program. (By Haydn.)
10. What was unusual about Mr. Jack’s hand?
11. What was Mr. Jack’s first name?
12. What was the first name of each of these teachers:
Miss or Mrs. Williams
Miss Smith
Miss Stange
Miss Skidmore
Mrs. Bollinger
Miss Fairbanks
Mrs. Groom
Mrs. Cordes
Miss Ericson
Miss Butler
Miss Purdum
13. What was the first name of the principal, Miss Crisler?
14. Bonus points: what was the first name of Mr. Jellies, the janitor? The maiden name of Mrs. Bollinger?
15. Name one substitute teacher.
16. Name five schoolmates who left for other towns during your years at Hawthorne.
17. Name the weekly magazine we read in first grade.
18. If you were in that classroom, name the song that our classmate Doris Scannell sang while the traveling music teacher played the pump organ. (Doris was asked to perform because she had such a good voice.) Alternative question: can you name one song we sang in Music that refers to water? Hints in next line.
Sea, ocean, canal, bay, cavern.
19. On a kindergarten field trip to Miss Smith’s parents’ house—where did they live?
20. Name one destination of a field trip in town.
21. Who was Mrs. Farmer?
22. What instrument did you play in the first-grade performance for mothers?
23. Where in the school did you have your hearing tested?
24. Name the well-known, local female author who once signed books at school.
25. Name the Superintendent of Schools.
[26, added Sept. 30, 2013]: Name one other field trip besides to Mrs. Farmer’s.
[27, added Nov. 11, 2013.] Name one item you either drew out of the grab-bag or left inside it unwillingly.
28. Name one word that helped make up a crossword puzzle in a class exercise.
29. What appeared in the north windows of the school each December? (Question by Harry Strong.)
Hawthorne School, Glen Ellyn, Illinois
Memory Challenges
ANSWERS
1. Name three songs from any songbooks. Marine theme song, Erie Canal, Amalfi Bay, Clementine, Dixie, She’ll be comin’ round the mountain, Battle Hymn
2. Name one book on the classroom bookshelf. The Boxcar Family (orange cover)
3. Name one book that a teacher read aloud to the class. Understood Betsy, the Bible, Winnie the Pooh
4. Name one word on the annual vocabulary and general knowledge test. prior
(Disclosure: I remember this one because I was irked that David Murphy knew it.)
5. Name one framed painting (reprint) on the wall of a classroom.
Sunflowers by Van Gogh. Mother holding child, by Gauguin
6. What was the manufacturer’s name on the drinking fountains? (Two words.)
Halsey Taylor
7. Who was “The Littlest Angel”?
Protagonist of a cautionary cartoon about safety when crossing the street—a child who was hit, went to heaven, but came back OK.
8. What was the name of the character on the weekly (?) classroom-radio-program whose voice sounded electronic or like a train whistle? Sparky
9. Name one piece of music that was played on that same program. (By Haydn.)
“Surprise” Symphony
10. What was unusual about Mr. Jack’s hand? Missing a finger
11. What was Mr. Jack’s first name? Clarence
12. What was the first name of each of these teachers:
Miss or Mrs. Williams (ditto) Ruth (M. Craddock)
Miss Smith (ditto)
Miss Stange (ditto)
Miss Skidmore (ditto) Wilma (M. Craddock)
Mrs. Bollinger Grace
Miss Fairbanks Mary
Mrs. Groom Delia
Mrs. Cordes Charlotte
Miss Howard Sarah
Miss Ericson Effie
Miss Butler Nancy
Mrs. Purdum Maude
13. What was the name of the principal, Miss Crisler? Frances
14. Bonus points: what was the first name of Mr. Jellies, the janitor? The maiden name of Mrs. Bollinger? Bollinger [sic]
15. Name one substitute teacher. Mrs. Brubaker, Mrs. Boylston (Someone said that Mrs. Brubaker was a full-time teacher)
16. Name five schoolmates who left for other towns during your years at Hawthorne.
Jimmy Glaser, Bobby Stege, Sandra Cottingham, Will Franger (Crescent Blvd. on hill), Sandra Shryock (from CA?, NE corner Main & Hawthorn), Ralph Nickerson (? Main St. just uphill from Pennsylvania), Ronny Nicholson, Kim Cowlin, Ronald Glassman, prob. Barbara Sorensen
I think Sandra Cottingham transferred to Main St. School before moving out of town—M. Craddock
17. Name the weekly magazine we read in first grade.
Weekly Reader. [Workbook: Think and Do]
One article explained the Buick Le Sabre, a snazzy experimental design.
18. If you were in that classroom, name the song that our classmate Doris Scannell sang while the traveling music teacher played the pump organ. (Doris was asked to perform because she had such a good voice.)
“There’ll be a hot time in the old town tonight.” Songs with water: “America” (“From sea to shining sea”), “My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean,” “Erie Canal,” “Amalfi Bay,” “Clementine” (slipped, drowned, bubbles).
19. On a kindergarten field trip to Miss Smith’s parents’ house—where did they live?
Cloverdale. (Mistakenly called “Bloomingdale” in my original set of questions.)
It was a farm. M. Craddock. I climbed a tree–R. Wells
20. Name one destination of a field trip in town. Library, post office. Fire station—M. Craddock
21. Who was Mrs. Farmer? Owned a country estate and busloads of children come for the day w. bagged lunches. (I may have the name wrong.] . .] No, she lived near Ann Moore and was a bird and nature expert. She came and talked to us about birds . M. Craddock.
22. What instrument did you play in the first-grade performance for mothers?
Triangle??
23. Where in the school did you have your hearing tested?
Girls’ bathroom.
24. Name the well-known, local female author who once signed books at school.
Rosamond du Jardin (answer courtesy of Carol Ann Hill McQuinn.
25. Name the Superintendent of Schools. Mr. Riedel.
26. To the farm of Mr. George Goodrich, Sr. (a memory of Alan Grindal.) R. Wells adds these trips: town’s public library (we walked downhill on Forest Ave. one bright autumn day, some of us holding hands), U.S. post office (observation peep-hole upstairs in the cavernous room full of bins), and telephone company (a row of women sitting in front of wires).
27. Signaling mirror.
28. Crocodile.
29. Faux Stained Glass Windows created by 5th-6th (till Forest Glen stole our 6th graders), using black construction paper and cut-outs with colored cellophane paper.
Our schoolmate who answered the most questions but not enough to brag about: Alan Grindal. He also remembers going to the gym-auditorium to watch TV when General Douglas MacArthur resigned. I believe he remembered Mr. Riedel’s first name: Mark. He also remembered the first name of Mr. Jellies. I am grateful to Harry Strong, who furnished one last name, corrected the spelling of another, and corrected one first name (2013).
Please let me know if you have any corrections, comments, or additional names. Even additional class photographs that you would like me to post.
Contact randallawells via my Yahoo account. Thanks, RW.
###
Teachers: Miss Mary Fairbanks and Miss Sarah Howard. Pupils: Sue Hesterman, Stephanie Vega, Philip Spencer, Tom Hollinger, Janet Oury. Photo by Randy Wells.
Miss Sarah Howard and pupils.
Children left to right: Tom Hollinger, Bonnie McChesney, Shannon Cobe, Harry Strong, Barbara Sorenson (-sen), Philip Spencer.
Photo by Nancy Johnson Furey.
2013
With two sets of railroad tracks running through Glen Ellyn and three gated crossings, there was always a tension between the kinetic and the domestic.
In the fall of 1950, a car was hit by a train and its occupants were killed. One was the driver, Mr. Swatek, and two were our schoolmates, Marilla and Jeanie. (In Along the Waccamaw I mistakenly said the mother was driving.) These children were the cousins of Betty Kutilek, our classmates. I understand that the Glen Ellyn News printed an Extra on this civic tragedy. Hawthorne School asked a minister to come in, and the Rev. J. Stanley Stevens of the First Congregational Church (the father of our classmate Karen) gave an encouraging talk to an auditorium full of pupils.
Some of you might want to add a few words to this memorial. If so, just send them to randallawells@yahoo.com.
Bless you, sister Sisters.
Marilla Swatek.
Photo courtesy of Betty Kutilek Fox
Jeanie Swatek.
Photo courtesy of Betty Kutilek Fox.