Sept. 30, 2010

Do you have any special Homecoming experiences to relate?

My foster sister Pauline Shepherd was in the same class as I even though she was a year older and thus Leesa's age. We had a lot of fun together but one time for Homecoming we almost made mom and dad faint. Pauline was in the Homecoming queen contest and for part of that contest they had to make a cake to sell at an auction. Pauline made, what looked like to me, an exceptionally good cake. It was german Chocolate with a special coconut and brown sugar frosting. So during the auction I did what any good brother would do for his sister and that was to try to run up the price on the cake. I succeeded and it was close to $ 100.00 before I quit at the thought that I really didn't want mom to faint. I didn't buy the cake but the person bidding against me did the second I stopped. It was a lot of fun and luckily I didn't win. I think though that it made Pauline's night.

Sept. 29, 2010

How did your school celebrate Homecoming?

We celebrate Homecoming during basketball season since we had no football program. We always had a formal dance and that was about it. I don't remember any Homecoming king but we did have Homecoming Queen contests that were pretty intense. In fact Marie was Miss Congeniality for one of them.

Sept 28,, 2010

Did you ever have a "good friend" who did something mean to you?

I apparently had good friends. I cannot recall any of my friends ever doing something mean to me.

Sept. 27, 2010

Tell about a memorable birthday cake?

It was my 19th birthday (and now my 57th one also.) My sister in law made a cake shaped like a camera (and my daughter made one also shaped like a camera only she added the strap to it as well.)

Sept. 26, 2010

What was your school mascot?

The Golden Eagle

Sept. 25, 2010

What were your school colors?

Blue and White.

Sept. 24, 2010

Do you remember a special school custodian?

There were two specifically that I knew and loved. One was a cousin (not a first but not too far distant either) and that was Glen Stevenson.He was very kind to all of the students and we in turn were kind to him as well. He was probably more special to me because I knew he was related just never knew quite how. (Well he was from the Stevenson side of the family and my grandmother was a Johnson somehow related to the Stevenson's, I would have to check my genealogy to know for sure. Update: 02-24-2019- Grandma Rozilla Poulson and Aunt Ruby-Glen's mother were sister's) I remember once long after he had moved to Vernal when my family visited him and he showed us the pride of his backyard a two story playhouse. I t was pretty neat.

The second one was Harold Spencer, my neighbor, Home Teaching companion, and bus driver. We spent a lot of time together doing farm work as well as seeing him at school and church. Harold was the one that I was hunting for when I shot the largest buck I had ever seen and he later told me that the meat was really good. The Lord had provided that deer for his family, not me.

Both men hold special places in my memory.

Sept 23, 2010

How did you get to and from school?

I rode a bus for the most part.we were the second stop in the morning and the second to the last at night which meant we spent the most time on the bus except for the first and last stop. There were a lot of times though when I would run home after school in the spring and fall months. Then there were the times we had primary after school usually on Wednesday's and we would walk to the church and ride home with mom or a neighbor. There were also times when I would just walk down main street to the bus garage and spend time with dad at work then go home with him. It was mostly the bus however.

Sept. 22, 2010

What is the meanest thing you remember a teacher doing to a student?

We had great teachers in Duchesne and as it was a small town there didn't seem to be any bad things that were done when I was there by teachers. I cannot think of a single instance where there was any abuse to a student by a teacher that I knew of at all. Maybe I just kept one eye open for the good and both eyes shut to the bad.

Sept. 21, 2010

What is the worst trick that you remember a student pulling on a teacher?

I am coming up blank except for one that my father told of he and his friends when he was in school. They took the principals wagon apart and reassembled it on the roof. They had to be pretty darn energetic and I don't think in our day that taking a car apart would have been quite so easy.

We did have pranks pulled on the school in general though. Usually at the time of year for the Junior Prom the older class (Seniors) or someone would in general would pull a prank to slow down the progress on decorating for the prom. The worst one however was done against our class when someone through a bottle of kerosene scent into the air ducts. Well that particular smell is just like skunk scent and the ones who did it actually got in some pretty deep trouble with the law.

Sept 20, 2010

What did your report cards usually have to say about you?

3rd Grade

2nd report

Kent has really been putting forth a lot of effort in his classwork. He has been his class time to good advantage. I hope he will continue to do so. Mrs. Lewis

We are happy to know that Kent is improving in his use of class time and we appreciate all that you are doing to help him. Mrs Kermit Poulson AND NOW FOLKS those were the only comments that I found on any of my report card clear through 12 grade.

Sept 19, 2010

If you ever were in a fight tell about it.

Beat a dead horse into the ground will ya? I have told about the fight with Jay before no need to tell it again and I was never in another fight.

Sept 18, 2010

Describe a typical school day outfit in grade school...

We usually wore a button up shirt with Wrangler of Levi pants.

In High School...

We usually wore a button up shirt with Wrangler of Levi pants.

Where did you usually buy your clothes?

From Sears catalog or if lucky we made a trip to Provo and bought them at some clothes store. (Malls didn't exist at that time.)

Sept 17, 2010

Who was the best teacher you ever had? Why?

Mr. Goodrich. If I ever had a favorite teacher it was Goodrich. He was our math and science teacher. He could tell when students were bored and when they needed a challenge and thus I liked him. He taught my senior class chemistry and could tell that I had an ability to understand electronics and electricity. I ended up making an electric photo cell while I was in his class. I don't remember anyone else in the class ever making one but it was something that I really had a lot of fun doing and I think he enjoyed helping me with it. I spent several hours after school even working on it and similar types of things.

Sept. 16, 2010

Did you ever have a crush on a teacher?

We didn't get many young beautiful teachers out there and so there wasn't much of a chance to have a crush. Not that I didn't have a crush on someone it just wasn't a teacher. I'll leave it to you to guess who that was.

Sept 15, 2010

What teacher did you dislike the most? Why?

I don't remember having a dislike for any of my teachers except the 7th grade math teacher if I had to choose one. I really didn't dislike any of them but to me he was a very poor teacher. He was brilliant and had a great mind that couldn't teach on a 7th grade level. He was never able to really communicate with us but probably did OK with the seniors.

Sept 14, 2010

What was your most embarrassing school moment?

The day I got kicked out of English Class because I needed to go take more yearbook pictures. I think I have written about it before but it was the worst moment because it was the only time anything remotely happened like that. I was a model student and that wasn't the model I wanted nor the Librarian, mom.

Sept 13, 2010

There wasn't a question for Sept 12, so I skipped it.

Name the schools that you went to.

Now this is an easy one. Duchesne Elementary, Duchesne High School, BYU (continuing ed for a health class that I needed to have for graduation from high school, another class that Serena didn't have to take), Snow College and to the school of Hard Knocks.

Sept 11, 2010

How did you experience the 9/11 attacks?

When the attacks happened I was working for Anderson Cabinets and Mantels. I did the finishing work on all of the cabinets and mantels that were built there. We had a radio in one of the rooms that we could here inmost of the shop. When the announcement came across the radio for the first time I thought that it was just a joke. Then as the continued and we had gathered around the radio we were beginning to be stunned by what we were hearing and as the event continued and they announced the pentagon and the plane that went down in the field with the last calls from people on the plane to their loved ones it started to really hit us.

I went home that night and continued to watch the TV coverage. I will not forget what happened and many of those scenes will go un-erased from my memory.

Sept. 10, 2010

Tell about the naughtiest kid in school.

Would have to have been Jay for reasons that I have already shared but he really wasn't too bad I guess. Other than that we had good kids in our school and I enjoyed all of them while growing up and attending school with them.

Sept 9, 2010

Tell about who you thought was the smartest kid in school and why.

Why it was me of course:) Actually it was Serena Davies because she got to be Valedictorian and I was second as the Salutatorian. The main reason she was smarter however was that she had was smart enough to take less hard classes to fail tests and lower grade scores so she beat me out by a couple hundredths of a point. I have no hard feelings and was actually quite surprised when I was the second one and it wasn't that fun since we both had to talk at graduation. (We actually both had to talk at Seminary graduation as well since we were the top ones in that class as well.)

Sept. 8, 2010

Did your parents ever make you wear something stupid to school?

No but when I was in the 9th grade we had initiations and the seniors made me wear a dress and dress like cinderella going to the ball. If I remember correctly I had to wear it all day as well and we even had to walk in a parade down main street in the clothes that they made us wear. It was pretty humiliating but that was what the whole day was about. We had to rebuild white wash the "D" on the hill in the afternoon which was fun since the whole day was pretty much all about missing classes without a need for an excuse from our parents. I don't remember doing much of an initiation when I was a senior even though we probably did and that I am sure was due to the fact that we were on the side causing the humiliation not receiving it.

Sept. 7, 2010

Tell about the playground equipment at your grade school.

I kind of already told you. I did forget a few of the details. The swing set had three swings with flat board seats. The metal poles forming the A frame construction was fun to climb and we would often climb up them and then slide back down. It was quite tall but I really have no idea for sure how high they were at the top of the A frame ,I would guess about 12 feet. We also had a merry-go-round that I didn't mention. It was the typical tilted slightly to one side construction and I did spend a lot of time going around in circles on it. We also had some tetter-totters, at least that was what we called them. There were several sets and we had a lot of fun there. (You always had to have a buddy in order to use them though since sitting on the ground on just one side was quite boring.) We had a cement tennis court also if I remember correctly with a couple of basketball hoops on it but I don't remember ever playing on them other than to race across them during a game of tag. Well I don't remember any of the other equipment so I'll stop there.

Sept 6, 2010

What do you remember doing at recess?

Of course this only applies to 1 thru 6th grades since I went to Grandma's after the morning classes when in Kindergarten and 7 - 12 had no recess only breaks between classes.

I remember that we had a very tall swing set, monkey bars, and tetherball poles. We also had kick balls and baseballs. We also had the big medicine balls. So what I usually did since I was seldom chosen to be on the baseball team was to swing and bail out of the swing. (That was until one of my friends broke an arm and then we didn't get to go as high as we wanted to because a teacher was there to stop us.) So I liked also to play keep away with a group of friends with the medicine balls and the rest was pretty much chasing the girls around the grounds. (Well not really but I sometimes wanted to but I was a bit to shy.) I did play baseball sometimes on rare occasions but wasn't that good at it since I was pretty small or at least I think I was, it may have just been an excuse to not have to play and find out if I was good or not.

Sept. 5, 2010

Tell about a school bully.

I was lucky to have had only one bully. I was in 6th grade and he was in 3rd but he was actually larger than I was and a lot meaner. He beat me up during recess once and only once but that was enough for me to learn to avoid him. Later in high school I got to where we were friends but not best friends. I use to play at his home because he had a brother the same age as I and we were pretty good friends. Anyway I guess the only other bullies were the seniors in high school. We had 7th through 12th grades in our school and the seniors always liked to pick on the 7th grader. We had one hall where the stairs were actually a ramp from one floor to the next and were in a U shape with the sides and top open to the rest of the ramp and the seniors held me upside down over the top of the rail once but I was so small it wasn't much of a task and then someone else reminded them that my mother was a teacher so they ought to think twice about it. It never happened again either.

Sept. 4, 2010

Tell about your school year calendar.

I suppose we had calendars but I don't remember ever really using them. In elementary school we would have Halloween carnivals each year near Halloween and we would get out for Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks. We would have a couple of days in Sept or Oct for UEA. (Utah Education Association) Teachers were supposed to go to meetings in Salt Lake City but it was mostly just a couple of days out of school. We never had any Teacher Preparation Days and we generally started after Labor Day and ended before Memorial Day. In High School we would add the dances to the calendar. Usually a Home Coming dance after some basketball game and a Jr and Sr Prom in the spring. We would have a yearbook signing day just before the end of the year and Graduation on the last day of school for everyone. We would have basketball games on friday nights in Jan and Feb and wrestling meets, track meets and a few other sports mixed into the schedule through the year. That I guess was our calendar.

Sept. 3, 2010

Back-to-school-days... What do you remember about that big yearly "First Day of School"?

I remember the wearing of our new clothes that came once a year also and it was at school beginning each year. We might get some at Christmas but it was pretty much very scant compared to the beginning of school. I really didn't get that much then either because I got mostly hand-me-downs instead but I did get some and that was good.

The other memories included the first ride to school on the bus that made the whole summer seem to just vanish with the familiar ride that we had 9 of the 12 months of the year. I also remember the last three or so years sitting on the flower bench that was across at the end of the hall and watching Marie walk to school that first day. That was always fun for me no matter which day but especially the first day because I knew there were many more to come.

Sept. 2, 2010

VJ Day ... Do you have a memory involving the end of World War 2?

If not, then share a memory of Vietnam.

I grew up in the era of the Viet Nam war. I had a high draft number so I wasn't going to likely be drafted but the war was still plenty close to home. Clair joined the army so he would have a better chance of choosing where he would go and Stan was drafted and went to Nam. His experiences over there he hasn't really talked about too much but we were all very aware of the blessings from the Lord that he had which brought him home early. He awoke one day seeing double and it wouldn't go away. They finally sent to a hospital in Japan and then when they couldn't determine the cause of the problem sent him to the Denver VA hospital where he woke up one morning seeing fine again and he told me several years ago he has only had about a five minute occurrence of it since that time but he was discharged honorably from the military due to that problem. Other that I knew didn't return. I had a cousin killed in the war when I was a senior in High school and have never forgotten the day we found out. It was Jack Skewes little brother, Blake, and he came to tell his wife Dea who was in my senior class that it had happened.We were all very shocked and saddened but Jack took it the hardest by far.

It was apparently from shrapnel.

Sept. 1, 2010

Do you remember any Labor day traditions of your youth?

It was just another day of work on the farm and dreading it since it meant school would be starting the next day and summer was over. I don't ever remember any specific things that we would do to celebrate the holiday but it seem like the last of the summer chores were still there and of course we couldn't go shopping for school clothes since the stores all closed on all of the holidays as well. I suppose that it also meant dad and mom didn't have work so we could get the last full day of canning in for the summer, the rest would be done on saturdays till all of the fruit was put up and the jams and jellies made for the year.