What I Remember — From Seventh Grade (1963–1964)

I’ve heard it said that a child remembers nothing from his or her first three years. I’ve also heard it said that old people like myself — I turned 73 recently — remember more about their youth than they do about last week. Thus, as I prepare to attend my 55th high-school reunion of the class of 1969 later this summer, I thought it might be interesting to see what I actually remember from those early years, kindergarten through twelfth grade in the Catholic schools I attended in upstate New York. Since I don’t honestly remember much from those early years of school, I thought I would post my vague memories, and perhaps they might stir up the memories of others who attended school during that same era.

For seventh grade, we moved up to the third floor, and for the first time, we changed classes. If memory serves me correctly, the two seventh-grade classes occupied the western end of the building, and the two eighth-grade classes inhabited the eastern end. I don’t think we changed for every subject, and I don’t specifically remember which teachers taught which subjects, but I think Sister Monica taught English on our end, and we had to cross through the auditorium/gymnasium for our math class with Sister Anne.

Sister Anne’s classroom on the northeast corner is still vivid in my mind today because that’s where I was sitting on Friday…