My Road To Rotary

Chapter 15

The Last Day of School

IN MY BOYHOOD we did not have to depend entirely upon imported talent for entertainment; some of it was home-grown and of the best; Caleb Pennypacker for instance. Caleb was the son of Jonas Pennypacker, a hard working man who never smiled. Caleb was nothing that his father was and everything that his father was not; he never worked and he always grinned; in fact, his face was wreathed in grins from morning until night and his grin begot grins on the faces of others. He enjoyed the distinction of being the "grinniest" and the naughtiest boy in town. There was little room for melancholy in Wallingford as long as Caleb lived there. He viewed the world as a huge joke and all he had to do was to unleash it and that duty he gladly performed.

To us younger fry perhaps the most conspicuous of Caleb's varied skills and accomplishments was the knack he had of converting himself into a sore-eyed old man through the simple expedient of turning the upper lids of his eyes inside out where they would remain until he willed it otherwise. This amazing transformation, he could accomplish in a twinkling and folks who saw it for the first time never knew whether to laugh or to cry. The exercise of this remarkable faculty was an excellent way of relieving the tedium of school life. Whenever the teacher became too serious, Caleb could relieve the tension by turning his upper eyelids inside out. For this voluntary contribution, he was frequently ferruled but he was never cured of it. Naturally all of the boys envied him and did their best to follow his noble example but none succeeded. When Caleb left school turning eyelids inside out became a lost art.

Naturally there were other boys who made contributions of an extra curricular nature to school life. George Marsh could make his ears wag as a horse wags his ears in fly time. It was a grand accomplishment and always brought down the house. "Inky" Ballou could make his knuckles crack like a pistol shot. Such contributions are entitled to honorable mention but the only one to really shed lustre on the Wallingford school was Caleb in his inimitable performance of turning his upper eyelids inside out.

When school was in session, some of the trustees made unexpected calls in order to inform themselves of the progress being made. When Trustee Charles Congdon called, he was generally expected to make a speech and he always lived up to expectations. He invariably closed his remarks with a poem which he considered appropriate. I heard it so often, I remember it now:

"As I walked by myself I talked to myself, and myself said unto me:

'Beware of thyself, take care of thyself, for no one will care for thee'."

Whenever I saw him coming into the room I had difficulty in restraining myself from arising and greeting him with the words of this poem.

Mr. Congdon was, however, a fine old gentleman. Among other things, he rented saddle horses at twenty-five cents per hour to those who could afford that luxury. I enjoyed the inestimable privilege of hiring a saddle horse from Mr. Congdon once upon a time. Where I got the necessary twenty-five cents, I do not remember, though so important an event should have stamped itself upon my memory as did the experience of finding a silver ten cent piece in a pile of rubbish back of Ben Crapo's store. The fact that I found the ten-cent piece was not the wonder; the wonder was that some Vermonter must have lost it without publicizing his calamity; he may, of course, have gotten it dishonestly. Sometimes boys served as temporary hitching posts for farmers with business to transact at the grocery stores; it was easier to throw the reins to a boy than to hitch and unhitch. On taking up the reins again, he would say, "Thank you, boy; some day I'll give you a quarter, the first one I find rolling up hill." That was the nearest I ever came to earning a quarter as a hitching post.

On the first day of May it was customary for the school teachers to take their charges into the woods to gather May flowers and trailing arbutus and to welcome the migratory birds to their northern homes. Once a Maypole was erected in the school yard and we danced and frolicked around it in the manner of another age.

Decoration Day was another celebration which took place at end of May. We decorated the graves of the soldiers, who had died in the Civil War, with spring flowers and we placed a small flag upon each grave. Civil War Veterans dressed in full regalia, led the procession to the cemetery where patriotic speeches were made. Our veterans made a very brave showing; Harlon Strong, our Sunday School Superintendent, Martin Williams, the cheese-maker, Mr. Thomas, the paper-hanger, all looked particularly well in their uniforms and our hearts swelled nearly to the bursting point when the Congregational church quartette sang, "We deck their graves alike to-day with springtime's fairest flowers," and again when the Hartsboro drum corps played. "John Brown's body lies mouldering in the grave "Yankee Doodle" and other patriotic airs. Deaf as I have become to many shallow forms of emotional appeal, my toes have tingled and tears have come welling into my eyes when our few remaining Civil War Veterans came limping by in recent years.

Joy bells surely rang in our hearts in the springtime; like frisky lambs we cavorted and, like tumblebugs, we turned somersaults and handsprings without regard for life or limb. One day Fay's father, who had been watching us from a distance, shouted, "Remember, Boy, your neck isn't long enough to splice."

Early in June came the long awaited "last day of school." The air in the school house is heavy with the perfume of gorgeous red, pink and white peonies. The girls are arrayed in new summer finery; the boys stiff and uncomfortable in their best Sunday clothes. Grand orations have been carefully committed to memory during long evening hours at home and nothing except the dread bugaboo, "old man stagefright," is likely to interfere with their delivery. There is no getting away from the fact that "old man stagefright" is a factor to be reckoned with. He begins his work early; long before the great occasion. During the quiet hours of the night he is on hand to prod his helpless victim. Can anyone imagine worse fortune than waiting for his name to be called on the program of the 'last day of school?" One after the other, earlier victims have been called upon; they have taken their place on the platform, tremblingly waged battle with the "old man," and returned to their respective seats either in victory or defeat.

Then comes the last name on the program. There is nothing to sustain the victim except the thought that it will be over soon, and the glorious long vacation that appears like a beacon-light ahead. A cold sweat stands in beads upon his brow; from somewhere in the distance a voice is heard. What is it that it says? "Paul Harris will now recite 'The Polish Boy'." I arise and step forward, "old man" close by my side. Soon another voice is heard, loud and brave- whose is it? Great Scott, my own! I have a vague feeling that the three of us, "The Polish Boy," "old man stagefright" and I are making quite a job of it but I am not sure of that fact. A lady in the front seat is having considerable trouble with her new hat and seems little concerned with the stirring events taking place on the platform; Thank God, she doesn't have to be reckoned with! I wish they all had new hats to fuss with; anything to take their minds off me.

Eventually the last word rings through the packed schoolroom and Paul Harris returns to his desk amidst salvos of applause. The Polish boy is forgotten and the "old man" buried, not to be resurrected until one year hence, when in due course of events there will be another 'last day of school."

The professor closes proceedings with appropriate remarks; touches his desk bell for the last time, and I slither away through the jam of mothers, fathers, sisters, and brothers, out of the suffocating atmosphere of the peony-scented room, out, out, where I can get a breath of uncontaminated air; and hasten to the swimming hole; oh, the swimming hole; glorious, carefree vacation time has begun.

Oh, for boyhood's time of June

Crowding years in one brief moon

When all things I heard or saw

Me, their master, waited for.

-John Greenleaf Whittier.

Vacation days were anxious days for grandfather. One day he asked me to go with him to the barn. Arriving there we seated ourselves, he in the wheelbarrow and I in the swing and then he said:

"Paul, I want to talk with you about your future. It is a matter of great concern to me. I wonder at times if I am doing right by you. It is my observation that growing boys should have daily work to do and I feel that boys who are taught to work have a great advantage over boys who have nothing to do except play. You do nothing but race from morning till night, Paul. Now there is not much work about this place except what I do myself but what I want you to do is to study a part of each vacation day and the best time to begin is right now."

He drew from his pocket an ancient spelling book, yellow with age, and began to pronounce words for me to spell. This experience was repeated several times during the summer and upon such occasions it was my custom to dawdle lazily in the swing, which had been dedicated to other purposes, and to spell as best I could, although I fear I did so with unconcealed resentment. The swimming hole cried out its invitation to a plunge and my mind was tortured with fears lest the gang break up before I could report for business. If such a thing happened, my day would be ruined; nothing could compensate; nothing perhaps except a fight, a flood, a fire or a circus. I did not, however, forget grandfather's words.

The thirst for learning is a New England characteristic. From New England it was extended throughout the United States. Senator Justin S. Morrill, the father of the land grant bill, was a Vermonter. By virtue of his efforts agricultural colleges were established in every state in the Union.

I had no objection to reading assuming that the reading be something sensible; I did not consider Pilgrim's Progress nor Plutarch's Lives in that category. Indian Pete and similar stories in the Youths Companion fired my imagination and let to further explorations in the field of literature. However explanations in nature's great out-of-doors were more attractive.

Living among mountains as I did, most naturally mountain climbing was in my line. White Rocks, near Wallingford and Killington Peak not far from Rutland challenged my attention. My experience in climbing these two heights inspired me in later years to greater undertakings in the Rockies.

The ascent of White Rocks began over boulders which had been wrested by storm, frost and perhaps earthquakes, from the perpendicular face of the mountain above them. Some of the lichen-covered rocks were fifteen or more feet in diameter and the surfaces of many of them bore the graven initials of generations of visitors, some of them distinguished in business or the professions. J.  T. Trowbridge, the writer of boys' stories, once lived in Walling-ford and his initials appeared among others.

After the boulder region had been passed, the climb up the precipitous face of the mountain began. It would not be considered even worthy of mention by an Alpine climber, but to the tyro it was a climb. I know of but few who have undertaken it but to me it was one of the things that had to be done. I think that I experienced more satisfaction the first time I climbed White Rocks than I did from climbing Pike's Peak years later. I had looked forward to it since the day grandmother decided that I was too young to accompany a certain old gentleman on an expedition to White Rocks which he intended to make for the purpose of gathering rare specimens of lichen. Some day, I hoped, I would be big enough and strong enough to do the job. The top of White Rocks had a romantic interest not shared by other spots of the Green Mountains and one reason why I wanted to climb to the top was because it was there that Captain Kidd was supposed to have buried his chest of gold. How Captain Kidd happened to be in the vicinity of White Rocks calls for more explanation than I am able to make.

Still another reason why I was anxious to make the climb was to obtain the unsurpassed view of my valley. In the summer time, nothing was to be seen of the houses in the village from the top of White Rocks as they were hidden in the foliage, nor could more than a brief glimpse be had of the winding creek. However, beyond the village and nestling at the foot of West Mountain, Fox Pond (excuse me, Elfin Lake) could be seen sparkling in the sun. Hot and perspiring as I was, it seemed to cry out to me. I never failed to resolve to go to the lake for a refreshing plunge immediately upon my return to the village but I do not recall ever having carried out this resolution; by the time I arrived home the coolness of the evening made the water seem less attractive and besides I was tired and I had a lot of miscellaneous business to attend to when the gang gathered for the evening's tryst.

How inviting the swimming hole was on hot afternoons as we got our first glimpse of it through the woods. Some unregenerate youngster yells, "Last one in is a... [[ etc., etc.," and off we start at high speed, stripping our clothes off as we run and into the water we plunge like so many bull frogs. Happy Days! Happy Days!

There are many other spring-fed ponds set like gems in the hills and mountains surrounding Wallingford; Shrewsbury Pond, Tinmouth Pond, and the two Sugar Hill Ponds, sometimes called Spectacle Pond because of their resemblance to a pair of gigantic spectacles. Griffin Pond was high up in the mountains east of Danby and its waters were cold enough to be inviting to brook trout which, because of the depth of the water, were of a high color ranging from pale pink to salmon.

There were also the much larger lakes, Bomoseen, St. Catherine and Dunmore, and, in a longer radius Lake Champlain and beautiful Lake George. No one objected to the term 'Lake" being applied to these larger bodies of water except a few die-hards who continued to speak of Lake Bomoseen as "Castleton Pond."

Anyone desiring a broad view of the surrounding mountains and hills, lakes and ponds, would do well to climb Rattlesnake Mountain near Lake Dunmore, select the highest tree and from its topmost branches survey the county as far north as the Canadian border.