Eight Decades Ago at Burbank High School

 Following the blog post recalling Mother’s high school graduation, Bobby Simma, one of my former principals, shared senior panels from Ripley High School featuring his parents and grandparents. This spring marks the 80^th year since my father’s high school graduation, so it seemed a good time to revisit those four years of Dad’s life. The post about Mother’s graduation was entitled The Graduation Gift That Couldn’t Be Wrapped which can be accessed at: https://bernadeanjgates.blogspot.com/2018/05/the-graduation-gift-that-couldnt-be.html

The 1938 Panel from the Burbank High School at Burbank, Oklahoma. Dad is pictured 
fourth in the bottom row. Gracie Rice in the lower left corner was also a Big Bender. 

                My father attended high school one year at Fairfax. He made many friends in the student body, such as the Shafer twins, Claude and Clyde and in the faculty, V. J. Lockett. Having to ride a horse to the nine-mile corner west of Fairfax to catch the bus, then riding back to the Gates farm just in time to do evening chores took its toll on Dad. He characterized that year “as a waste”- educationally.
              Dad’s older sisters, Ella Edith and Mary Elizabeth, had lived with families in Fairfax so they could complete high school in 1933 and 1934, respectively. My grandfather, Edmund Gates, Sr., paid room and board to the families and my aunts did housework to assist with their “keep.”

My grandpa’s reliance on my father precluded Dad moving to Fairfax to further his education. The family farm in the Bend demanded my father, as a teenager, live there and do morning and evening chores each day, with a full-day’s work required every Saturday and Sunday.

Finally, Dad’s hope for an education drove right up to the little farm on the Arkansas River. Prior to the beginning of the 1934/1935 school term, Mr. Roy Stegall, the superintendent of Burbank High School, actively pursued the Big Bend high school-aged students by developing a relationship with the parents of these students. Dad said Mr. Stegall arrived at the Gates farm and began with, “Ed, your hogs really look good…” Soon my grandfather willingly agreed to send Dad to Burbank High School.

                My father boarded the Burbank bus at Woodland Grade School after walking about 1 ½ miles through the timber from his home to the community school. Then he rode the over-30-mile ride to Burbank to attend high school. Dad always felt privileged to have graduated from high school prior to serving in World War II. Below are excerpts relating to Burbank High School from his military memoir, Okie Over Europe.

Edmund’s father had always quoted Benjamin Franklin who had said, “Put your purse into your head and no man can take it from you.”  The quotation had impacted him so much that he had copied it in a quotation collection he had been required to compile in his high school days.  Edmund had always preferred the outdoors and vigorous activity to time spent at a desk poring over books.  Yet once again the path that he had chosen greatly influenced his placement in the military.  Although Edmund had never dreamed his attainment of a high school diploma would so strategically affect his life, the first question with which he was confronted was: “How much education do you have?”  He was immediately steered in a different direction from those who had only completed the eleventh grade of high school. 

Later he would reflect with deep gratitude on the encouragement he received from Miss Cecilia Smith, his English teacher, enabling him to graduate from high school.  The bus ride from his rural community, the Big Bend, to Burbank where his high school was located was about 35 miles or a round trip of 70 miles each school day.    Edmund frequently carried a can of cream or several dozen eggs as he walked the one and a half miles to board the school bus.  He sold both farm products at the little store in Burbank located just down the hill from the high school.  Every penny from the eggs or cream was returned to his mother.  Miss Smith knew what hardship Edmund faced just to attend high school, so she worked with him on her lunch break to assist him in meeting her stiff requirements for the senior English course she taught.  He could never have imagined the immense value her dedicated instruction would literally mean to his survival. 

         An article from the Ponca City News dated February 1, 1943, reported of Edmund’s squadron being credited with shooting down thirteen enemy planes.  In the same article, Roy Stegall, Edmund’s high school superintendent, was quoted as identifying Edmund as ‘an “A” student.’   In retrospect, Edmund was not sure this was an accurate report of his school record from Burbank High School.

          He had just finished hearing the third game of the World Series.  He said it was a good game until the Yankees scored four runs in the eighth.  Obviously, Edmund was a Cardinal fan.  The St. Louis Cardinals and the New York Yankees played in the World Series of 1943.  The broadcast was direct from the United States.  Edmund reminisced about high school days of skipping classes just to hear part of a World Series game.  Little had he realized when attending Burbank High School just a few years earlier that he would find himself in such dangerous combat situations. Edmund was aware he was contributing his small part in a much greater struggle literally to save the Western World’s highest principle of personal freedom for all.

                As our family remembered what would have been the 99^th birthday of my father on June 15, I recalled Dad saying, “Hard work never killed anyone.” Few men worked harder from their earliest days until well into their 90s than Dad did. As a result, that pattern made him a star patient of his therapists even after both strokes. Dad attempted all asked of him from his therapists.

                I aspire to reduce or eliminate the complaining. Dad sometimes expressed being glad when an especially tough task was done. But I never heard him back down from a job, dread the job, or grumble at having to do it.

                Dad had a way of laughing and making a tedious task bearable and even fun. I think that is what is meant by teaching a child to work. (Mother taught us to find satisfaction in a job well done. Grandma Gladys Rainey Smith insisted the dread was the worst part of the job.)

               

Outside my window, a new day I see,

And only I can determine what kind of day it will be….

I can enjoy what I do and make it seem fun,

Or gripe and complain and make it hard on someone.

lines from the poem, Today – poet unknown

                Any of us with influence on children whether as teachers, parents, grandparents, relatives or mentors at church or in an organization must realize attitude and instruction is essential with young people. Properly approaching a task and completing a job requires working along side the child or teenager, giving needed encouragement and coaching the young person to perfect the task. King Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived, wrote about the joy of working. As we find joy and contentment in our work, may our example inspire younger generations to do the same - just as Dad's determination to get a high school diploma still inspires doggedly perseverance to reach goals.

So I decided there is nothing better than to enjoy food and drink and to find satisfaction in work. Then I realized that these pleasures are from the hand of God.     Ecclesiastes 2:24