To the editor:
On Sept. 22 and 23, Baldwinsville’s own Baker High School Class of 1967 held its 50th anniversary reunion at Fireside Inn on Friday and the Red Mill Inn on Saturday evening. About one third of our class came together to celebrate. I wrote this poem and read it to my former classmates, spouses and invited guests.
“A Half Century Ago”
Our memories of high school – 50 years have now passed.
Some years went by slowly and some, oh so fast.
Freshman year was a time that really divided,
As some stayed at Durgee and some at Baker resided.
The classes were harder and the teachers more strict.
Remember John Lindenmayer and his specific gravity of spider spit?
The hallways were crowded and in just four minutes were bare,
And there weren’t enough lockers, so some had to share.
Phys Ed was a class that many would dread.
The girls hated those “gym-suits” that were horribly red.
And there was also a place that they called the pool,
With girls dreading those knit swimsuits that really were cruel!
But the guys had it worse when they went to pool class,
‘Cause their natural swimsuits had them showing their [expletive]!
Sophomore year arrived and our class was now one.
Surviving biology was not easily done.
Dissecting dead frogs was surely not easy
And at lunchtime it made lots of us feeling queasy.
Geometry was a “laugh-fest” with theorems so vile,
With George Hawley teaching, did the guy ever smile?
Junior year seemed like chaos with construction everywhere.
The cafeteria, now a gymnasium, filled with tables and chairs.
No hot food was served, white bags now did rule.
But slowly the chaos yielded a beautiful new school!
A lovely new library, science rooms in a wing,
And music rooms for practice and a place for chorus to sing.
The front entrance of Baker had now disappeared
And the glorious new entrance magically was here.
Senior year was upon us with plans in the making.
What our future would hold left a lot of us shaking.
Attend college or not, ‘twas the military for a few,
Business or nursing, oh what should we do?
The times were a-changing and do you recall
The Beatles and Stones, mini-skirts, Senior Ball?
Applying to college and awaiting the letter
That could change life forever and make it much better (?)
Weddings, divorces, lots of children were born,
And sadly the funerals that made us forlorn.
Friends drifted apart and moved all over the map.
Now many have grand kids that sit on their laps.
White hair or no hair, and the pounds we deny,
But thing we all share, days at C.W. Baker High.
Helen M. Wase
Class of 1967
