In-the-Woods Reunion

Thatcher Woods, Cook County Forest Preserve, September 24, 2016. Mr. Irene headed back last weekend to the Chicago area for a high-school reunion. He stopped at Thatcher Woods to revisit some memories, and he was happy to find the place in great shape.

Graduation Weekend, in Three Takes

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River Forest, Illinois, June 1976. Where did I imagine I'd be in 40 years?

My alma mater is in the news.

A Newsweek article about Trinity High School.

Thanks to my classmate Nora for pointing this article out to me.

Religion Class

River Forest, Illinois, January 13, 1976. Religion classes were mandatory at my high school. Few of us took the classes seriously, and we usually tried to find a course that wasn't very "religiony." This photo is from one of those classes, Marriage Class.

The requirement that students wear uniforms did not mute self-expression.

Grading

River Forest, Illinois, November 1975. A teacher at my high school uses the time between classes to review a few papers.

"Bonjour!"

River Forest, Illinois, November 1975. Here's another snapshot from my stint as a high-school yearbook photographer. The woman on the right is the Dominican sister who taught French. I enrolled in French-language classes after I completed my two years of Latin study. She was an amazing teacher: she never allowed us to speak English in her classroom. I felt nearly fluent in French after I completed the coursework.

This teacher's training was so good that when I enrolled in college, I tested out of the foreign-language requirement and earned the equivalent of four years' credit in French. I was so excited when I learned the news that I called her from my dorm room telephone to thank her.

(Does anyone still install terrazzo floors [distinguishable from "terrazzo tiles"]? The Venetian apartment in which I lived had them, too. I just love them.)

"Ticket Nunsense"

The President of my high school encounters a vanity-plate problem.

Kumbaya

River Forest, Illinois, September 1975. A cherished high-school friend visit me this week. She took a day off and drove up from the Chicago area. I had seen her twice in the last thirty-eight years. We picked up as though no time had passed. She brought a photo album filled with some touching snapshots. Among them was this one she took at the "Big Sister/Little Sister" picnic the high school hosted at the beginning of our senior year. We attended a mandatory, outdoor Mass during the picnic. My friend correctly remembered that I disliked going to Mass, and she recalled I was annoyed by the 1970s-ish "cool" Mass trappings. I'm (wearing a bandana and) apparently singing compliantly in this image, but my friend spotted a look of discomfort and skepticism in my brow.

Thanks to my friend Mary for making this photo available to us.

"So … one of the most significant works in the history of architecture is the prototype for America's architectural Anti-Christ?"

PrairieMod mocks a headline calling Frank Lloyd Wright's Winslow House the first "McMansion."

(Here's why I am interested.)

UPDATE: I've revised this entry to reflect the edits posted at PrairieMod.

Property Listing

PraireMod reports the William Winslow House is on the market. Mom visited the home during a house call in the early 1960s.

The Life Box (Part 14)

By the time I enrolled in high school, the parochial curriculum no longer carried a Latin-language requirement. The school offered four languages: Latin, Spanish, French, and Italian. Most Catholic schools offered German instead of Italian; my high school taught Italian because it had a substantial enrollment of first- and second-generation Italian students. I'm sure my Parents would have directed me to study German if that language had been available.

My Parents decided I should study Latin. I wasn't thrilled about Latin because it was not a spoken language. But I came to love Latin for several reasons. First, the Dominican Sister who taught the course—Sister Mary Hope O’Brien—was a delight. She was elderly, and she wore full habit, in the pre-Vatican II style. She had me with that from the outset. Sr. Mary Hope was a tender, thoughtful person. When I had an appendectomy in the winter of my freshman year, for example, she sent some fellow sisters to deliver a care package to me at the hospital (this was back when an appendectomy resulted in a week-long hospital stay). Sr. Mary Hope also taught me the discipline of memorization, drilling, and repetition.

Second, studying Latin led me to appreciate grammar. I only approached grammar with discipline after I had studied sentence structure in the Latin language. My understanding of Latin grammar made it easier for me to study English. It also strengthened my Lithuanian because the Lithuanian language—like Latin—not only conjugates verbs but also declines nouns.

Third, Latin was a foundation on which I built my post-graduate education. I studied medieval history. It would have been difficult to pursue that field without a basis in Latin. Latin, in turn, made the study of French and Italian—also part of the medieval history program—much easier.

Here are some views of my Latin notebook:

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How did a sticker from my Animal Kingdom scrapbook make it into a high-school notebook?

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The drills begin. Here, the drills focus on vocabulary.

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We completed a translation exercise early in the school year.

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Vocabulary and conjugation drills.

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My handwriting doesn't look anything like that any longer.

The Life Box (Part 5)

In the 1970s, my high school—like many others of that era—divided students into groups based on the school's perceptions of our potential. Students clustered in the "AP" category enrolled in college-prep courses with demanding workloads. I often found the homework expectations overwhelming. There were many nights when my Parents permitted me to stay up beyond my bedtime so that I could finish assignments.

Most homework projects were rewarding. I enjoyed doing the newspaper project that accompanied our study of Romeo and Juliet. The same teacher who assigned the newspaper project also required us to write a play. I wrote a story about a man fleeing life behind the Iron Curtain. 

 

During my freshman year, I took a "World Civilizations" course. It was one of my favorite classes. Early in the year, the teacher assigned a "team project." We were to work in groups of two or three girls, and we were to produce a document that illustrated our understanding of ancient Greece. I chose to work with a classmate that I had met in gym class during the first week of school. 

 

Here are some snapshots of the assignment we submitted forty-one years ago. A few thoughts popped into my head as I looked at the project today: (1) In my first career, as an historian, I focused my research on Mediterranean piracy (see the last paragraph of the project's text); (2) The teacher who created this assignment still teaches at my high school; and (3) My partner on the project and I keep in touch, and she occasionally visits the blog.

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Related by Marriage: A Visit from a Cousin

Suburban Chicago, January 2, 1962. Here's Mr. Irene and  his "Cousin I." Cousin I is Anthony's daughter; Anthony was Mr. Irene's Godfather.

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Suburban Chicago, January 2, 1962. Cousin I's Mom sits between Cousin I and Mr. Irene. That's the head of Mr. Irene's maternal Grandmother, Anna, on the left.

Chicagoans: does that box of Heinmann's cookies from Dominick's trigger your salivary glands? The cookies likely were those thin chocolate chip ones that often seemed a bit overly crispy on the edges. We were a "Jewel family," so I didn't visit Dominick's often. My Parents probably thought it was too Italian. My neighbor took me to the River Forest Dominick's on North Avenue once or twice a year: on those occasions, I grabbed a few hot cookies as they emerged into the bakery on a conveyer belt. The store encouraged that conduct.

The Verona Morning Star

My favorite high-school teacher also taught English. We students thought this teacher was cool because she was only eight years older than we were. She was fresh out of college. She was stylish: her clothes were a bit hippie Bohemian, and she styled her hair in a long shag. The teacher spoke to us as if we were adults, and she often peppered her vocabulary with words we hadn't hear before. She moderated the "Creative Writing Club," which I joined, and she took a group to hear Germaine Greer speak at the local community college. (What I remember most about Greer's lecture was how Greer flirtatiously played with her long, silk scarf throughout the talk).

 

During my sophomore year, the teacher assigned Romeo and Juliet. To test our understanding of the play, she assigned an unusual homework project. We were directed to create a newspaper that knit the themes of the play and showed our grasp of its historical setting.

 

We received the assignment on a Friday, and it was due the following Monday. When I returned home from school, I headed that afternoon to my Best Friend's house. My Best Friend was artistic, and I hoped she'd have some materials with which I could craft the piece. We found some large sheets of newspaper stock in her supplies. My Best Friend and I went out to her backyard, where we burned the edges of the paper to make it appear aged. From there, I spent the weekend writing up stories about Renaissance Verona on my Parents' Royal Typewriter. I drew advertisements, maps, and a comic strip. 

 

The assignment was the most memorable one I completed. What I learned from this teacher—and from my other, favorite teachers—was that good teachers don't teach you material; they teach you to think differently and apply what you've learned critically.

 

 

Suburban Chicago, October 12, 1973. A piece of twine originally held the two pages of my newspaper together.

 

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Page 2 featured a column by Margarita's Mouth, "Verona's Galloping Gossip."

Why are we here?

Suburban Chicago, March 1959. Did Dad think the Forest Preserve parking lot was a good place to take baby pictures?

Things are still wintery.

Thatcher Woods Forest Preserve, Suburban Chicago, February 1964. But the lengthening days tell us spring is around the corner.

Maywood Architecture

My childhood home stood on a street that ran perpendicular to the banks of the Des Plaines River. Across the river, to the east of our home, began the tony suburb of River Forest, and beyond River Forest, was elegant Oak Park.

Both River Forest and Oak Park are home to architectural gems. I attended high school in River Forest, and Mr. Irene's high school was in Oak Park. We each often rode past famous homes, including the Frank Lloyd Wright Home and Studio. My Mom made a house call to the William Winslow House.

Fewer people know about the architectural history of Maywood, the suburb that began three blocks to the south of our home. Many unaltered, historical homes—both Victorian and Prairie-Style houses—stand in Maywood. Today a friend pointed me to a new video, The Historic Homes of Maywood. It's worth a look.

(Via Chicago Curbed.)