1960 Waynedale and Pleasant View

1960   Waynedale and Pleasant View. Frequent absenteeism, continuing high school, changing to college bound courses; Roy and Ronald Fike, chemistry class; teachers: Ira Amstutz, Melvin Black, Stella McCleary, Harold Henderson, and Dorothy Drushal; a separate social life among Pleasant View Mennonites; socials and parlor games, girlfriends and cars; examples of international Christian service; winter skating and summer baseball and the 1960 World Series.

During my four years of high school, I was frequently absent. I look at my old report cards: grade nine, 15 days; grade ten,  22 days; grade eleven, 19 days and grade twelve 14 days absent. An average absenteeism of seventeen and one half days of school each year or I was away from classes each year for three and one half weeks. Those three and a half weeks were a busy time; I was the main farmer of our small 80-acre dairy, hogs and cropland. The small herd of about eight cows was morning and evening milking. Also, in the fall, I took off a week harvesting (picking) corn, and in the spring I often took off a week for planting. Often in the winter, I would take off a few days for hauling manure out of the cattle shed and spread it onto the frozen fields. 

Even though we now had purchased a new Massy Ferguson tractor, we still used our horse-drawn manure spreader powered by the back wheels, and the back wheels had much better traction on the frozen ground. When the ground was wet or slippery, the back wheels easily started slipping, hence no power on the web and tedders spreading the manure. In fact when we went Mennonite, we kept some of our horse drawn equipment such as manure spreaders and planters and simply now pulled them with the new tractor. 

I enjoyed farming, the animals especially, but also the crop and field work, and I also knew that I was contributing to our family welfare. My mother and older brothers helped as needed, and David and little James also helped although farm work seemed to have diminishing interest among the younger set. With my father on an emotional leave of absence, I somehow knew that I was at the end of the line for our small dairy and hog operation. Paul hinted about going on the college in the next year or two, and we knew Roy would be gone when he reached age 20. 

When I reflect on those years today, I think my on-going work on the farm as a teenager and Paul and Roy’s income from working on the construction crew eased my continuing in high school after age 16; our family of 10 was taken care of quite well. My father Andrew had finished off the mortgage before his paternal abdication, so we felt financially secure. I don’t recall any specific conversation with my parents and Paul or Roy about it. It simply was assumed by that summer of 1960, I would continue in high school. This decision was certainly not because I was the family academic or scholar; both Paul and Roy were stronger than I was in their study, memory and analytic skills when they were interested in a subject.   

Not that my older brothers were always interested. One of my most memorable days at Waynedale High School was as a freshman in study hall when the commercial teacher Ronald Fike threw my brother Roy out in the hall shouting at him: “You will never amount to anything!” Roy later told me that it was about a tiff he and Fike had in a General Business class, Fike losing it when Roy declared he was quitting high school and telling the teacher that “in twenty years I'll amount to more than you ever will." Fike hit Roy over the head with a magazine and sent him out in the in the hall, in hopes that the principal Edwin Thompson would pick him up for an office visit. Okay, that is the Miller version, and I’m sure the Mister Fike version would have more sympathy for a teacher unseemly provoked.

Although detention after school was mainly used as punishment, in 1960 errant high school students were still paddled by the principal Edwin Thompson. I recall one of my best friends telling me on the way home from school about his getting whacked in the principal’s office. I think he had been caught smoking in the toilet or something. He was terribly humiliated, and I was truly sorry for him. I am glad that corporal punishment in our schools has diminished during my lifetime although I’m not a purist on these issues. At the same time I wish the government had never entered into this question, and as a society we had simply allowed it to diminish by local cultural practice. Appropriate punishment and expulsion should be an administrative and educational decision for school personnel, not a legal one. Today, after serving about two decades on the local Southmoreland (Pennsylvania) school board, I refuse to sit through these tedious expulsion and legal hearings in protest to them being held at all.      

But back to entering my junior year of high school, I also decided that I would probably continue in college after high school, maybe become a teacher or a game warden (like Sidney Coral). I think that choice was influenced by the teachers I knew and liked close by. I switched to the academic courses which the college-bound students were taking for my last two years. My junior year I took chemistry and in my senior year physics, both two-session classes and now there was no time left for agriculture classes, so this decision was the end of Future Farmers of America. I also took some additional math class in geometry and senior English. Although I had enjoyed Schaffter’s biology, I did not take the science and math classes because I liked them or had any natural aptitude for them. I simply was told that a college-bound student needed them. They proved quite difficult, especially given my spotty attendance and meager preparation.

Working for me in this transition was my chemistry (junior year) and physics (senior year) teacher, a Kidron Swiss Mennonite named Ira Abraham Amstutz (1907-1976) although most of the students called him Doc Amstutz. I think he had some sense for my background and was considerate and kind, in spite of my chronic absenteeism. Chemistry especially assumed considerable math background for which I was badly prepared. Amstutz was bright but also personable with students, often chuckling with a laugh deep in his throat and his round belly bumping up and down. Then, he would say: “observe, students.” Connie Gerber and Dorcas Steffen of Kidron were also in the chemistry class and one day, Amstutz asked the two girls to bring shoofly pie to school for a treat which they did. I had never heard of shoofly pie, but it tasted sweet and thick. I later learned that it was the traditional sweet molasses pie associated with central and eastern Pennsylvania Dutch culture.

Amstutz also loved to philosophize on life, often giving local illustrations. In describing the speed of gravity (physics class), he told of some farm boys who shot guns up in the air trying to see how many of the bullets would land back down on the tin roof of a large straw shed. He said they were deadly foolish because the bullets after coming to a stop up in the air would regain the same speed on return as the velocity they had when they left the gun barrel. I never heard an accidental death happening from such shooting until at the very time of this writing a young woman from Mount Hope, Ohio, was killed by a bullet from a gun a man shot accidently into the air.

Another memorable teacher was Melvin Black who taught English my junior year and lived in Fredericksburg, or at least had an apartment there--filled with books. I recall visiting him at Fredericksburg and hearing him talk about his books, loaning a few to my brothers and me. An elderly man, I believe he was only at Waynedale one year perhaps finishing out his career, having taught out towards Loudonville most of his life. But what caught my interest in his English class was writing and reading English and American literature, reading short stories by O. Henry and poetry by the American poets Emily Dickenson and Robert Frost. The same was true with senior English when we read Shakespeare and pondered over the brooding “Macbeth” lines of  “tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow.”

Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

It was not that I agreed with the murderous Macbeth. It was rather that one could write so well and so wisely of queens, kings, shepherds and even witches. I still have my little paperback we used in class and see that I noted the birds and Scripture allusions in the play. Our teacher Stella McCleary was quite a fair and foul work herself, treating us like some unwashed Philistines polluting her sacred temple of first year college English. But that aside, this approach of literature and the student entering into another world of Elizabethan England or to a New England poet was quite a change from my freshman and sophomore English classes. Those sessions were mainly reading Reader’s Digest, silly jokes and the most mundane pabulum imaginable, all presumably under the encroaching educational doctrine of relevance.

I have since come to the conclusion that with few exceptions the more a teacher tried to be relevant, the worse the class. Conversely, the more the teachers were in love with their subjects (and of course liked us the students) and we entered the world of that subject, the better the class. Okay, I know Alden Schaffer’s song birds and waterfowl were nearby, but still it was his interest in seeing them and talking about them that sparked my interest.  Same with Stella McCleary. 

Two other memorable teachers were Harold Henderson and Dorothy Drushal who taught American history and American problems. Henderson, better known as Bugsy, gave us a basic tour of American history beyond the stories of Washington and Lincoln and got me interested in some of the unique elements of the American experiment. We learned the difference between a pure democracy Roman style and a republic with a constitution, independent courts, and the rule of law, the three branches of government. He was probably the definition of unimaginative regarding teaching method because he sat on his desk and lectured and asked questions, but somehow he got me interested in American history and government. Dressed formally with a bow tie, I think many students considered him slightly goofy, but I enjoyed his class and the subject. By the end of the school year in 1960-61 Mister Henderson selected me to take the Ohio State Department of Education district scholarship test in American History, and I came in third; I still have the certificate.

The other teacher who got my attention was Dorothy Drushal, who taught American Problems during my senior year. As I recall the class, it was early social studies and sociology type, a window on how American society functioned. But mostly I recall Drushal; she brought along to class Time and Newsweek which we could take home or read. These magazines, also available in the library, became an open facet to the world. We soon got Newsweek at home, but I think it was my brother Paul who subscribed to it, and our family has been a subscriber over the past 50 years. That may end, however, what with the easy access to the news electronically and current editor (2011) Tina Brown’s entertainment with news approach.  One other aspect of Ms. Drushal was that her husband taught at the College of Wooster (later becoming the college’s president) and was president of the Wooster City Council. So we got regular, perhaps too regular, updates of what was happening in Wooster, its college and her family’s considerable achievements.  

So I remember the teachers because for me the classroom was high school. I did not have any social life outside of the classroom. When I heard class mates carry on regarding football games, dances and plays, I was hearing of another world. Our family and church were sectarian and had our separate social life with the Pleasant View Mennonites near Berlin, colloquially called PVs. One day, I looked up from study hall and a conservative Mennonite couple was walking up the hallway of Waynedale High School. The man was dressed like a member of a plain-clothed holiness or Nazarene sect. The woman however had a white prayer covering on her head; they were conservative Mennonites. They were my parents, Andrew and Mattie.

Everyone looked up and stared at them as though some creatures from Mars had arrived at our school. It was not that the Amish and conservative Mennonites were not in our community; they were throughout our entire neighborhood from Holmesville to Mount Eaton; occasionally I’d look out the window and see a buggy go by State Route 250. But usually we were worlds apart. I simply looked at my parents, somewhat embarrassed and confused because two worlds, my school and my home life, had been brought together, and they did not fit. The Holmesville students of course knew my parents and understood it all, but for the rest, it was a zoo, or so it seemed to me. I don’t recall why my parents visited Waynedale that morning, but I do remember my confused feelings of loving mom and dad -- but wishing they were not at school.

My social life belonged with the conservative Mennonite young people. This year I began attending the Pleasant View Mennonite social gatherings with my older brothers Paul and Roy. These were gatherings on Saturday evenings and attended by twenty to thirty young people, mostly teenagers but youths could attend until they got married or left our community for college or voluntary service. My brother Paul was one of the leaders, and the socials were hosted by one of the Pleasant View families. Because almost all of our families were of Amish background, I suspect the Saturday evening socials were really an updating of Saturday evening Amish hoedowns and dating, what we used to call scouting in Pennsylvania Dutch, now under more churchly control and with the decorum of parlor games.   

At the gatherings, there was a short opening of singing and devotional, and then there were refreshments and games, social games. In a game called “Wink’em” all sat in a circle with one empty chair where the boy or girl behind the chair would wink to attract a person to the seat. It had the charm of attracting or being attracted by a girl, holding onto a girl’s shoulders or being held by a girl, and well simply a playful drama of boy and girl attractions. Then there was a game called “Do you love your neighbor?” Here again all were in a circle in chairs with one in the middle had to try to find a seat by asking “Do you love your neighbor?”

Again, it was controlled activity of sitting next to a girl with choices of retaining her or moving her. We would dash to another seat and there was human contact.  Sometimes, the games took on a trickery such as one called “Barber shop” where in innocent male was blind folded and kissed at the end of a haircut, presumably by a girl. Well, you could only play it once. I loved these parlor games because they were a part of meeting attractive young women my age. Later in life, I found them quite cross cultural and even played them at house parties whether in other countries such as Puerto Rico or Venezuela or among our neighbors on Arthur Avenue in Scottdale.

Finally, there was a game called “walk a mile” which may have been singular to these socials; this game was played after dark usually on summer evenings when we would go walking in boy girl pairs strung out along the road with one person on the move, ordering the boy or girl to go up three or back two. In any case, it brought a lot of small-talk and hand-holding with a variety of girls. The system worked and couples were formed in the course of these socials. Both Paul and Roy had girl friends whom they had met at these socials, and soon I developed a liking for Fannie Mae who was my age, even if emotionally and physically quite developed beyond my years. This pairing took my social life to another level where we would go on dates, sometimes double with one of my brothers, especially Roy because Fannie Mae and Roy’s girlfriend were best friends.

Our girlfriends sang in various ensembles, so often dates were to places such as Sunday evening hymn sings or other venues where our Miller brothers quartet sang. After the service we took the girls home in our cars, and if I knew the girl quite well, such as Fannie Mae, she would eventually invite me to come inside to her home, visit, and maybe have popcorn or refreshments with her parents and the rest of the family. The rest of the evening was visiting in the living room.

Aside from the erotic and spiritual love for Fannie Mae, I also benefitted from her musical tastes. She considered me a musical barbarian and exposed me to more formal musical tastes at her home, listening to European and English choral music. In fact, during Christmas she took me with her family to Columbus to hear a full rendition of Handel’s “Messiah” where her brother was at the Ohio State University medical school. Paul and Roy and I would compare notes on our dating developments during these few years.

Another element of these social and courting rituals was the car. We’re talking of the souped-up car, the car with fender skirts, and little cotton balls hanging from the mirror, with glass pack mufflers which could roar, hiccup or rumble. The car was a common element with the larger culture whether it was driving to school at Waynedale and circling in front for all to see or circling the Dairy Isle or ice cream stand at Berlin to see who else had stopped for treats or mainly simply to be seen.

We Millers of course thought this whole emphasis on chrome and leather was quite below our dignity and propriety and drove around in plain totally uncool cars such as Ford Falcons. Years later when I saw the George Lucas’ coming-of-age movie American Graffiti in 1973, I thought I was back in my Waynedale and Pleasant View days of car culture, with all the car characters of my early sixties in rural Ohio. The setting of the movie was in southern California.  

The other thing the southern California end of high school had in common with my Waynedale Pleasant View years was the question of what next: college, international service, or working? During my Pleasant View days, I became aware of an older youth Emmanuel Erb who left for Paraguay in PAX service to help build the Trans Chaco Highway to where the Mennonite colonies were located. Emmanuel sent back photos of the project and when he returned told us all about it. An older friend Marion Yoder went to Costa Rica in a voluntary service project and a Katie Yoder (Schnella Crist family) also went to Central America in mission service; I think she was a nurse. The service question came up for me in a peculiar way because Mennonites were Christian conscientious objectors to war and during the military draft needed to do some form of alternate service, hence a Christian calling.

But I think it also had an appeal for its sheer adventure and exploration. I remember during August of 1961 the Conservative Mennonite Conference met for annual meetings in Hartville, Ohio, and my girlfriend Fannie Mae and I attended. What I remember distinctly was Wayne Yoder of Hartville speaking of his PAX service in Germany, helping rebuild after the destruction of the Second World War. I respected Wayne who seemed so dedicated as a Christian and also worldy-wise and a friend of my brother Paul. It planted an idea in my mind that maybe some day I too could do international voluntary service.

Finally, there was an outdoor winter social activity of the Pleasant View youth—ice skating on Roy R. and David Millers’ ponds. The one pond was west of Berlin and the other east at Bunker Hill. In the evenings and on Sunday afternoons we would go skating as a social and recreational activity. This was not your sticks and pucks outdoor hockey of roughhousing boys.  This skating was a social recreation of both girls and boys: singly, in pairs or in groups. Sometimes we formed crack the whip skating games circling around the pond.

The accomplished skaters were really graceful dancers, going backwards and sideways and able to do modest swirls. And then there were always a few boys who did show-off jumps, dangerous twirls and abrupt stops sending the ice chips flying. In January and February our ice skating numbers were increased by students of the Conservative Mennonite Bible School which was also held at the Pleasant View Church building. At Roy R. and Berdella Miller’s pond, they often built a fire at one end of the pond where we could stand around and warm our hands and feet. The Miller children also skated, and Gloria, still in her elementary school years, became an accomplished and graceful ice skater.

In the summer we Amish and Mennonites played softball, while the rest of the world played baseball, both Little League and various youth leagues and also the major league baseball of the Cleveland Indians. I never attended a game, but I listened to many a Cleveland Indians game on the radio and read the box scores in the Wooster Daily Record.  My favorite players were first baseman Vic Power, left fielder Tito Francona, the mercurial center fielder Jimmy Piersall, and the pitcher Jim Mudcat Grant. By 1960 the Cleveland management unwisely traded the popular home-run hitting Rocky Colavito to Detroit for the base hitting champion Harvey Kuenn, and by October the team finished fourth in the American League.

The New York Yankees represented the American League in the World Series playing the Pittsburgh Pirates. Waynedale High School coach and teacher Mel Riebe turned on the World Series broadcast in our physical education class, and I heard the bat crack when Bill Mazeroski hit the home run which won the series and the world championship for the Pittsburgh Pirates. I did not much think of it at the time, but later in life when I lived in southwestern Pennsylvania, I would hear of that famous Mazeroski homerun every Fall.   

Waynedale teacher Ira Amstutz’s physics illustration I referenced was the Associated Press story of December 20, 2011, with a Fredericksburg, Ohio, dateline: “Sheriff: Ohio man cleaning gun killed Amish girl.”  Shakespeare’s lines in Macbeth are from Act V, scene v, lines 24-28. The Pleasant View girlfriend’s name Fanny Mae is a pseudonym. Information on the Conservative Conference meeting August 15-17, 1961, at a Nazarene campground near Hartville, Ohio, from David I. Miller, telephone conversation, March 2, 2011.