Leaf Print - a Memory

Ok, I apologize and confess that although this blog was creted to bring news of places to go and things to do in South Jersey, relating to historyk sometimess, I allow myelf to veer off into personal events and memories. One memory that pops up frequently, even regularly, is of a day in public school in Philadelphia in the early 1950's. Perhaps I was in third grade. I was a shy, traumatized, sensitive child and everything about school terrified me, but one day, our teacher handed out 5 inch squares of construction paper, little wooden framed screens, and pots of tempera paint. We had all been instructed to bring in old toothbrushes and tree leaves, though where most of the children would have gotten tree leaves in our red brick canyons of South Philadelphia is anyone's guess. I was lucky in that my block had a tree, poor noble, long suffering specimen entrapped in a small 3 foot square of soil surrounded by concrete blocks. Sesonally, it sprouted new green leaves which turned red in fall fell off to be collected by children like myself. I wonder if that tree is still there? Anyhow, I had leaves to bring to school. We placed our leaf on the construction paper, dipped our toothrush ito the pot of paint (mine was white) and scraped it across the screen to create a spatter over the leaf and paper. When it dried the leaf was removed and we had the silhouette of the leaf against what looked like snow.I was enchanted and that memory has stayed with me, arising at odd quiet moments over these nearly 70 years. I think it is what made me an artist, what guided me to my career as a techer, and in my Art school major in Printmaking.

A lot of people ar cativated by lighthouses but my favorite historic structures are the one-room schools of which we have so many and which ar disappearing rapidly. The Burlington County Historical Socity used to run an annual one-room school tour which was delightful. I went on it about three times I wish they still had it. What a huge part of the American Democracy has Public Education been. All the generations of teachers guiding all the generations of children into the world of reading and writing and science and art. And I wonder what joyful moment from your school experience has stayed with you! I have many sad ones too and terrible ones of course the Philadelphia public schools in the post World War II baby boom weren't idyllic - they were overcrowded, filled with tired teachers dragged out of retirement to hold down the fort until the next generation of teachers could be trained and certified. We had few suplies and the threat of nuclear war always hanging over us. Everyone of my generation remembers the dreadful air-raid siren exerises. We had to go down to the darkm roach infested basement of our huge brick public school and lie on musty smelly army surplus cots until the all-clear. We didn't think it wa fun!

Some of my favorite oe-room schools in historic South Jersey are the one at what was Shellpile, down near the Bayshore Discovery Project at Bivalve, the one on Main Street in Maple Shade, the Goshen School (and I might add the church across the street has had some stelar Halloween decorations in years gone by) and the one in Vincentown, NJ. Hope you get to visit some someday!

Happy Trails through the memory or the backroads of NSouth Jersey - Jo Ann wrightj45@yahoo.com