Pictured is a 1937 Saratoga Union Grammar School yearbook cover.
'Character," said Mrs. Bertha R. Seely, "is something that belongs only to you. You can't buy it, and no one can give it to you. It's yours alone and what you make of it is entirely up to you."
Those may not have been the exact words of Mrs. Seely, principal and eighth-grade teacher at Saratoga Union Grammar School, now just Saratoga School, but I have remembered the gist of her message for almost 60 years--mainly, I think, because it was delivered apropos of nothing else that was going on at the time. She just hauled off and started talking about character.
Admittedly, these recollections take on an aura of idealism with the passage of time. Rough edges are smoothed, and childhood scenes are suffused in the warm glow of sentimentality. So, as one of the 21 graduates in the Class of 1937, I can say that Mrs. Seely's gratuitous homily was entirely in keeping with the atmosphere at Saratoga School; we were made to feel that character and citizenship were important.
We recited the "Pledge of Allegiance" every morning, not necessarily reflecting on the meaning of the words. We had to learn the American's Creed, which we recited as a class at our eighth-grade graduation, and in recent times I have had occasion to ponder its message: "a democracy in a republic; a sovereign nation of many sovereign states; a perfect union, one and inseparable" as an ideal yet to be attained.
Still in the idealistic mode, I recall some of the academic gymnastics we were called on to perform: Friday spelling tests; diagramming sentences to learn grammar; memorization of poems; mental-arithmetic drills. A lot of it stuck.
In my time at the grades one-through-eight school, it was an all-female faculty; the only man aboard was the janitor, and even there I feel we had role models. There was quiet-spoken Mills Pash, who could turn his hand to any mechanical task. Later, there was Charles W. Cobb, dignified but with a sense of humor, a pillar of the Federated Church who also became township justice of the peace.
One of the wisest decisions ever made by the Saratoga school board came some time around 1970, when, faced with the necessity of meeting earthquake-proof standards, the trustees opted to beef up the 1923 Spanish-style structure rather than have it demolished and erect a new one. There is a dignity to that building, the kind of community presence that is not always built into more modern schoolhouses. I like to think of it as a physical expression of what education is all about, because I feel that is what I obtained there: a good, solid grammar-school education.
Such sentiments, although not, I am sure, in such maudlin terms, probably will be bandied about on Aug. 17, when those who attended Saratoga Grammar School from the 1920s on gather for their second annual reunion. There will be a school visit from 10 a.m. to noon, followed by a picnic at Wildwood Park. Henry Clarke, Class of 1938, has details, and he can be reached at 867-3184.
This article appeared in the Saratoga News, August 7, 1996.
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