4H

Introducing my fellow 4H members around 1960, Garden Grove grade school. Can you find me? We met in Shawnee at the Foster Drug to have our picture taken by the Shawnee News-Star for an article they wrote about our award winning 4H Club.

Also, this was the entire student body in the big room (grades 5 through 7). I wasn't kidding in my previous posts about the size of the school. Eight students total. The two kids on the back row and the boy on the right in the front row were in the 7th grade. The three girls in the middle row and the boy on the front left were in the 6th grade. The boy in the middle of the front row was the only boy in the 5th grade. The girl in the back row and the boy in the middle front row are brother and sister. The two girls on the middle row, center and right are cousins. The boy on the back row and the boy on the left, front row are brothers. Needless to say we were all one big happy family.

You will notice the boys in their green 4H jackets. I wonder why we girls didn't have jackets. It's a new world today.........

Each year we would receive a booklet according to their grade and gender. One of my first projects was to make a wrist pin cushion which I used throughout my 4H years. We were allowed class time for our project and I remember two mothers coming to school to guide us as we made the pin cushions which were blue felt rectangles, sewn by hand, stuffed with hair, and sewn with a piece of elastic for the wrist band. We had to enter these in the 4H review and in the Pottawatomie County Fair. I learned right away if you wanted to win ribbons, your stitches should be exactly the same size.

I made dresses, modeled in 4H style reviews, gave several demonstrations, gave speeches, and was involved in several plays. We would give our demonstrations and would be judged, If we won, we would compete at a higher level. The same thing would happen with all the 4H projects, i.e. plays, speeches, style reviews. Garden Grove, my grade school, always excelled so I cannot say that I was any better than any of my other class members, but I was!!!

The plays we put together were so good that we always went to state competition with them. I remember we put on "Hiawatha". We had great props as we were neighbors with lots of Indians. My grandpa had a real peace pipe and he let them borrow it for the play. It broke and I remember the sickening feeling I had about that. Two other plays I vividly remember were the "Banana Boat Song" which went on to state, and "Snow White" which was set in 2/3 time like: My Name (pause) Is Snow White (pause), etc. Every movement in the play (even sweeping the floor) was in 2/3 time and very hard to produce, but we pulled it off to win state.

So the next time you are at the fair, take a look at the 4H exhibits. There may be a shy 6th grade girl's name on that ribbon and she is bursting with pride. One of these days, she will have fond memories of making that dress.