Of Chalk Dust and Mimeographs

I have a confession: I once loved the smell of mimeographed tests. It's true; I think I may have well been a mimeograph junkie by the time I graduated from Rison High in 1975.

In the 70's, you may well recall that we had no Xerox machines, at least not in Rison. And, if we did, we certainly didn't use them for tests papers. Tests, if you remember, came on (sometimes damp) mimeographed paper.

The mimeograph machines (sometimes called stencil duplicators) were used for a variety of things in our years: office work, church bulletins and certainly classroom materials. The stencils, I'm told, could be produced in a variety of ways. But the approaches that I recall used by our faculty was either by typewriter or by using a special stylus pen that cut an impression in the mimeograph paper, which was subsequently run through the machine to produce copies of the master.

Evidently, our teachers would often run the masters through the office mimeograph machine at the last minute, because I certainly remember getting test papers that were still wet when they were passed out. The smell was always intoxicating too: kind of a sweet, aromatic fragrance that made the test-taking almost bearable.

Coach James Hendricks used to create his tests by hand - and he was always late, so the tests were always damp. Others (I can't recall which) would typewrite their tests ahead of time - thus no dampness. But, thank goodness the aroma was still intact. Mrs. Sandra Wright (our typing teacher) would have typewritten hers I'm sure - but hardly any of her tests were written if I remember correctly. We mostly had the joy of producing our own typewritten results in Mrs. Wright's class. (Funny story: Sandra Wright was also my Sunday School teacher, which always put me in a tough spot! I mean, how many of us made it through typing classes without letting a swear-word slip out? Well, I couldn't - and then had to face Mrs. Wright each Sunday morning! Thanks goodness she was as gracious in class as she always was as my Sunday School teacher! Besides, Larry Hurst was in my typing class and Sunday School class and he was a better cusser than me!)

Seems odd now that we didn't have the luxury of copy machines. How did we survive? And, how did we produce a Rison High School paper? We did have one didn't we? (Please remind me of the name of our school paper).

Thinking back just now, I remember that we didn't have white boards either. We had "chalk boards" that, in our case, were dark green. And, to our chagrin, some were painted, such that in some places on the board it became difficult to write or print legibly because of the rough surface produced by the poor paint job. We never were fancy at RHS anyway.

I suppose kids today don't know what they're missing. I'm certain that no one "dusts the erasers" anymore, because you don't have to dust off whiteboard erasers do you? And, what copy machine gives off a delicious fragrance? Copy ink doesn't elicit much charm!

We lived in a simpler time in the 1970s, it's true. But, I'm sure when we were 17 and 18, the world seemed like a difficult place. The Vietnam War was coming to a close, gasoline was sometimes as high as 40 cents per gallon, Elton John was turning gay and Olivia Newton-John was far too young and beautiful for adolescent boys to imagine.

But, by golly, we had a Country Club complete with a golf course and swimming pool. What did we have to worry about?

Right on!

- Ken

Fashion Statements

Every generation of teenagers must think that they are the first to come up with fashion ideas. So, I'm sure that we probably thought that blue jeans came from us. They didn't, obviously.

The denim jean has been around a while. In fact, it was in 1873 when Jacob Davis approached Levi Strauss about an idea he had regarding the installation of rivets on what was known as "waist jeans" that Strauss was making, subsequently patenting that idea on May 20th of the same year. Thus Levi jeans got off to a roaring start.

However, it was OUR generation that first came up with the idea of "Super Bells" wasn't it? Seems that way at least. Kids today thinks that it's original to wear jeans that drag the ground and get a little "frazzled" at the hem. Heck, we pulled the hems out, remember? Thread by thread, we'd sit at home (what else was there to do?) and re-design the bottoms of our bell-bottomed jeans until there was at least an inch or two of "fray" at the bottom of our pants. And, of course, we wanted them a little worn and weathered as well.

When did the "patches" come into vouge? I vaugely remember having a "peace sign" sewn on the back pocket of my favorite Levis - those that had the bottom hems pulled out. Seems like we used to go to a place in Pine Bluff called "The Jean Joint" or something similar to buy Levis. K-Mart jeans would never suffice; our jeans had to say "Levi" on that brown, leather-like patch in the belt loop. Shamefully, I wouldn't wear what were otherwise great pants that Mom bought.

Do you guys remember your shoes from high school? For a while, it seemed that we all tried to wear Adidas - those that could afford them. I had to wait until I worked during the summer to afford a pair - otherwise my brother and I wore the K-Mart knock-offs. Funny thing, today I'll wear anything that feels comfortable (because now I'm the one paying the bills). And, not to forget, "platform" shoes came along sometime near our junior or senior year, because I remember losing a heel at one of our dances! Trust me: it is very diffcult to look cool when one leg is 3" shorter than the other!

Somewhere during our last couple of years, we boys started wearing those ugly black soccer-style shoes...Vikings was the brand it seems. How those crude things made the fashion top-ten I'll never know. I think they also doubled as our football shoes...go figure!

Shirts? Help me out here: did we rip the sleeves out of our button-down shirts - or was that a bad dream? I guess Larry-the-Cable Guy stole our idea. Some of us attemped that fashion trend for a while. I know I did, at least until Kelly Cathey Smith announced one day in class that I looked kinda "slouchy" (which broke my heart because I had a crush on her for an eternity). I do recall the tie-dyed craze, another fashion idea that the latest generation of kids think they invented. My brother and I bought several boxes of Rit Dye and armed with a bag of rubber bands and our best white tees, made our own brand of tie-dyed t-shirts. (I'm not sure how Kelley rated my work, but I'll bet I was hoping she'd notice!).

It's amazing to realize though that blue jeans have been a part of every generation since the 1950s - perhaps even earlier. Wikipedia tells me that the James Dean era teens started emulating Hollywood with straight-legged jeans in the 50's, then the Hippy bunch took over in the 60's. I guess our gang latched on to the Super Bells in the 70's and the 80's saw the introduction of "designer jeans" that took old man Strauss' ideas of jean-making to new levels.

Truth be told, in 2008 I still love jeans - but not bell-bottoms. And, I don't try to rip them up anymore...I buy them as "relaxed fit" and allow them to self destruct on their own!

Peace,
Ken