My Girl’s Commission faculty leader, Mrs. Dixon, was our homemaking teacher.  I never liked her, and I have the feeling she wasn’t too thrilled with me.  My experience with her was unpleasant.  She was pregnant and very touchy.  My friends and I were going through the same thing she was going through, changes in our bodies.  She was going through her first pregnancy, and we were irritating her with our bickering and silliness. One especially bad day for me was the day I came back from missing school because of sickness.  We were learning cooking at that time.  Mrs. Dixon asked me to do something simple, in her book, which was to make WHITE SAUCE!  I had never made white sauce in my life.  I whispered to my friend and asked, “How do I make white sauce?”  She helped me through, but I was a nervous wreck by the time I made it.  Now, my family might remember me taking out a little old two- by-four card from my recipes every time I made white sauce.  That card is still in my recipe box after sixty-seven years.  (I’m sometimes not very confident.)  Mrs. Dixon did teach me to sew.  I learned several different stitches and made a dress and skirt that I became very sick of.  I hope she was able to retire and have a lovely life with many children! Because I was a commissioner, I was able to help with filling out dance cards for a dance.  We would partially fill out the dance cards.  It was so fun sitting at that table and making sure everyone of our class had at least half the dances already filled out on their dance cards.  We played basketball during gym class.  I was pretty good until we got a girl on the team who was aggressive and sassy.  She made everyone feel pretty bad anytime we messed up.  I was glad to stop playing; she took all the fun out of it.  One person sure can make a difference. We also had our Field Day.  I loved that day.  I’m not sure if we competed against   Dixon Junior High School.  I was good at the Long Jump.  In fact, in the ninth grade I won the Long Jump.  We did compete against Dixon Junior High in the Posture Parade.  Every year, each grade of girls in the school would line up, and our Civics Teacher, Mr. Carling, would run his fingers down our back to see if we had any problems with our spines.  The girls with problems would be taken out of the line.  (I can’t remember any who were.)  The rest of us were taught how to stand straight and walk straight.  We marched around the field when we competed.  It was all very exciting, and, in my memory, Farrer got the most points.  Mr. Carling told us of an experience he’d had of meeting an old student of his while walking down a street.  He said she had still remembered what he had taught her about her posture.  She walked beautifully.   I used to think of that little example he gave and tried, always, to walk with good posture.  One person can really have an impact on our lives. My favorite class was Typing.  I loved it.  I would get a movie magazine and type up the stories they had about movie stars.  I could type very fast.  I gave up playing the viola to take a typing class.  I had had viola lessons from Mr. Hilgendorf during the summer between 8^th and 9^th grades.  We practiced at the school.  I liked playing, but it was hot in the building, and even though I was first chair, I didn’t continue when school started.  I only had one choice for an extra class, and I took Typing instead.  Mother and Mr. Hilgendorf tried to talk me out of it.  Mr. Hilgendorf said I would regret not continuing and that I had promise.  Yes, I do regret it. One day in Health Class our teacher gave us all a long sheet of paper and asked us each to write our names at the top of the sheet.  We were then to give the paper to the teacher, and she would give them all back to different people.  We were to write what we liked about each girl in the class.  When I got my paper back I was so happy.  I had always gone out of my way to say hello and be friendly with girls who weren’t in our gang.  I didn’t want them to think I thought I was better than them (although it’s apparent from my little history that I was proud of my belonging to the gang).  Many of the girls remarked that even though I went with certain girls, I was still nice to them and they liked me.   I carried that paper with me for years.  It accomplished what the teacher wanted it to…it made me happy, and I wanted to be a good person, one that people would always like. One sad day we learned that our friend, Verneil Rodrick, had died.  We knew she had been out of school for a while but hadn’t realized her true health.  We were shocked and so sad.  At that time, we didn’t really know what faith each of us had.  I hadn’t known Susie Lingenfelther was Jewish until she invited us to a Job’s Daughter’s dance.  It didn’t seem to matter to us, until some of us went to Verneil’s funeral.  The funeral was held in the Community Church on the corner of 2^nd North and University Avenue.  We came out of that funeral stunned.  Verneil’s name had not been mentioned once!!  That was my first encounter with a different faith in that setting. June Cloward and I had a great relationship.  I always felt that because she was so good, whatever June did, I could do.  I enjoyed going to her little home and visiting with her mother and sisters.  Her grandmother lived in a little house behind them.  The first time I had dumplings was at June’s home. I also remember some of the other homes of my friends and their moms.  Bobby’s mom seemed mature, except that I remember we played with the Ouija board one night at her home, and I was scared to death.  I would never touch it after that.  Jackie’s mom was a little frivolous.  Phyllis Winkler’s parents still spanked her.  That was a shocking thing for all of us.  Phyllis was also a very cute girl and had a great laugh.  After being in JoAnn’s Hanson’s home and meeting her mother, I was glad my mother was not silly and trying to come down to our immature level.  Nancy Brockbank had a very nice mom, and when we had a sleepover at her home, the next morning we got up to a beautifully set table for breakfast.  Nancy was the youngest of nine girls.  Her father was a lawyer; their home was the biggest of all my friends.  I remember Joyce Madsen’s dad was growing flowers in a greenhouse he had made behind his house.  He grew begonias.  I was very impressed.  Those are the kinds of things I remembered about my friends.  They were not in the same area as me, so they wouldn’t have gone to my ward if they had been Latter-Day Saints. My first ‘date’ was shared with two other couples.  We were all going to Keeley’s Ice Cream Parlor after a dance.  I can remember my concern:  I wasn’t sure who was supposed to pay for the ice cream!  Was it to be my date or me?  I was so stressed that I could hardly keep a conversation going.  I must have seemed like a ‘dud.’  Maybe that is why I have lactose intolerance.  I can even envision the booth we were sitting in.  I can’t remember how it all came out—the trials of a young teenager.  During the last half of my ninth grade was when I really became aware of the girls who I was comfortable with and those who I wasn’t.  Our differences in faith and actions became more pronounced.  One of the girls, June and I learned, was sneaking out of her house at night and doing who knows what.  Very shocking to us! I have many more memories of Sadie Hawkins Days and the dances, as well as other activities that pop up in my mind.  These years seem to have been large in my memory. I loved the people living in my home.  I had a great three years where I was stretched—I had great friendships, challenging experiences, and grew up just a little bit more.  After we all graduated from junior high school, I moved back to Salina.                                Open dance card with no names and one with names put in. Front part of dance card – Paths to a Better World. Open dance card Farrer J. H. S. Commencement Ball. Paths to a Better World Graduation Program. Farrer Junior High diploma, signed by J C Moffitt and J W Thornton. Ninth grade graduation picture, taken in front of the City and County Building, downtown Provo.