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Have you ever perused an old high school yearbook of a school you were familiar with but did not attend? It is often fascinating to learn more about the school and even see pictures and stories of people you have crossed paths with or were familiar with in some way over the years.
That happened to me recently when my wife, Laura, and I went to an estate sale on Lookout Mountain, and I ended up purchasing some old McCallie School yearbooks from 1951-53 and a Girls Preparatory School one from 1955.
I had previously written a story for Chattanoogan.com about the McCallie yearbooks and had fun Googling the names of some of the then-young students and learning about their often-accomplished later lives. The GPS yearbook was also just as interesting collectively, even though I purchased only one. In fact, as a male, maybe I found that annual more interesting or at least more intriguing!
The book, which is called the Kaleidoscope, maybe has those softer touches of kind and heart-felt words in places as you would expect from a girls’ school. That included a poem from student Theodora “Teddy” Shalett, the touching words of the school’s alma mater and the fact that three former students who had moved out of town still had their pictures and names listed on a special page.
But I also noticed hints that maybe the GPS administration and faculty were paving the way back in the 1950s for a world in which women could feel comfortable one day having careers beyond just motherhood and family life. That included an interscholastic basketball team that went undefeated in three games, including with a two-point win over Notre Dame High School.
The school also had the black and blue intramural teams and groups that apparently also created a little friendly competition and camaraderie.
One of the top athletes who apparently also soared high in terms of what her fellow students thought about her was Nan Harlan Chamberlain. She would be named that year’s May Queen and would become the first of three Chamberlain sisters to hold that title, which remains a school record, although pairs of sisters and others with multiple family connections have also served. Frances Jones was the 1955 maid of honor.
The president of the senior class was Ruth Howell, while Marjorie Reeves was president of the student council and Winnie Crouch was president of the National Honor Society.
And, in that yearbook, the three seniors who had their formal pictures on a page were also photographed together in a casual scene in what was another unique GPS tradition over the years.
The principal was Mary Hannah Tucker, who would lead the school from 1950-66. An item I found online put out by GPS remembered her as a stern but revered staff member. Some other information reported she had gone to Tennessee College for her bachelor’s degree and Vanderbilt for her master’s. Tennessee College was apparently not what became the University of Tennessee but the Tennessee College for Women, which became Middle Tennessee State University. She had majored in math but also showed some diversity by minoring in philosophy and French literature.
Ms. Tucker came to GPS in 1928 and taught math and headed the math department before also getting into administrative work that included being co-principal with Mrs. M.O. Clark from 1945-47. When the school moved to North Chattanooga from Palmetto Street by Fort Wood in 1947, and Mrs. Edith Mattson Lewis became principal, Ms. Tucker served as business manager. She had also served as treasurer from 1945 to 1949.
One fact not usually highlighted in brief biographies of Ms. Tucker is that immediately before becoming the lone principal at GPS, she had served as the academic dean at Milwaukee-Downer girls’ school in Wisconsin for one year. That school later merged with another school, but its former campus became part of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where Bruce Pearl coached men’s basketball before leading Tennessee and Auburn to much success.
Ms. Tucker did not die until December 1999 at the age of 96 and is buried at Oakland Cemetery in the Gibson County town of Trenton in Northwest Tennessee.
The 1955 GPS yearbook was dedicated to Mrs. Carolyn Plunkett. Other instructors among several others included Mrs. Warren James, whose husband would teach at McCallie, and history, Latin and chemistry teacher Ulrica Whitaker, who was also showing the ability to be diverse with her multi-disciplines. Ms. Whitaker once did some research for a thesis paper while studying at the University of Chicago on the famed Southern agrarian writers such as Robert Penn Warren and solicited some correspondence from them. The papers are now in the collection of UTC.
Ms. Whitaker was also a historian and artist and wrote a heart-felt letter to the editor praising 1958 May Queen Grace Moore after her tragic death in 1960 in a car accident near Chapel Hill, N.C. Ms. Moore is photographed as a ninth-grader in the 1955 annual and was also president of the GPS Junior Glee Club, perhaps trying to follow in the footsteps of her famous aunt by the same name. The faculty leader of that glee club was Margaret Glenn.
Among other underclassmen, sophomores included Mary Lynn Barnwell, who would become the wife of Tennessee football coach Johnny Majors, and Judy Evans. Readers of the Mountain Mirror today know the latter as Judy Rowland, the writer of numerous articles for the paper.
Two other sophomores included Betsy Chamberlain, the younger sister of Nan Chamberlain and a future May Queen, and Bettie Porzelius, the daughter of the school’s chairman of the board of trustees, Mrs. A.F. (Mary Elizabeth Clemens) Porzelius. The latter was a 1929 graduate of GPS.
One time in the late 1980s, I had a delightful interview with the elder Ms. Porzelius over the phone about her memories of a late former friend she had from Baylor. The person was Hugh Beaumont, who would gain much fame playing father Ward Cleaver on the hit mid-century TV sitcom, “Leave It to Beaver.”
Another freshman that year was the late Betty Sue Ayers, who was a close friend of classmate Grace Moore and whose father was in the automobile business. Today, she might be best known as the mother of Chattanooga Mayor Tim Kelly.
An eighth-grader was the late Mary Davenport of the Krystal family, while one seventh-grader was Charlotte Fox, who in recent months made a multi-million-dollar contribution to GPS in her will after a successful career in the financial realm in Atlanta.
As Ms. Fox would show, even back in 1955, GPS was apparently creating an environment where young women could envision any kind of future life they wanted, from wives and mothers to movers and shakers.
by John Shearer
That happened to me recently when my wife, Laura, and I went to an estate sale on Lookout Mountain, and I ended up purchasing some old McCallie School yearbooks from 1951-53 and a Girls Preparatory School one from 1955.
I had previously written a story for Chattanoogan.com about the McCallie yearbooks and had fun Googling the names of some of the then-young students and learning about their often-accomplished later lives. The GPS yearbook was also just as interesting collectively, even though I purchased only one. In fact, as a male, maybe I found that annual more interesting or at least more intriguing!
The book, which is called the Kaleidoscope, maybe has those softer touches of kind and heart-felt words in places as you would expect from a girls’ school. That included a poem from student Theodora “Teddy” Shalett, the touching words of the school’s alma mater and the fact that three former students who had moved out of town still had their pictures and names listed on a special page.
But I also noticed hints that maybe the GPS administration and faculty were paving the way back in the 1950s for a world in which women could feel comfortable one day having careers beyond just motherhood and family life. That included an interscholastic basketball team that went undefeated in three games, including with a two-point win over Notre Dame High School.
The school also had the black and blue intramural teams and groups that apparently also created a little friendly competition and camaraderie.
One of the top athletes who apparently also soared high in terms of what her fellow students thought about her was Nan Harlan Chamberlain. She would be named that year’s May Queen and would become the first of three Chamberlain sisters to hold that title, which remains a school record, although pairs of sisters and others with multiple family connections have also served. Frances Jones was the 1955 maid of honor.
The president of the senior class was Ruth Howell, while Marjorie Reeves was president of the student council and Winnie Crouch was president of the National Honor Society.
And, in that yearbook, the three seniors who had their formal pictures on a page were also photographed together in a casual scene in what was another unique GPS tradition over the years.
The principal was Mary Hannah Tucker, who would lead the school from 1950-66. An item I found online put out by GPS remembered her as a stern but revered staff member. Some other information reported she had gone to Tennessee College for her bachelor’s degree and Vanderbilt for her master’s. Tennessee College was apparently not what became the University of Tennessee but the Tennessee College for Women, which became Middle Tennessee State University. She had majored in math but also showed some diversity by minoring in philosophy and French literature.
Ms. Tucker came to GPS in 1928 and taught math and headed the math department before also getting into administrative work that included being co-principal with Mrs. M.O. Clark from 1945-47. When the school moved to North Chattanooga from Palmetto Street by Fort Wood in 1947, and Mrs. Edith Mattson Lewis became principal, Ms. Tucker served as business manager. She had also served as treasurer from 1945 to 1949.
One fact not usually highlighted in brief biographies of Ms. Tucker is that immediately before becoming the lone principal at GPS, she had served as the academic dean at Milwaukee-Downer girls’ school in Wisconsin for one year. That school later merged with another school, but its former campus became part of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where Bruce Pearl coached men’s basketball before leading Tennessee and Auburn to much success.
Ms. Tucker did not die until December 1999 at the age of 96 and is buried at Oakland Cemetery in the Gibson County town of Trenton in Northwest Tennessee.
The 1955 GPS yearbook was dedicated to Mrs. Carolyn Plunkett. Other instructors among several others included Mrs. Warren James, whose husband would teach at McCallie, and history, Latin and chemistry teacher Ulrica Whitaker, who was also showing the ability to be diverse with her multi-disciplines. Ms. Whitaker once did some research for a thesis paper while studying at the University of Chicago on the famed Southern agrarian writers such as Robert Penn Warren and solicited some correspondence from them. The papers are now in the collection of UTC.
Ms. Whitaker was also a historian and artist and wrote a heart-felt letter to the editor praising 1958 May Queen Grace Moore after her tragic death in 1960 in a car accident near Chapel Hill, N.C. Ms. Moore is photographed as a ninth-grader in the 1955 annual and was also president of the GPS Junior Glee Club, perhaps trying to follow in the footsteps of her famous aunt by the same name. The faculty leader of that glee club was Margaret Glenn.
Among other underclassmen, sophomores included Mary Lynn Barnwell, who would become the wife of Tennessee football coach Johnny Majors, and Judy Evans. Readers of the Mountain Mirror today know the latter as Judy Rowland, the writer of numerous articles for the paper.
Two other sophomores included Betsy Chamberlain, the younger sister of Nan Chamberlain and a future May Queen, and Bettie Porzelius, the daughter of the school’s chairman of the board of trustees, Mrs. A.F. (Mary Elizabeth Clemens) Porzelius. The latter was a 1929 graduate of GPS.
One time in the late 1980s, I had a delightful interview with the elder Ms. Porzelius over the phone about her memories of a late former friend she had from Baylor. The person was Hugh Beaumont, who would gain much fame playing father Ward Cleaver on the hit mid-century TV sitcom, “Leave It to Beaver.”
Another freshman that year was the late Betty Sue Ayers, who was a close friend of classmate Grace Moore and whose father was in the automobile business. Today, she might be best known as the mother of Chattanooga Mayor Tim Kelly.
An eighth-grader was the late Mary Davenport of the Krystal family, while one seventh-grader was Charlotte Fox, who in recent months made a multi-million-dollar contribution to GPS in her will after a successful career in the financial realm in Atlanta.
As Ms. Fox would show, even back in 1955, GPS was apparently creating an environment where young women could envision any kind of future life they wanted, from wives and mothers to movers and shakers.
by John Shearer
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