Jeanilne Kliefoth Price | jeffclassof54

About the book! Most everyone who ordered a book has received it by now, and the response has been completely gratifying. To all who sent kind comments, thank you. The post office does strange and not so wonderful things, so if your copy has not arrived, be patient. I followed some of the tracking numbers and found that our astute postal service sent a number of the books to Dallas even though for delivery in Austin and here in SA. Go figure.

I will include a few of your comments below, edited a bit.

From Pete Sweet: My reflections booklet arrived on Monday. I cannot begin to tell all of you what a terrific job you did with it. It has so many memories and I started at the front and have read through letter “C”, the information submitted by classmates shows what a diversified group of young people attended Jefferson High School graduating in 1954. To see everyone of our classmates is a true joy and to hear their adventures and experiences was a true gift. I do not know what those who did not order a copy of the publication thought they might be getting, but I can personally say that I got way more than I expected. I thought that I would get a pamphlet containing what those who replied about the past 60 years had written. To get as much information as this fine book contains is priceless. I hope that perhaps in the future when classmates are in San Antonio they might be able to get together to keep in touch.

From Janet Walker Mathes: I just received my 6o Years of Memories book today and I can’t put it down. It is so great and I am so very thankful to all those who helped you get this together and get it out. It is such a treasure. Please relay may heartfelt thanks to all those who took their time and energy to compile and distribute this to all of us. I wish I had known all this about my fellow classmates before we were together. What interesting lives.

From Sue Grum Redding: Received the ’54 History Book on Wednesday. I spent all afternoon reading it from cover to cover and then reread some parts yesterday. It is awesome. Thanks for all your work and the others that were involved. Thinking back on my time at Jefferson, I remember more about the fun and friends instead of all the studying we must have done. Would you have believed when we graduated that 60 years later there would be this volume of success stores?

Enough of the praises. On to more interesting:

History factoids: The bit on the Hertzberg clock history generated memories and comments. Patsy Hatch Patterson and Jeanine Kliefoth Price both remember getting off the bus at that corner and checking the time. Patsy walked down Houston Street and up Alamo Plaza to get to Joske’s. Ben Williams that “You may not know that Hertzberg’s is where Ike bought Mamie her engagement ring. He was an instructor for ROTC at TMI in his first assignment after West Point.” Back in the 80’s (1980’s) when I often presided over ribbon cuttings for the Chamber of Commerce, one of the events took place on a newly converted office building on Broadway. It had originally been an apartment building and was the first residence of Ike and Mamie after they were married.

And on TMI, how many of you remember that Douglas MacArthur was as student there? TMI (Texas Military Institute) opened its doors in 1893. Douglas MacArthur was an early graduate, finishing in 1897, before entering West Point two years later. Here are a couple of photos of MacArthur. More about TMI in a later blog.

Closing with a few more photos sent by Jim Warren:

Bonnie Hirsch Margaret Pratt

If you have old photos to include here, send them along to jeff-54@satx.rr.com

The Texas Theater: Jeanine Price raised a question about the Texas Theater. Here are photos I found on the Internet:

Opened in 1926 for the Publix-Paramount chain, this large downtown theater was designed by the Boller Brothers firm, and was done in Spanish Colonial and Rococco style. Its fantastic terra-cotta facade, complete with columns and multicolored arches decorated with gilded medallions, in addition to its huge vertical marquee, were as spectacular as the interior, which was one of the city’s finest movie houses of the 20s, along with the Empire, Aztec and, later, Majestic Theatres.

Hailed by Publix as ‘San Antonio’s Two-Million Dollar Showplace’ when it opened, it was the site of the premiere of Paramount’s “Wings” less than a year later, which was filmed near San Antonio. Stars Buddy Rogers and Clara Bow were both in attendance.

However, after many years as a successful first-run house, even thriving during the Depression era, the Texas began to decline, and closed in the 70s. Unfortunately, just as interest in saving many of the area’s historic buildings was starting to pick up, the Texas was razed, in 1983, but its facade was salvaged, and incorpated into the modern office building built on the site. When Southwestern Bell took over the building, it meticulously restored the Texas’ terra-cotta facade to its 20s appearance.

Below is the interior. Wish it were in color. And look at this great view of Houston Street. All the old signs are gone.

This is how it looks today:

Does anyone recall: When we had to figure out our schedule at the start of each semester, the strategy I recall was to arrange a third period class in or near the cafeteria wing. I generally opted for Spanish, just down the outdoor arcade by Mrs. Hicks’ rose garden. Or you could do history upstairs or math or typing or whatever was near the first floor main entrance. Back then, we had the precursor of today’s fast food stores. There was a small kiosk on both the boys and the girls side, where you could get hamburgers, and maybe hot dogs. Does anyone remember what else they sold there? I do recall the burgers were pretty bad, but fast. The early McDonalds. People like Jim McNeel and Ben Williams worked in the booth. I don’t remember who else. The good old days. I will bet that the boys and girls are not segregated now. I wonder why it was done back then? Anyone have a clue?

The lockers: When I visited Jeff last March for an open house, all of the lockers still line the hallways, but most appeared to be empty. The combination locks are gone and a few had padlocks. I recall with the combination locks, you could stuff a small piece of paper in the mechanism so that the locker would not lock. Some of us managed to get a paper stuffed into the lock of one of our classmates (nameless, of course), so that we had access to it. He was not aware and dutifully unlocked it every time he needed something. We used to leave notes, re-arrange things in the locker, and generally make him wonder what was going on. Don’t know if he ever caught on or not.

I hope today’s comments have triggered some of your own memories that you will share. Thanks to all who have made a comment.

Beth Wilcox: Sadly, Beth Wilcox passed away last Saturday, August 2.

jeffclassof54

Reminiscing about high school days prior to upcoming reunion

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