Editor’s note: This is another column in Bill Boyd’s new series, “The Way It Was,” about growing up in Marysville. Bill continues to work with the Union County Historical Society to obtain information for his stories. With Marysville and Union County celebrating Bicentennial anniversaries in 2019 and 2020, respectively, these articles help depict what life was like in those early years.
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In the fall of 1938 when I entered the first grade in Marysville’s West Elementary School, I learned a lot of things on the very first day, and one of them was “keep off the grass.”
You see, the building had an attractive sweep of lawn all the way down Seventh Street. Then it went north along Court Street to the public library. I think it was one of the nicest lawns in town.
To keep that lawn looking nice, no kids were allowed to set foot on the grass during recess. A couple of teachers were stationed at the edge of the lawn to make sure we stayed off. If a boy’s ball rolled out on the grass, he had to get permission from one of those teachers to walk out and retrieve it. That’s just how serious they were about keeping the lawn looking nice.
But there was one day in the spring of 1939, shortly before school was out for the year, when those rules were thrown out and all of us first graders were allowed to play on the grass. In fact, the teachers let us have a picnic and play on the lawn all afternoon. It’s hard to explain how much fun that was.
There were areas for all sorts of games. One of the most popular was where we played Red Rover. When we chose up sides, the first kids picked were usually boys because they were bigger and stronger. But there was one girl in our class who was also one of the early picks. Her name was Peggy Dow, and that’s her in the attached photo.
Peggy wasn’t a very big girl, but she was very athletic. And boy, was she competitive. When the opposing team chanted, “Let Peggy come over,” she put her head down and ran full force. She ran so hard that she could almost always break through the line.
In another area, along Seventh Street, we were allowed to run races. The races were alternated between boys and girls, but Peggy sometimes ran against the boys. And by golly, she sometimes won those races. The only boy that she couldn’t really compete with was Jim Woodson, who was the fastest boy in the first grade.
I think Peggy was a bit of a tomboy. She went regularly to the Saturday afternoon matinee at the Avalon Theater. That’s when they showed cowboy movies and the front seats were packed with all of us boys cheering for our favorite cowboys. Just about all of us had our toy guns in holsters strapped to our waist.
There were a few girls who occasionally attended the Saturday matinees, but Peggy was there almost every week with her own “six shooter” at her side.
A couple of years ago, I heard from Peggy. I hadn’t seen her in probably 70 years. She was living someplace down south, and someone had sent her a few of my columns. She just wanted to tell me about the memories those columns evoked in her.
I told her that I had two favorite memories of her. One was when she was racing us boys on the lawn. The other was when she was sitting in the Avalon Theater with her holstered six-shooter at her side.
We both agreed that we were two lucky youngsters to have grown up in Marysville during the 1930s. It was a perfect time and a perfect place to be a kid.
Those wishing to contact Bill Boyd can e-mail him at bill@davidwboyd.com