Frick Junior High Oakland California
. Mike was no more, he was left behind the excitation of his middle name at Burckhalter Elementary School, it was forthwith Gary who was enrolled at Frick Junior High. Crestfallen was what described it, , not quite a disappointment, just something a little less. These were Gary’s thoughts as he arrived at what would be his new academic home for the next three years. He reasoned the circumstance that caused a sense of disillusionment to surface was his midterm graduation which propelled you directly into a new environment, no summer vacation or pause before entering junior high.
. The building was three stories high, the upper floors echoing hallways accessed by three stairwells, the center stairs for going up and the two end ones for descending, with administrative offices occupying a center hub downstairs on the Foothill Blvd side of the building. The facility also sustained a full service cafeteria, auditorium, orchestra room, mechanical drawing, wood, sheet metal and forge vocational shops. A large partitioned gymnasium area separating the boys from the girls for intramural indoor sports and a small array of portable classroom buildings. The educational structure with its manicured lawn setback a distance from the Foothill Blvd thoroughfare, with the 64th Ave side of the school displaying the shops and gym also with black top, large tennis practice backboard and an array of basketball backboards with hoops. The remainder of the voluminous two city square block domain consisted of baseball backstops and dirt flag football playing areas. Gary estimating the Low-7 class size at close to 150 students, with the rest of the student body class’s much the same, making the total enrollment at Frick plus or minus nine hundred students.
. He wasn’t alone that first morning, his friends Don already a June 7th grader, and Hank in the low 8th, directing him to the posted home room assignment lists before going their separate ways. Gary soon discovering he was in Mrs. Bigelow’s home room class in one of the portable buildings. Most of the faces surrounding him were no longer the familiar ones that he saw every school day for the last six years at Burckhalter. A new experience, a locker assignment, a home for the books and since the Boys didn’t dress for gym, just the girls, a place for the needed gym class tennis shoes. His subjects consisted of English, Social Studies, Art, Mechanical Drawing woodshop, Arithmetic and P E, each in a different classroom and a different teacher for each subject. One of the first things Gary experienced was how fast the school day would elapse in comparison to sitting in one elementary classroom with one teacher for a lingering day.
His school day at home starting no different from the past, awakened to the voice of his mother’s normal morning epitaph, “if you want any breakfast you better get a move on”. That’s where similarities parted, no longer was walking to school an option, or even mounting his bike, considering the hills and the distance. Frick Junior High was thirty five blocks or 3 1/2 miles by bus route, making bus transportation a necessity. Key System, Oakland’s public bus transportation service scheduled additional bus’s before and after school for city-wide student transportation. In the Mornings, Gary would meet Don and Hank, the three walking to the Greenly Drive coach stop by the Water Works, catching the 7 45 bus, able to arrive at school with time to spare. On many occasions he would leave earlier, his dad dropping him off on the way to work, enabling him to check out a ball from the early arrival of Physical ED instructor Mister Tabor.
. The school day starting every morning in home room with the Pledge of Allegiance, the remainder of the twenty-minute attendance and student information gathering used at the student’s discretion normally for last-minute homework additions. The curriculum for seventh grade students was predetermined with no electives. Besides Mrs. Bigelow’s home room, Gary started his day with Mr. Tabor’s physical education class, Mr. Alves social studies, Mr. Noyes Mechanical Drawing, Miss. Jory’s English, Mr. Templeman’s art class and Mr. Dostones arithmetic. The school bell system something new to the junior high arrivals, elementary schools having limited use for the bells, the sounding two bells five minutes apart at the start of school, then proclaiming the beginning and ending of the lunch period and a singular bell at the finish of the day and of course the continuous bell for a fire drill. The Junior High bell system similar, a two bell system announcing the beginning and end of each classroom period, the students having five minutes between classes to get to their lockers before the sounding of the next bell.
Gary was impressed Frick having an open campus, students able to leave the school grounds during the lunch period. The school providing a full service, balanced meal cafeteria, a book of ten tickets costing two dollars and 50 cents or three fifty. the higher priced tickets included a bountiful dee sert. Across the street from the school on Foothill Boulevard were two student drawing establishments. The Doggie Diner, a single counter small establishment providing a variety of hot dogs, chips and soft drinks, Gary surmising, the school was the primary reason for the business location. Across from the School on Foothill at 64th. ,was a Foster Freeze, a dispenser of soft ice cream and fountain accoutrements’. Gary, when not frequenting the cafeteria, finding a chilidog from the diner and a root beer float from Fosters a fulfilling treat for a seventh grader. The new seventh grader becoming comfortable with his new surroundings, a new experience, new name, new school, new teachers, new curriculum, new friends, and the beginning of a new journey on the road of life.
Tags: Jr. High
Inquisitive Quest 
March 24, 2010 at 9:00 am |
How often do you write your blogs? I enjoy them a lot 3 2 1
April 2, 2010 at 3:00 am |
Thank you for asking. I write everyday and I have a lifetime of events to tell about. It fun reliving and writing about those events.
Take care…………….Gary
August 8, 2012 at 8:58 pm |
I remember the first few days of “low 7” at Frick. That was the entrance all new students – it consisted of being covered with lipstick at the end of the school day. We had to leave the lipstick on until we got home to take it off. I also remember being forced to go up to girls and ask “do you wear pink falsies?” I remember getting very embarresed at having to do that. I was not even sure what thye pink falsies were at that point.
Don T