High School - Revisited

On my 70th birthday my friend Terry, who I had worked with while at the University of Waterloo, sent me the clipping shown at left which appeared in the Owen Sound Sun Times newspaper sometime around October of 1970/71. I was the valedictorian for my graduating class whatever year it was and the article mentions my remarks at several points. Terry wrote:

"Happy Birthday, Reg.  I don't think I've shared this Sun Times clipping with you before.  I just re-read it.  Your words are as true today as they were then."

The picture is captioned, "Other Ontario scholars at the OSCVI last year were Peggy Lennox, Margaret Jones, Mary Vaughan and Donna Brown." The photo credit is "SUN TIMES PHOTOS Catherine Breen"

The text of the article reads as follows:

286 graduates receive diplomas at OSCVI commencement exercises

Parents and friends filled the auditorium Saturday night as 286 graduates received diplomas during annual commencement exercises at the OSCVI. Principal Kenneth McClelland welcomed 92 honor graduates and 194 second school Grade 12 graduates.

Among those receiving diplomas were 12 Ontario Scholars, the largest number recorded in any year at the school. Some 52 graduates are attending university, 21 are attending various colleges, and 16 are registered in schools of nursing. Approximately 100 Grade 12 graduates are attending classes in Grade 13.

Valedictorian Reginald Quinton, an Ontario scholar, in his address called for an end to polarization of OSCVI students into groups which keep to themselves and look with contempt on other groups.

He said that in school, unless one is a complete individualist, he often loses his identity; he becomes another gear in a use less machine.

Noting that students have their own class system within the school Mr. Quinton stated: "They ran, jumped, cheered and insulted one another in unison — just like sheep following one another. People prefer to follow the group rather than stand alone and take the bumps."

He added, "Everyone does the same thing, not because they want to but because they are pressured into it. Being different is crime."

The speaker said in his view being different is not a crime but the mark of a true human being an individual. He called for an end to student pressure groups and an attempt by all students to mix with others and recognize individuals for what they are and not by their group label.

"With no pressure groups you have nothing to lose," he told the students, "You wouldn't have to join the football team, do dope, or drink to impress any group and enhance your position in that group. For once in your life you could do what you want and be what you want."

Mr. Quinton said the student cliques at OSCVI condemn one another simply because they are different. He said he could not understand why one group thinks it is better than the other. Least of all, he said, he didn't see why there should be any groups at all.

"Instead of discussing peace in Vietnam, and the lack of personal freedoms in Communist countries, let's try peace, love and individuality in our own lives, be it in university, college, and especially the world some here tonight have already entered," Mr. Quinton said.

The 12 Ontario Scholars attending were Catherine Breen, now at the University of Western Ontario; Donna Brown, University of Western Ontario; Bryan Ferguson, University of Waterloo; William Frost, Ireland's book store; Margaret Jones, University of Waterloo; Jeffrey Knowles, University of Waterloo: Peggy Lennox, Bell Canada; John McKerroll, York University; Paul McKnight, University of Waterloo; Reginald Quinton, University of Western Ontario: James Rourke. University of Western Ontario, and Mary Vaughan, Toronto General Hospital.

Chester Kuhl, chairman of the Grey County board of education, brought greetings from the board and spoke briefly. He ....

The clipping, aged and fading, ends there before the last column listing all the awards and such for that year. Peggy's mom had saved the clipping for her. Peggy is married to Terry and was a classmate of mine, she is pictured above and listed as one of the Ontario Scholars. Somewhere there was probably a clipping that my parents had saved but they're long gone and I don't have a clipping to share. So thank you Terry, Peggy and Peggy's mom for sharing this souvenir with me.

Terry, who went to the same high school, asked, "I hope you weren't talking about me back then. I felt totally awkward in high school and out of place. Too skinny to be an athlete and too nerdy to be cool." 

And I  replied, "High school is a hard time. We all felt like lepers on the outside. But there definitely was an inside vs outside. I suppose it's just part of growing up. There's a song for that ..." and gave him a link to the Nanci Griffith song "It's a Hard Life Wherever You Go" (from Storms, 1989).  Nanci Griffith had died in August of 2021; another one of those singers we miss.

The OSCVI high school that I went to was torn down around the year 2000 when a new building was opened near the current hospital on 8th Street East; and, with changing demographics, that was closed around 2016 and converted into an elementary school. OSCVI was amalgamated with the West Hill High School at that time and is no more.