Not Lilly, Pa., but it is close to the 1950s -- except for the backpacks
… just walking to school was a joy for us as kids
This may be the perfect time to post this since Pennsylvania is being hit some snow.
I laugh about the idea of “snow days” that sprang into being in the late 1960s and early 1970s, those when the kids sit at home because of the weather. They love them, parents hate them, and teachers are often frustrated by them.
Back in the 1950s when we were students at St. Brigid’s School in Lilly, Pa., we had no such things as snow days. Almost everyone walked to school.
Only two school buses
The public school district, Lilly-Washington, had two buses that brought students in from distant rural areas, but our school — nicknamed “sisters’ school — did not. Even those two buses did not have to travel more than a few miles — from Scanlan .
So, I remember when we would have eight to ten inches of snow and my sister would complain to my mother about having to walk to school. She invariably replied, “We don’t skip school because of snow.”
Thus, we would bundle up and walk the quarter mile to St. Brigid’s in the seven or eight inches of snow. Some of our friends walked further than we did — like the Barlick kids in Lower Dutchtown.
Snow days and delays hurt education
Today, educators are attempting to do away with the “snow days” because they are so disruptive to the academic process. Now, since so many have access to electronic education, the snow days can include instructional time. And, the horrible two hour delays that disrupted activities can now be a thing of the past.
America was definitely a better place when the kids walked to school.
Comments