Jim Ross

Liberty Corner Memories

• I attended the Liberty Corner School from K through fourth grade. I remember Ellie Pinson and I coaxing a fellow classmate (don't remember name) who lived on a farm on Mt Prospect into making snow-angels so his snow suit would fill with snow and our teacher would get upset having to dry him off. I also remember Ellie's legs getting bright pink from the cold as we waited for the school doors to open (those girls who complain about wool leggings don't know how good they had it).

• Sledding down hill on Far Hills/Douglas Roads with Bobby Perkins and his mother making hot chocolate afterwards..

• Taking long walks on weekends with my older brother, Dan. We would disappear for hours with no questions asked. I think my parents were happy to have us out of the house. Today it seems you hardly ever see children playing outside.

• “We're doing our Christmas shopping at Robert Hall this year.”

• Playing tackle football at the Liberty Corner School with Dave Simpson and his older brother and friends on weekends. No pads or helmets – this probably explains a lot.

• On a sad note, I remember Philip Mylod asking kids to punch him in the head on the playground and too many boys were happy to do this. Mobs would cheer them on. One time I went and got a teacher to stop the beating. A Lord of the Flies moment.

• On summer weekends we would see lots of light aircraft circling slowly over Liberty Corner. My father would always laugh and say they were looking down at the nudist camp.

• Miss Kearns took me out of the regular reading groups for several months in fifth grade at Cedar Hill and gave me phonics books to work on. She did more to improve my reading skills than any other teacher and I have only fond memories of her.

• In sixth grade Mr. English had the class do a big show & tell of our favorite stuff. I and several other boys had WWII memorabilia from relatives and Archies junk shop. Jim Rickey had a paper Dixie cup with two slightly used Vicks cough drops. He labeled it “General Patton's Cough Drops.”

• I met Bruce Macchiaverna in sixth grade and we became best friends. I spent many summer days swimming at his pool. We played endless games of chess. We would play punt-back in the street in front of my house for hours on holidays and maybe one car would come by every half hour. Punt back involves punting a football back and forth until one person is driven back to a predetermined goal line. Needless to say, Bruce always won.

• I enjoyed Boy Scouts in junior high and high school. I enjoyed camping and learned a lot from my scout leaders in Troop 54.

• I remember in ninth grade one of the classes (maybe ours?) wanted to have a dance with the theme “Midnight in Moscow.” This was a big hit in the spring of '62. Mr. Keeler vetoed the theme because he did not want McCarthyite complaints from anti-communist parents.

• I think cross country and track were my favorite activities in high school. I had lots of friends on the track team – Bruce M, Jim Crawford, Rick Porter, Tommy Ike, Ken Ballenger, Cliff Schmutz, Ted Miller, Jeff Wilker, Jack Welch and many more. We did very well our senior year. Coach Smith was a very positive influence for me. He taught me the value of hard work.

• I visited the high school in the early '70s and was surprised when I saw the athletic records board in the gym. When we graduated, our class had almost all the records. Just six years later they were almost all broken by succeeding classes. That's life.

• History was my favorite subject and I really admired all my history teachers – Mr. Pederson, Mr. Moyer, Mr. Meys and Mr. Eisenhart. Their influence caused me to major in history in college. One day in Mr. Meys' U.S. History I class, Cliff Schmutz was able to read something in small print on the bulletin board from way across the room. Mr. Meys was amazed and administered an impromptu eye exam which Cliff passed with flying colors. I too was amazed since I was sitting much closer to the bulletin board and could not read it.

• In the fall of our senior year, Bruce M, Randy Pratt, Rick Porter and I were sitting in the cafeteria discussing the edict banning raisins from brown bag lunches because someone had ground them into the cafeteria floor tiles and they were difficult to clean up. Henry Cabot Lodge had won a significant write-in campaign in the New Hampshire earlier that year and I threw out the idea that we should form a party and run for class offices as write-in candidates. I meant it as a joke, but Bruce, Randy and Rick thought it was a great idea and the Radical Raisinist Party was born. I made up some campaign posters based upon silly Mad Magazine characters and taped them up around the school early on the morning of the election. On my way to my first class I remember seeing Mr. Keeler tearing down the posters with a scowl on his face. I don't remember my parents being called into school about the campaign as Randy's parents were.

• One of my last memories of Ridge High was graduation day. A group of seniors was sitting on the stairs by the library. Randy Pratt had a plastic olive drab toy mortar that fired ping pong balls. He was periodically shooting them at passers-by. When asked what he was doing, he said he was practicing for Vietnam. Shades of things to come.