<Begin Segment 17>

[Ed. note: This transcript has been edited by the narrator]

TI: Let's, you mentioned earlier Bailey Gatzert. So let's talk about elementary school and what that was like for you.

SA: Well, I tell you, we had a remarkable woman (as principal) named Ms. Mahon, and she always brought her dog, which was a big collie dog. But she understood (who she was) dealing with. Like I said, it must have been ninety percent Chinatown and Nihonmachi (children). So she started a Good American Citizenship club. Now, I have never seen anything like this, and I was a teacher in later years. Well, in fact, twenty-two and a half years I spent in teaching. But I look back on it now and I tell my peers, "We had a platoon system at school." And (...) we don't have that (now), we have a self-contained classroom. But, (at that time), from third grade on, you were moved into a platoon system. We had a music teacher, Ms. Phelan, and we had specialists, actually. Ms. Laurie in art, we had Ms. McQue for math and we had, the librarian was Ms. Salverson and I could go on. But (the school had) specialized into these subjects. So we had an education far superior than you could even pick up now, I think.

TI: You mean, so, in elementary school, it wasn't your traditional one teacher all day with a classroom, you're saying that you actually moved from --

SA: It was not a self-contained classroom, teaching all subjects.

TI: You moved from subject to subject.

SA: (Yes, in) kindergarten, first, second, third, we were contained, but from fourth the platoon system started, fourth, fifth, sixth. And then at seventh and eighth we were sent to Washington middle school. But prior to my grade, I think when my sister was going, they ran up to eighth grade, and then on to high school.

TI: So, so I didn't realize this. So this platoon system at Bailey Gatzert was innovative. It was something that was not happening --

SA: Oh, I thought so. I don't know what other schools did, maybe they did it, too. But I know the bunch of us there that turned into schoolteachers, (...) remarked how, how lucky we were. Because the science teacher would take us, Ms. Chambers would take us walking on -- we don't have field trips -- but around and we used to look at the forsythias. She (also) got the mushrooms, you know, and we'd, she'd pass out black paper, I'd like to see some people do it now. Take the mushroom, invert it, and the spores would fall down and make a pattern. And when I think about that, I thought, boy they were innovative.

<End Segment 17> - Copyright © 2008 Densho. All Rights Reserved.