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Part of the graduating class at Murfreesboro High, 1947

Mascots were: Judy Evans, Bucky Wise.   Front row, from left: Elizabeth Warren, Elizabeth Cullens, Myrle Vinson, Frances Brown, DeLena Jones, Helen Duncan.   Second row, from left: Irvin Joyner, Charles Liverman, Bertha Griffith, hidden unknown, Margaret Parker and Elton Askew.

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SCHOOLHOUSE SKETCHES
By Pete Austin

Lunch Went to School in a Brown Paper Bag

During the first few years after the Roxobel-Kelford School opened they did not have a lunchroom to serve hot food and drinks. Until the cafeteria opened my mother prepared what I would consider today as being some great lunches. However, back then I considered those meals to be "just so."

Each morning we carried our lunch to school in a brown paper bag, whenever they were available. Or my mother would wrap our lunch in kraft paper and tie it with cotton twine, nice and secure, to prevent it from falling out to the ground, as we always ran once we arrived at school. It also helped to keep out the flies that quite frequently were attracted to the lunches, as the school was near a pasture and farm barns, and their entrances had no screens.

In those days, in the early 1930s, we had no store-bought loaf bread to make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches ~ or poly-bag-packed Frito-Lays etc. to carry to school. Grocery store pre-sliced bread became available later, but we just couldn’t afford to go to the store to purchase it back then.

Mainly we had rolling-pin clabber biscuits that were oven baked in a wood-fired cook stove, or deep pan-baked egg bread made with bleached wheat flour and water-mill-ground corn meal. It was then placed in a hot oven after it was mixed with a couple of beaten eggs with whole milk being added as needed.

We had deep pan-baked corn bread that was cut into two-inch squares for serving, deep fat-fried corn bread cakes, "pone" bread cooked on top of the stove in a black skillet, and sweet potato hand-dropped biscuits.

My mother also made homemade white or whole-wheat loaf bread that was served with black sorghum molasses, homemade jelly, jam, apple or peanut butter, pan-fried country ham, flour-battered oxen tripe, link or patty pork sausage that was pre-cooked and stored in a stand of lard to preserve it until it was dipped out and re-heated in a cast-iron skillet, whole oven-baked sweet potatoes, deep-fried white-potato pancakes, a strip of fried fat and lean pork (thick bacon or fatback), boiled cured pork dandoodle cooked in a pot with cornbread dumplings and garden greens, fried or baked country chicken, battered and fried pork chops or boiled pork backbone.

On special occasions a sugar cookie would be included for a treat.

There were some students who had little more than collard greens and corn bread in their poke. It was fun to exchange lunch with classmates. One of the items that I had very little interest in eating, and that I usually traded with another playmate, was dark-fried corned herring that my family had at our breakfast table. Having it served later in the day meant that you had to get up several times during the night to drink water to quench your thirst.

Other specials for breakfast included scrambled eggs with pork brains, poached eggs over baked whole herring fish roe, scrambled eggs with canned fish roe, hard-boiled brown chicken eggs (white eggs came later), canned fried salmon patties, fresh deep-fried oyster fritters, pork scrapple, hotcakes with Karo syrup, Cream of Wheat, hot oatmeal, grits cooked with real cow’s cream added to give them that real rich taste.

The leftover grits were later served as garlic grits at suppertime with skillet-cooked crackling bread, made from fried pork crackling taken from a lardstand stored in the kitchen pantry.

To make crackling, the fatty portions of the hog were diced up and all the grease was cooked out in a large black washpot for several hours to bring the contents to a dark golden brown color. After the grease was drained off, the fried fatty pieces were then placed in a sausage press to extract all of the remaining oil, and the cakes of pressed crackling were then stored in a separate lardstand for future use.

Occasionally we had Post Corn Flakes (called the "All-American Buck Rogers breakfast cereal"), and cinnamon toast on light bread. Cheese toast was a Sunday morning treat. Hot cocoa was served during the winter time, and cool milk was common during warm weather.

Also, on Sunday night we had a bowl of clabber with a spoon full of sugar added and served with homemade pound cake. Another favorite was a spoon full of chocolate powdered Postum, that was added to a glass of hot whole milk. This drink also became a milkshake when used with cracked ice whenever it was available.

The menu in the 1930s for a school lunch was quite different from the basic food that is placed in a store-bought lunch box today. It is important to note in class group photos that there were very few obese students back then. Our tote bag back then had lots of no-no fried foods that were prepared at home, and took lots of time for our moms to prepare each morning.

Not only did mom need to prepare and cook the goodies, she had to fire up the wood cook stove to get the oven just right for baking. Today's time-saving fast food, pre-packed items and canned soda make it much easier to send a child off to school with a lunch pail filled with surprises. Now modern school cafeterias serve well-balanced hot meals to all students every day if the student chooses to eat there.

After giving it lots of deep study, I can't say that I would even think of changing places with these kids today, even though they now serve pizza, hamburgers, soda pop and ice cream daily.

(Watch for more "Schoolhouse Sketches" by Pete Austin)