Joyce Darr, a Rolla resident, graduated from Rolla High School. She shares her experience at Rolla High including location, similarirtiers and differences from the High School today, cultural influences, style, and traditions.
Due to the fact that the 10th street Rolla High School building wasn’t finished until 1953, Darr went to the old High School building on Cedar street.
“[It was] just the one, brick two story building. The gym was in the basement. It was really kind of a tri-level because you had the gym downstairs and then the main level that you went up steps to get to and then really a partial third floor of classrooms up top. The football field was up where the back part of the school is now. So all that on down, where the current sports fields are now, those were all homes and there used to a swimming pool on 10th street too. When you went in the front doors, you walked downstairs to the gym and locker rooms. When you went up, you had the principal’s office on one side and the superintendent’s office on the other. And then, directly in front of that was the auditorium and then down the hall you had several classrooms. That’s where the english classrooms were and some history classes,” Darr said.
Most school times are from eight in the morning to three in the afternoon, but that wasn’t the case when Darr was in school.
We went to school at nine o’clock, we got an hour for lunch, and we got out of school at four. And everyone walked to school in town. The only buses brought kids in from the country. So kids walked home for lunch or you brought your lunch. There wasn’t any lunch room. I lived on 7th street where it’s part of the parking lot of the high school now, so it was very easy for me to get back. It took me two minutes to walk from home to school.
Like today, Rolla High in the 1950s had a great band program as well.
“We had a really good band because Isabelle Estes, whose name is known all over Rolla, was the band director. Isabelle did the vocal music and then by the time I was a Sophomore, she was only doing band and then we had other vocal instructors,” Darr said.
Estes wrote the Pride song in 1937. This song is still played by our band at football and basketball games.
Unlike today, female students didn’t have many activities to get involved in.
“It was all boys because there were no girls teams. Anything that was girls was just done during P.E. which we had everyday. So, we had gymnastics but it wasn’t a competitive team .We didn’t travel or anything like that. There wasn’t a whole lot for women back then. You could be in FHA, Future Homemakers of America, or Secretarial Club.” Breuer said.
Dances were also pretty similar to today, just with a few different traditions.
“We had Homecoming and in the winter, they had a Key Club dance, and in the spring we had Prom. And we used to have a homecoming parade up Pine Street. We made floats, the sophomore, junior, and senior classes competed against each other. We had band and then the convertibles that the candidates rode in with their suits and hats that they wore that friday night to the football game. The float competition was a big thing. Each class had a teacher sponsor and it was tissue paper and chicken wire. it was hours. I can remember it being midnight or one am and were trying to finish the float because the parade is the next day. And, then we had a lot of sock hops in the gym. Back then, the garage bands were popular, and there were four guys from my class that had a band called The Reactions. They played at all of our sock hops. Then sometimes when we didn’t have a school one, they would rent out the Armory and charge a cover and we’d have sock hops at the Armory,” Breuer said.
Bands and celebrities ruled the fashion trends back in the 70s just like they do today.
“The Beatles were big, but it was starting to trend more to harder rock. I felt that our class was one of the last classes that the boys didn’t have the long hair. Into the 70’s was where it became more hippy but our class was pretty clean cut. But, mini skirts came in and skorts, knee socks, bell bottoms were just starting to come in, and palazzo pants,” Breuer said.
Since the middle school wasn’t built yet in 1970, students went straight to the Junior High.
“All we had was Mark Twain and Wyman and then you went to the Junior High. We were the first class to go into the Junior High when it was built. 7th, 8th and 9th was there on Soest and the year it was built, our class was the first class that started there,” Breuer said.
After she and her children all graduated from Rolla High School, Breuer expresses her overall experience in the Rolla Public Schools system.
“I have to say it was an overall good experience. I know Rolla High offers a lot more than it did but that was 46 years ago things have come a long ways. My kids went there [and] I feel like they got a good education went on to have successful lives,” Breuer said.