Remembering Oak Park childhoods 50-plus years ago

Ascension School Room 107, 1958

In the early 1930s, when a Cubs game ended at Wrigley Field, the el cars were so crowded that Ascension 8^th grader Winnie Halvorsen Soucie and her brothers, “crawled through the train windows to get a seat back to Oak Park,” she remembers.


Memories of grammar school from the early 30s to 1960 filled Ascension’s Pine Room as more than 74 Ascension alumni and family members gathered Sunday, June 27, 2010 for a Gold Alumni Brunch honoring students who had graduated 50 years ago or more.


In 1933, recalled Soucie, early adolescence was filled with Cubs games, picnics and swimming at the lake in Columbus Park. The fashions of the day were wide-bottomed sailor pants and billowy culottes.


Soucie recalled how her love of history was nurtured by beloved 7^th grade teacher, Sister Bernard. During its first seven decades, the school was staffed by the Ursuline Sisters who saw class sizes explode from under 20 children to more than 50 during the 1960s baby boom.


The nuns were known for their discipline, remembered Margie Cunningham Davitt,(class of 1957) who recalled how she and a classmate were sentenced to hard labor picking dandelions in the rectory yard after snickering at the way their teacher pronounced the word “bouquet.”


Classmates Pat Enyart Saraz and Barbara Prack (class of 1952) remembered first and second grade ice cream excursions “marching up Oak Park Ave. to Wallace’s” with Fr. Ryan. They shared fond memories of roller skating in the gym and candy purchases at Molly’s on East and Harrison.


Then, as now, Catholic moral teachings were central to the curriculum. A memorable sex-ed talk to a basement of mortified young men began with the priest saying, “So you think you’re one of the boys in the know, do you?” recalled John Walsh(class of 1955).

Winnie Halvorsen Soucie, Class of 1933

But though fifty years have passed, some facets of childhood as Ascension school remain unchanged. Peggy O'Leary Barnes (class of 1960) wrote a letter to the fifth grade of her memories of trying to circumnavigate the entire school without touching the sidewalk -- by climbing from ledge to ledge and grasping window bars. A student wrote back: "Kids still do that today," said Barnes, smiling.