Lea with Her Sister Elinor - Already Demonstrating Her Future Teacher Talents

Teaberries, Tadpoles and Tipping Over Toilets

Childhood in Hyde / Hyde Child in the ‘Hood / Growing Up a 'Hyde Hood’

By Suzanne Sherkel Nagle

In the 40’s and 50’s Hyde City was the perfect place to be a kid. There were three general stores: Rafferty’s (which was also the Post Office), Paul Bailey’s and Schrot’s; two gas stations, a factory - American Mono-nickel, or the A & M, that I always thought stood for Airplane & Marine (?), a furniture store – Henry J. Brown’s (which is still there!), the Hyde Hotel, the Laurel Garden dance hall, the Pilgrim Holiness Church, two or three barber shops, a ball field, the “hill” (for sledding or tobogganing – NOT skiing!- usually on HJB’s cardboard), the village-dividing Montgomery “Crick” (which we dammed up in several places to make swimming holes), several vacant lots, some of them boggy or swampy (great for picking teaberries or catching tadpoles and salamanders) or woodsy (for “camp”-building using –you guessed it – HJB’s discarded cardboard appliance boxes). There was even a nearby Country Club with a nine-hole golf course! And, of course, there was “Hyde City Tech”, our much-loved four- (later, five-) room elementary school, with the super, l-o-n-g cement sidewalks for hopscotch and roller-skating, and a “football-field”- sized patch of real grass on either side.

But Hyde City was really its families, with names like Ammerman, Armstrong, Bell, Brown, Collins, Crawford, Duckett, Duttry, Faulkner, Gearhart, Guelich, Haag, Harper, Haversack, Heitsenrether, Hoover, Hummel, Hurley, Jay, Johnson, Lanager, Lanich, Lawhead, Little, Mabie, Magnuson, Michaels, Moyer, Poole, Quinn, Raybold, Reed, Reitmyer, Shimmel, Teats, Tornatore, Triponey, Viehdeffer, Vokes, White, Yatta – many of whom spawned dynasties of athletes who excelled, especially, in football, wrestling and golf.

From 1948 to 1951 I lived in one of the “suburbs” of Hyde City: the Montgomery Run, Fletcherville, Coal Hill, Riverview Road “loop”; and I got to ride the bus with kids named Barr, Carns, Fiscus, Fletcher, McBride, Powell, Ogden, Rauch, Rose, and Rumfola. Lest we forget, that’s where the airport and armory were. The Sherkels lived in the lower half of the old, then “duplexed”, McPherson farmhouse during the great ice-storm of the winter of ’50-’51. And to a nine-year-old kid, it really was “great”!

By the time I moved back to the “city”, some of the streets had been paved and given names (We never knew our “address”, except for a P.O. Box number.), fewer and fewer outhouses were in regular use, and most homes had indoor plumbing, including pure, sparkling water piped in from the Montgomery Dam. A few TV antennas were beginning to sprout up; but we kids still played outdoors until dark. (The Sherkels never did get a TV set until my mother’s beloved Pittsburgh Pirates played the Yankees in the ’60 World Series, after I was long-gone.)

Some may ask how we came to be known as “Hyde Hoodlums”. I honestly don’t know, except for the fact that we were all pretty “rough and tough”, due to our physically active, relatively unsupervised, “left- to do-as-we-pleased” childhood. As a result, some of us got hurt, and some even got arrested. (We started “halloweening” in late September: corning, soaping or, worse, waxing windows, tipping over outhouses, stretching ropes and/or chains across the streets, as well as dressing up in old clothes, with nylon stockings disguising our faces, and going begging from door to door.) As far as I can recall, we Hyde kids were not into Girl and Boy Scouting, which might have redeemed some of us – although I was in 4-H, but only because my grandmother was the leader.

Leaving Hyde City Tech for the Junior High was pretty traumatic; but that’s another chapter….

All in all, I wouldn’t trade my childhood in Hyde for anything – it was a gift for which I am eternally grateful.

Present-Day Hyde, As Photographed by Karl Nagle

- Razor Sharp Photos by Karl Nagle

Planning Committee Moves the Agenda Ahead

- Fuzzy Photo and caption by Karl Nagle

The planning committee meeting for our 50th-year reunion in 2009 attracted a number of new participants to the cause on Saturday, Aug. 2. Joanne Shimel Magnuson volunteered to head the decorating committee; Sue Weisshaus Speicher presented a number of great ideas for the commemorative booklet; Sam Lansberry agreed to host an picnic-type event at his Woodland home the Friday before the the formal reunion; and Tom O'Day presented a number of excellent ideas for events surrounding the Saturday event, including golf outing, canoe trip, bus trip to historic Clearfield County sites, and Sunday breakfast.

Following the meeting, Wilbur and Karen Shirey volunteered to host a Sunday breakfast.

All in all, the meeting attracted the largest number of participants to date, and most agreed it was one of the most productive sessions yet. The next meeting is set for Saturday, Nov. 1, at the Shaw Library in Clearfield.Watch this site for a full summary of the day's discussions and decisions.

Wil Shirey, Chairman Herb Maney and Gary Bolton

Joyce Amon Michaels, Orvis Kline, Sue Weisshaus Speicher and Suzy Sherkel Nagle

Suzy Sherkel Nagle, Tom O'Day, Joanne Shimel Magnuson and Dennis Mollura

Joyce Moody Fletcher, Bonnie Henchbarger Powell, Herb Maney and Dennis Mollura

Linda Smith Dale, Sam Lansberry and Joyce Moody Fletcher

- All Sharp and Clear Photos by Karl Nagle

Joyce Moody, at the Tender Age of 7

As we come up on our 50th-Year Reunion planning meeting this Saturday, Aug. 2, from 10 a.m. to noon at the Shaw Library, it is fitting, proper and long overdue that we pay tribute to the one, only, and incredible Joyce Moody Fletcher, who provides the spark, the cohesiveness and the glue for all our reunion efforts.

Joyce has worked tirelessly (and mostly alone) for many years to keep the knowledge, the records and the spirit of Clearfield Area High School alive - not only for the Class of 1959 but also the Golden Bison Alumni Association.

If you ever attended Clearfield Area High School, she has a record of it. If you've ever been "lost"or "gone missing," she'll track you down. That's how she earned the nickname Jessica, as in Jessica Fletcher of the TV series "Murder She Wrote." (Believe Karen Shirey pinned that moniker on her.) And if you've ever died, well, she has a record of that, too.

So, here's to you, Joyce Moody Jessica Fletcher! We love you and we appreciate you, more than you know.

Clearfield Area High School Class of 1959

50th-Year Reunion Planning Meeting

August 2nd - Shaw Library - 10 am - Noon

Come Join in the Planning

and

The Fun!

Betsy Kephart Kruckenberg Uncovers a Treasure of Photos

Betsy Kephart, maybe Seventh or Eighth Grade.

Somedays you open your mail and a wonderful gift arrives. Our classmate Betsy Kephart Kruckenberg produced an envelope full of memorable photos, both students and teachers, primarily from our Junior High School years. What you see here and below are but a fraction of the photos. Watch this website though the next few months for the complete file. Thanks, Betsy. You really came through for your classmates.

Great Group of Girls - Can you Name Them?

Vickie Libreatori and Betsy Kephart

Linda Wright and Kay Skinner

Jerriann Jury

LaRee Luzier

Keith Knepp - This Man Obviously Loves To Party

Keith Knepp's birthday party, 1959

Dressed for the Senior Prom, 1959

White sports coats, pink carnations, and two lovely women in their elegant prom dresses. From left, Fred King, Corrine Gelnett, Sue King and Keith Knepp.

- Copies of photos from Keith Knepp

Molluras Drop In on the Nagles in Indiana, PA

On their way home from a family reunion in Clune (Coal Run), PA, Dennis and Rosemary Mollura had a great idea - why not drop in on Karl and Suzy Nagle at their lovely new home on School Street in Indiana.

The visit was brief but filled with lots of fun and laughs. Suzy and Dennis dominated the conversation, mainly about our 50th-year class reunion in 2009 and some memorable CHS moments and characters. Suzy even promised to deliver the long-awaited "Growing Up in Hyde City" article that she's been "writing" for this website.

Karl and Rosemary played the patient spouse routine and let the conversation wash over them. What choice did they have?

Karl, ever the gracious host, served coffee and made these "historic" photos. We're looking forward to the Reunion Planning Committee this Saturday at the Shaw Library in Clearfield.

- Dennis Mollura