Princeville Community High School Class of 1939

Some of my favorite days volunteering at the museum are the days when we received donations of photos and newspaper clippings.  Photos and newspaper clippings give us a personal glimpse into past history and really help us with genealogy research.  We recently received this composite photo of the Princeville Community High School Senior Class of 1939.  This photo has the names of all the members of the class written under each individual photo.  To help identify the ladies, I used the 1965 Maroon yearbook to research their married name.  As of 1965, the class of 1939 had only lost one classmate, Joseph Friedman, who passed away in 1945.

Top Row: Bettye Ryan Anderson, Franklin Smith, Virginia Hammer Cable, Franklin Staples, Minnie Reich Emken, Frances Neill Paddock, Milton Smith, Jr., Helen Schaad Shears, Donald Sears.

Second row from top: Elizabeth Compton Rusinger, Ronald Slane, Sue Harvey LaFollette, Lloyd Miller, Arlys Streitmatter Conrad, Glen Grimm, Eileen McDonnell Gubbins, Ruth Donath Stickling.

Third row from top: Elizabeth Shearer Ramirez, Orin Scanlon, Raymond Ralph, John Wolfe, W..R. Cordis (superintendent), Laverne Streitmatter, Dewey Smith, Robert Pritchard, Virginia Potter Pierson.

Fourth row from top: Caryl Carman Cowan, Elaine Sibley Mannick, Beatrice Neel, Marie Van Deusen, Phyllis Biederbeck Hammerle, Betty Purcell Murphy.

Fifth row from top: Leo Brown, Lester Woodsworth, Lois Garrett Isome, Harriet Timmons Drake, Charles Timmons, Mary King Payne, Glen Streitmatter, Joseph Friedman.

Bottom row:  Ethel Cheesman Oertley, John Callery, Marian Burns Koch, Darlene Toft Gilles, Arlene Toft Gilles, Edward Callery, Helen Huggins Jackson, James Harmon.

Do you have any old photos, scrapbooks, newspaper clippings or items you would like to donate to the museum?  We take donations Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 10 am to 2 pm or by appointment.  If you can, please call us (385-1916) and let us know you have items to donate so we can be ready to accept your donation.

Princeville High School FFA Parents of 1965

If you follow us on Facebook, you have seen numerous older Future Farmers of America photos.  This blog post was in the works when we've reached out via our Facebook page for help identifying parents of 1965 FFA members at Princeville High School.  A big thank you to all the Facebook friends and museum friends who helped with this.

Behind every FFA member are supportive families, and, especially parents.  The national FFA website devotes a whole page to FFA parents:  "As a parent, you’re the biggest influence in your teenagers’ lives.  FFA's purpose is to reinforce all the values you’re already teaching them at home. We ask all FFA members to set goals, work hard, and serve others. We also encourage them to discover their unique talents and use them to build a successful and satisfying career."

It has been fun researching these FFA parents.  We don't know who took the photos of each set of parents.  Most are taken inside their homes offering us a slice of what the 1960s home and fashions looked like.  If you have any corrections to these names, please either comment below or email me at phmarchives@frontier.com.

Please scroll down and view the supportive FFA parents of 1965:

Alf and Betty (Klepfer) Donsbach

Ed and Helen (Buck) Lauber

Edwin and Dorothy (Heinz) Gilles

Gary and Malinda (Womack) Sager

Glen and Corrine (Pepper) Stone

Leland and Marcia (Riggen) Whittaker

Leo and Ruby (Bornsheuer) Donath

Milt and Dorcas (Gelling) Smith

Roy and Pearl (Grimm) Rumbold

Berryman and Helen (Harrison) Hurt

Carl and Estelle (Hoene) Donsbach

Mr. and Mrs. Charles Myers

Don and Martha (Graves) Gibbs

Don and Virginia (Camp) Sloan


George and Ruth (Burton) Begner

Gerald and Lillian Grunloh

Herman and Lois (Kimble) Fuchs

Mr. and Mrs. James Miles

Joe and Mary Ellen (Purcell) Boylan


John and Lillian (Knobloch) Elsasser

Leonard and Marie (Leuthold) Menold

Mr. and Mrs. Lloyd Brittingham

Melvin and Lorraine (Anderson) Peterson

Mr. and Mrs. Milford Haney

Mr. and Mrs. Oscar Selberg

Otto and Eleanor (Grusy) Baer

Robert E. and Vera (Carver) Campbell

Mr. and Mrs. Robert Gelling

Ted and Delores (Millard) White


Wallace and Edna Fuller

Wilbern and Jessie Pauline (McMahan) Parkhill

 Mr. and Mrs. Worth Clark

Are You Smarter Than an 8th Grader?

Recently, the news feeds featured a 1912 8th grade exam from Kentucky.  Many were trying to take the test to see if they could pass.  If you missed that, click here to view the 1912 exam.  Well, if you think that is hard, see if you could pass the 1932 8th grade exam.  In our archives, we have an exam taken at Adams School, a one room schoolhouse in rural Peoria County, IL.   Adams School was located on Streitmatter Road between Princeville Cemetery Road and Duncan Road.  The exam is in 2 sections, one was taken in the morning and the other in the afternoon.  In the morning, the students completed the arithmetic, geography and reading sections.  The afternoon sections were history, physiology, grammar and orthography.

Get your pencils ready, put away the calculator (it wasn't invented until the 1960s) and get ready to take the test.

 

The next set of photos is the rest of the booklet for the morning exam.  Get ready to test your knowledge in math, reading and geography.  No cheating, the 8th grade students of 1932 had to study without the help of the internet and take this all by themselves.

 

 

 

 

That concludes the morning testing session.  Take a break, grab lunch and don't worry about what you got wrong in the morning.  You need a relaxing lunch so you can get tested on U.S. History, Physiology, Grammar and Orthography. The next set of photos contains the afternoon testing booklet, starting with U.S. History.

 

 

That concludes the exam.  How did you do?  If you wish to view the exam, please stop in the museum which is open Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 10 am to 2 pm or by appointment.