I have my biggest inspirations at 3:30 AM and if I don't go with them, they are just lost. So this morning I woke up with a boy named Dwight Kite on my mind. He was an 8th grader at Nickerson Grade School and I must have been in 4th or 5th grade.
* I must put a disclaimer here to say that while the names are pretty close to accurate from my childhood days, the memories that accompany them are solely my perceptions recalled 65 years later and may or may not be completely accurate. But the events usually have some merit for some reason. That having been said, I will continue.
As I recall Dwight was a big boy. He was referred to around town as "now quite right in the head." There were several of those in my growing up days and were times different they would have been referred to as "special ed" and later "special needs" and today I think they are just kids. We have certainly come a long way in how we treat our children, but remember the time frame I am talking here. Dwight was big. Dwight was slow. Dwight was easily led astray.
The incident that is in my mind today was one of those times. There were also big boys who thought it fun to "rile Dwight up." I have no idea what had gone on and it is entirely irrelevant. I do know Dwight was "called into the office."
Mr. Houston was our principal. As I recall he was tall and skinny, but when you are 3 feet tall everyone looks tall. He wore suits and his shoes were always polished. His hair was parted on the side and combed in the manner hair was combed in those days. Several times a day he would walk slowly down the hall and peer into the class rooms to make sure we were studying. He could stop a heart with a look so we always kept our heads down.
Dwight was in the office with amazing regularity and we heard things were going to "come to a head" soon. Now you need to know, that back then a teacher could administer "discipline" in the classroom. Miss Howe in 4th grade was fond of coming up behind the dawdler with a wooden ruler and cracking it down with the straight edge on top of your head. Oh, trust me! You do not know what pain is until suddenly that ruler hits your bony head and the stars fly. Dawdling days were over then!
But if the teacher could not control someone, they were sent to the Principal for a "talking to" and usually that was all it took. I never got a "talking to" and I was very sure I did not want one. Dwight on the other hand received several of them. Mr. Houston kept a rubber hose in his office and we always thought it was just to scare us straight, but Dwight learned different. We all watched as he came out of the office with tears streaming down his face and red marks on his arms. Mr. Houston had won. We all were sad and of course went home at night to report the action to our parents.
Well, that is called "corporal punishment" and Dwight had been bad and no one seemed to know just what he had done that was so bad, but it must have been bad or Mr. Houston would not have whipped him with the hose. Dwight was never quite the same after that. He came to school and was just a big, hulking boy who didn't have much to say. And then he was gone. He still lived in the house across the street with his mother and father, but he was rarely seen. I never saw him, but the other kids said they did. I don't know.
That was a long time ago, but it still sticks in my mind. I marvel at how our world has changed, but no matter how much it changes, it still stays the same. Oh, the days of the rubber hose are gone, pretty much and replaced by more modern methods like "time out" or Lord only knows what. But there is still the standard there that kids have to measure up or be labeled different.
I wonder what Dwight Kite's home was like. I wonder if our society been back then what it is today what Dwight would have become. I do not know when they quit beating kids into submission, but I am thinking maybe some of them could still benefit from a little of that. Just not from the principal of the place you go to learn.
It was a different world back then. It is sad that all these years later, I still think of Dwight Kite. Our family went to church with Mr. Houston and his wife and son, and I was as afraid of him in church as I was in school. Later Miss Barkiss, the music teacher, married the son, David. That is all I know. That may be all I want to know.
* I must put a disclaimer here to say that while the names are pretty close to accurate from my childhood days, the memories that accompany them are solely my perceptions recalled 65 years later and may or may not be completely accurate. But the events usually have some merit for some reason. That having been said, I will continue.
As I recall Dwight was a big boy. He was referred to around town as "now quite right in the head." There were several of those in my growing up days and were times different they would have been referred to as "special ed" and later "special needs" and today I think they are just kids. We have certainly come a long way in how we treat our children, but remember the time frame I am talking here. Dwight was big. Dwight was slow. Dwight was easily led astray.
The incident that is in my mind today was one of those times. There were also big boys who thought it fun to "rile Dwight up." I have no idea what had gone on and it is entirely irrelevant. I do know Dwight was "called into the office."
Mr. Houston was our principal. As I recall he was tall and skinny, but when you are 3 feet tall everyone looks tall. He wore suits and his shoes were always polished. His hair was parted on the side and combed in the manner hair was combed in those days. Several times a day he would walk slowly down the hall and peer into the class rooms to make sure we were studying. He could stop a heart with a look so we always kept our heads down.
Dwight was in the office with amazing regularity and we heard things were going to "come to a head" soon. Now you need to know, that back then a teacher could administer "discipline" in the classroom. Miss Howe in 4th grade was fond of coming up behind the dawdler with a wooden ruler and cracking it down with the straight edge on top of your head. Oh, trust me! You do not know what pain is until suddenly that ruler hits your bony head and the stars fly. Dawdling days were over then!
But if the teacher could not control someone, they were sent to the Principal for a "talking to" and usually that was all it took. I never got a "talking to" and I was very sure I did not want one. Dwight on the other hand received several of them. Mr. Houston kept a rubber hose in his office and we always thought it was just to scare us straight, but Dwight learned different. We all watched as he came out of the office with tears streaming down his face and red marks on his arms. Mr. Houston had won. We all were sad and of course went home at night to report the action to our parents.
Well, that is called "corporal punishment" and Dwight had been bad and no one seemed to know just what he had done that was so bad, but it must have been bad or Mr. Houston would not have whipped him with the hose. Dwight was never quite the same after that. He came to school and was just a big, hulking boy who didn't have much to say. And then he was gone. He still lived in the house across the street with his mother and father, but he was rarely seen. I never saw him, but the other kids said they did. I don't know.
That was a long time ago, but it still sticks in my mind. I marvel at how our world has changed, but no matter how much it changes, it still stays the same. Oh, the days of the rubber hose are gone, pretty much and replaced by more modern methods like "time out" or Lord only knows what. But there is still the standard there that kids have to measure up or be labeled different.
I wonder what Dwight Kite's home was like. I wonder if our society been back then what it is today what Dwight would have become. I do not know when they quit beating kids into submission, but I am thinking maybe some of them could still benefit from a little of that. Just not from the principal of the place you go to learn.
It was a different world back then. It is sad that all these years later, I still think of Dwight Kite. Our family went to church with Mr. Houston and his wife and son, and I was as afraid of him in church as I was in school. Later Miss Barkiss, the music teacher, married the son, David. That is all I know. That may be all I want to know.
