Happy 154th birthday, Nebraska!
Well, belated birthday greetings — two days late. The Cornhusker State’s admission to the Union is March 1, 1867.
We Nebraskans are known as an independent folk. Why else would we have established the non-partisan Nebraska Legislature in 1937? And, as most readers know, we would rather be governed by our acquaintances from down the street than by the unknowns located on the east coast.
As a seven-year-old child my middle name became just that: Independent.
By the time I entered the second grade of Malcolm, NE Public Schools in September 1966, I had developed a rebellious attitude. I have no idea why. Maybe it was because I was forced to leave my comfortable one-room school that I had attended in first grade (now the Malcolm Post Office) and was forced to share hallways with tetchy third and fourth graders.
The school’s playground was located north of the building, well hidden from my classroom’s western view. I took full advantage of the fact my teacher, Mrs. Fern Westfall, couldn’t see through walls. My independent attitude resulted in several tardy crimes following recesses and lunch periods. They usually resulted from an unwillingness to cease flying as high as I could in the swings with other rebellious classmates. Mrs. Westfall would eventually arrive and retrieve her wayward students back to the classroom – sometimes by grabbing my ear.
My independence came to a head on March 1, 1967. The Malcolm Public Schools was celebrating Nebraska’s Centennial, and we students were encouraged to dress as Pioneers. Following a ceremony in the gym, I high tailed it to the playground where I remained in the swings until late in the school day. After dragging me indoors, Mrs. Westfall ordered me to stand in front of the class and explain why I ignored the bell. If I didn’t provide a justified explanation, I would be sent to the principal’s office, which meant a sure spanking from Mr. Leonard Melichar. He had recently warned me my bell ignoring practices wouldn’t be tolerated much longer.
I finally blurted out that I hadn’t heard the bell and broke into tears. If little lies are considered white, then this one was the darkest shade of black. But I wasn’t about to plead guilty to insubordination. Mrs. Westfall then announced to the entire second-grade class that she could no longer trust me and that I had become nothing but a huge disappointment. I would rather have had her whip me than tell the whole class that I was no longer trustworthy. Her strategy worked.
I eventually became an obedient and respectful student, not only for the remainder of second grade, but the ten school years that followed. I had decided school offered too many enjoyable opportunities to miss by failing to watch a clock or respond to a bell. I firmly believe that had Mrs. Westfall not shamed me in front of my peers by calling me untrustworthy, later years may have found me on the wrong side of a courtroom bar.
Mrs. Westfall would go on to educate children for several more years. She had two tenures in Malcolm, first teaching between the years 1929 and 1934. She then left and taught at a variety of schools before returning to Malcolm in 1956 until she retired in 1976. When a new elementary school was built just north of Malcolm in 1981, it was appropriately named Fern Westfall Elementary.
Mrs. Westfall died on June 2, 1996. She is buried at Lincoln Memorial Park, the same cemetery where my maternal grandparents are at eternal rest.