Nowadays I suppose students remember their classmates by the oh-so-clever posts they write on their friends’ Facebook pages, or with Twitter “tweets” and other so-called “social networking” devices.
Things were different when I was growing up. We bought fancy little autograph books, and passed them around, collecting the signatures and sayings of our dearest friends. Sometimes these turn up at estate sales or on eBay, and I thought I’d share one with you because — well, that’s what I’m paid to do.
This much-worn little booklet was once owned by Robert Hugh Murphy, who was age 10 and in the fifth grade. I know this because he wrote it inside the book. A few of his friends wrote “Bloomfield, Missouri” at the top of their pages, so that tells you where the book came from. Now how it ended up in Memphis, I can’t say.
What’s interesting is that in a book whose cover is labeled “My Schooldays Autographs” you didn’t just collect autographs, but you gathered witty sayings from your classmates. Apparently everyone picked out a clever poem or phrase, memorized it as their own, and wrote that in every book they were handed; they didn’t stand there and try to think of something on the spot.
So here are a few of the inscriptions. You’ll notice a certain trend with some of them.
And yes, by our standards they are corny, but you bet they were the bee’s knees back in 1932, which is the date of most of these: