Annette Bignall

Senior Picture: Kellogg High School, Class of 1972

When I was a college freshman at North Idaho College, my drinking habit interfered with my English Composition class, taught by Annette Bignall. Mrs. Bignall was the most striking, imposing figure this nervous, unsure kid from Kellogg (pictured above) had ever seen. Granted, it's been thirty-five years since I've seen Annette Bignall. I hope my memory of her is accurate: a shock of red hair, not straight, not curly, not messy, but not tightly controlled, flairing, as if she were the subject of Herrick's "Delight in Disorder"; her gait was purposeful, head high, high heels tapping, back straight. To my young mind, she seemed more French than American. I would imagine her walking imperially down the Champs Elysees, observant and impervious, impatiently making her way to a museum or to meet a fellow intellectual at a Parisian cafe.
Mrs. Bignall's mere presence triggered my imagination.

It was if an emissary from another land was teaching me English. I loved her. After a successful first semester in her fall English class, I reupped for the spring.

My second semester at North Idaho College started in late January of 1973. I lived at home in Kellogg the fall semester. The commuting got old and so two other guys and I moved into a motel kitchenette at the far end of East Sherman Avenue, near the Cove Bowl. Because the Idaho legal drinking age was nineteen, I could go to bars. Some late afternoons my mind would race. I'd feel tortured by my romantic failures or I'd revisit high school basketball failures or I'd want to think about poetry I was reading in American Lit. I walked. And drank. On these nights, I started drinking at the Steinhaus, near where I lived. I drank a beer or two, listened to the Moody Blues sing, "I'm Just a Singer (in a Rock 'n Roll Band)" and maybe have a hot ham and cheese sandwich on rye. I walked a few blocks west to Primo's Pizza, which became hooked up with the Blue Tooth Saloon. If I started walking and drinking early enough, I could get quarter schooners during Primo's generous Happy Hour. I went to Rathskeller's. I sucked on some gin or a ditch at the Iron Horse. I veered right to The Lakers.

By now it was about nine o'clock or so. I knew Rob and Bruce were home. I walked to their place, at the Cockroach Castle, and if Bruce's van, The Purple Pig, was parked nearby I knew I was in for an evening of Emerson, Lake, and Palmer, National Lampoon, refrigerated Marlboro cigarettes, and more cold beer. Sometimes Duke and Sluggo and Liz came by. Sometimes I'd dig out Bruce's U.S. History book and we'd study for the next George (Rufus) Cook exam. Mostly, Rob and Bruce told stories about their failures at Walla Walla College and we drank, smoked, talked ideas, listened to progressive rock, and eventually passed out.

Consequently, I always fell behind in Mrs. Bignall's class. I never quite had short stories by Joseph Conrad or Herman Melville or Shirley Jackson read on time; I skipped class, hungover; I attended class, hungover, my eyes coin slots, dim vermillion cracks. After spring break, much of our emphasis in the course was a research paper. Being from the Silver Valley, known nationally for its whorehouses, I decided to do a paper on legalized prostitution. Mrs. Bignall got right behind my project. She recommended books, helped me find articles in the National Observer and the Rocky Mountain Observer. She helped arrange an interview with her husband, attorney Bliss Bignall. I couldn't believe how generous she was.

I couldn't believe how generous she was because I always thought she should have kicked me to the curb. Time after time, I'd be late with papers. I'd come to her office after missing class. I was wearing the clothes I'd passed out in. They reeked of cigarettes and stale yeast. My teeth were unbrushed. But always, always, each and every time she welcomed me into her office, took my work seriously, answered my questions, and never penalized me.

I know now that this must have been very difficult for Mrs. Bignall. For reasons I know nothing about, she would be fired from NIC at the end of the 1972-73 school year. I should have known something was up. The enrollment in our English class was very low. I think students were avoiding her classes. She was tough. She demanded good writing. I liked that, even while I skipped her class and handed in late papers. But, what ever bitterness she might have felt about what ever pressure she was under, I cannot remember it ever coming into the classroom (unless I was absent) or into our conversations.

Here's what I think: I think Mrs. Bignall knew that I didn't need to kicked to the curb. I think she knew I needed to get some heavy nineteen year old drinking out of my system. I think she knew that I needed grace. By accepting my late papers, welcoming me hungover and reeking into her office, by aiding me in my lame research project about prostitution, and by giving a second, third, fourth, fifth, and probably a fourteenth chance to succeed, Mrs. Bignall helped keep me in school. I didn't need punishment for my academic sins. I needed forgiveness.

Mrs. Bignall never got to read my best work. It came my next year at NIC when I buckled down, stayed sober during the school week (most of the time) and poured myself into my studies. But, Mrs. Bignall treated me with trust. She believed in me. She never told me that, but I know now. Her belief in me got me through my drunken spring semester. I've never forgotten her tough love: tough on my writing, but forgiving of my behavior.

Every day in my work at Lane Community College I see my nineteen year old self in many of my students. I do my very best to be for them, what Mrs. Bignall was for me: a teacher strong enough to know that despite the fact the student is being stupid, sometimes it's giving a student a sixth or seventh or fourteenth chance to succeed makes all the difference.