Sunnyside school was closed not too long ago and its facilities were taken over by:
Dave Smith Motors in Kellogg is the largest Dodge-Chrysler-Jeep dealer in the world for the third year running. Dave Smith Motors dominates Kellogg. Cars and trucks are everywhere. So, when I go back to my old school, here's what the playground that was for the first and second graders and for part of noon recess for third graders looks like:
The big kids' playground was a lot better. It had a large playground with room for touch football games and a batting cage from which we played a lot of baseball. My favorite day at Sunnyside school was in the fifth grade during a cold snap. The teachers wouldn't come out for playground duty. The temperature was below zero. The snow was less than a foot deep, deep enough to cushion us by shallow enough to run in it. It was dry snow. We played forbidden tackle football that noon hour. Our running and tackling kept us warm. We weren't sopping wet when we returned to class. I loved that day. Were we to try to play that football game today, here's what we'd face:
And this:
Dave Smith Motors calls attention to itself with the bright colored license plate insert I showed earlier and with Macy Day Parade styled helium balloons that all look pretty similar. Sunnyside Elementary was a place where I learned arithmetic, writing, to read good books, and where I had a generally very good academic experience. Now, hovering over the building that once housed my old school is this:
At Sunnyside Elementary, we compensated for not having an outside basket for playing basketball by shooting through the space created under the fire escape by the brace on the right helping hold up the fire escape:
It was at this spot that David Rowley, a sixth grader, came to me and told me John F. Kennedy had been shot. I thought of that moment even more deeply today because Dave Smith Motors was flying its flags at half mast in remembrance of the passing of President Gerald Ford:
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