Warp's Review Book for Arithmetic

Preparation for 8th grade exams

Tonight I came across a workbook, Using Arithmetic in Everyday Life, that I had in elementary school. The workbook dates from my 8th grade year, 1964-65.

Our teacher was getting us ready for our 8th grade exams, and she wanted to be sure we could do story problems. This arithmetic workbook has 126 pages, and except for the explanations and examples, it is entirely story problems. I'm sure I found the problems tedious to solve -- they often involved two or more steps.

This book, Using Arithmetic in Everyday Life, was published by the Warp Publishing Company of Minden, Nebraska, and copyrighted in 1942 and 1957. Everyday life in Nebraska, for many students in those years, was spent on a farm or ranch. The author acknowledges that fact with word problems like these:

Suppose your father should test his seed corn and find that 12 out of 72 grains did not sprout. What percent sprouted? If he should plant 45 acres with this seed, how many acres of this field would not have any corn on them?

Mr. White's corn yielded 50 bushels per acre. He sold one third of the corn through a commission agent who charged 3%. If corn were $1.25 per bushel, what was the agent's commission. How much did Mr. White receive?

No authors are mentioned on the workbook's title page, but when I searched for "Warp's Review Books", I saw that Harold and Ruth Warp of Minden, Nebraska, are credited for writing earlier (1929-1930) workbooks. Student workbooks were available for 17 different topics in 1931, and the Teacher's Examination Review Books covered another 20 areas of study.

The primary goal of the Warp Review Books was to prepare students for the 8th grade exams. That's why they were written, and that's why our teacher had us doing arithmetic problems in one of them.

The 8th grade exam was still a big deal in Rock County, Nebraska in 1965 when I took it. The newspaper always carried a photo of the two top-scoring students with their teachers. (This was as much an honor for the teachers as for the students!)

I tried hard on the test, but the top glory that year went to Curtis Ratliff and his teacher, whoever she was, at the Bassett Elementary School. I don't remember who had the second-highest score.  I had the third highest score, so the extra practice in the Warp's arithmetic book may have helped me. I just should have done a few  more pages!

Berlin Adventure

Isaac's study-abroad trip begins

Life has been proceeding at breakneck pace around here for a couple of weeks. Much of the activity has been related to Isaac's trip to Germany. He will be in Berlin for five weeks, through a Kentucky program for international study. While there, he'll earn six hours of college credit. The two classes he is taking are "History of Berlin" and "Hitler and Nazi Germany".

On Wednesday (May 26), Keely, Isaac, and I drove to Cincinnati.  On Thursday (May 27), Isaac and his group flew out of the Cincinnati airport -- and Keely and I drove back home.

The photo above was taken as the group waited to go through security. The very tall, dark-headed fellow at the right side of the photo is Dr. Pizzo, the history professor. He's from Murray State University -- Isaac's school.  The other professor, Dr. Henneberg, has dual German and American citizenship. At Morehead State University in Kentucky, she teaches German, but in Germany, she teaches American poetry (if I'm remembering correctly.)

Isaac left word on his Facebook that he has arrived safe and sound. He said that he had been up for 28 hours, but I think that surely he slept a little on the plane. I hope so, anyhow! According to the itinerary, the whole group is taking a tour of the city and eating dinner together on Saturday, and then on Sunday, they have their first classes.

Purple Coneflowers

Self-seeding, native perennial

Many purple coneflowers bloom every year in one of our neighbor's pastures. I always enjoy seeing them. The USDA Plants database says that coneflowers grow "in rocky prairie sites in open, wooded regions." That's a nearly perfect description of the growing site of these flowers. This pasture has thin soil with some rock outcroppings, and the redcedars are doing their best to take over.

School Photo, Second Grade

The blogger at a tender age

I was in second grade when this photo was taken. I think this was the only time that a photographer came to Duff Valley District 4 for school pictures. It's understandable that photographers didn't want to make the long drive out in the country to our little school. I don't suppose we ever had more than ten kids in all eight grades. One year, we had just five students for most of the year.

My goodness, my bangs are short in this photo! My dad had an electric hair clipper, and when he cut my brother's hair, he cut my bangs too. I remember him putting one hand on top of my head to hold me steady while he buzzed my forehead with the clipper. Then he brushed away the prickly hair clippings with a little round brush. The clipper, some attachments, the brush, and a big bib for the victim all came with the set.

Later in second grade, I got my first pair of glasses. They were sky blue with tiny rhinestones along the top, and they hurt my ears terribly. But in this photo, little Genevieve is still unspectacled. I can look directly into her eyes, and I think I see that she is a bit dubious about smiling for the camera.

First Church of the Nazarene in Ainsworth, NE

Postcard from the 1950s

Some of the Nebraska folks who read this blog may recognize the building on this postcard even though it no longer exists. It is the First Church of the Nazarene in Ainsworth, Nebraska. The photograph was probably taken in the 1950s. About 1960, this building was torn down and a larger, stone building took its place on the corner of Third and Elm.

The building in the photograph is where I formed my earliest memories of going to church. I think I was about 3 years old  (definitely not more than 4 years old) when we started attending church there.

I don't remember Sunday School classes at all, though I am sure I attended them. I do remember the church basement -- how interesting! You could go down the steps in the church, walk through the basement hallways, climb the steps at the other end, and come out in the pastor's house.

I remember sitting with my parents in a big room in the basement and singing "This World Is Not My Home". Everyone sang, "The angels beckon me from heaven's open door..." and that reminded me of my Aunt Becky.

Outside this church, one night after prayer meeting, my brother Dwight punched a little boy who wouldn't let go of me. I was very thankful to be rescued. I asked Dwight about this a few years ago, and he still remembers it too.

Another time, one of the little church boys threw a tin can from the trash barrel at me. It cut my forehead between my eyebrows, and I have a small, faint scar from it to this day. I won't tell the names of those naughty little boys, but I still remember who they were.

At the Church of the Nazarene, people called each other "Brother" and "Sister". I believe I remember a Brother Roy Morrow who was the pastor when I was very young. (Hadn't my mother cautioned me that "roy" hamburger would make me sick? How odd that a man had that word for his name!)

After that, Brother James Tapley was the pastor. (Sister Tapley, his pretty, young wife, put a band-aid on my wounded forehead.) Later, as I recall, Brother Hiram Sanders was the pastor.* These pastors served in the 1950s and early 1960s.

The various parts of the worship service were planned and orderly, but there was always room for the Holy Spirit to move. People said "Amen!", "Hallelujah!", and "Praise the Lord!" whenever they especially liked the singing, praying, or preaching. Sometimes after the sermon, people went to the front of the church, knelt at the altar, prayed aloud, and cried, while the piano played softly on and on.

My mother was brought up in the Methodist church. My father was not brought up in any named church, but there were Holiness and Pentecostal influences in his childhood. I imagine that when he and my mom decided to start attending church, the Church of the Nazarene felt familiar and right to him.

My parents became members of the Ainsworth Church of the Nazarene about 1954 or 1955. We lived south of Johnstown, then. In 1957, we moved to the Duff Valley in southern Rock County. We still went to church in Ainsworth for a while, and then we began attending the little E.U.B. (Evangelical United Brethren) Church at Duff, just a few miles from our house.

The Ainsworth church was my parents' first Nazarene church. In the early 1980s, they helped to found a Church of the Nazarene in Wheatland, Missouri; it was their second Nazarene church. In other times and places, they attended various other churches, but they remained members of the Church of the Nazarene throughout their lives.

- - - - - - - - - -

*Brother Sanders was a pastor at the Ainsworth Nazarene Church after we moved to Rock County. He is remembered by my family for getting spectacularly stuck in the mud when he came to visit us one spring day.

Brother Sanders was from the East, and he had heard that, on the Sandhill ranches, a road might be nothing more than a faint trace of wheels. He was driving down our ranch road when he saw our house on the opposite side of a low, wet meadow. He decided he should leave the graded road and drive straight across the meadow to our house. He thought he could see a "road". Soon his car was buried in mud.

Brother Sanders walked to our house, but no one was there. He waited for a while, and still no one was around. Finally, he decided to start a tractor and pull his car out by himself. Soon he had the tractor stuck in the mud, too -- and then, another tractor. When we arrived home, he was thinking about starting the crawler. 

My dad winched his car out and got him headed back to town before dark. The ruts in the meadow are probably still there!

Tennessee Renaissance Festival, 2010

Photos of Tenn-Renn

Despite a rainy weather forecast, the kids and I went to the Tennessee Renaissance Festival ("Tenn-Renn") on Saturday. We arrived about 10:00 AM, and it didn't start raining until about 3:00 PM, so we had a good bit of time to enjoy the sights, shows, and shopping.

Keely, Taurus, and I wore garb that was more or less historically correct for the medieval period. Isaac wore shorts and a T-shirt -- smart move! When the sun finally burst through a lingering fog, the day became very hot and humid. I began to overheat inside my long skirt. I even thought about hitching it up and tucking it into my belt! I like to dress up, but I don't like to swelter.

Now Blooming

In flowerbeds of western Kentucky

I call this flower a " pē'-ə- nē " but most people around here call it a " pē-ō'- nē ". Either way, the flowers are gorgeous. Peonies must not be very fussy about how they're grown. Our peonies bloom every year with no special care. I love them, and so do the ants.

Nashville Flood Video

A natural disaster of epic proportion as photographed by Nashville's citizens

As the video notes, coverage of the Nashville flood on national news has been limited. Bombers, oil spills -- America has a lot going on right now. That doesn't change the fact that Nashville has been left a terrible, terrible mess by the Great Flood of 2010. I can't imagine trying to carry on with life in the midst of all the flood damage.

"We are Nashville" on the Section303 blog

Murfreesboro and Nashville Flood: How You Can Help
Middle Tennessee Red Cross
Salvation Army in Nashville

Old Gymnasium in Pembroke, Kentucky

The Physical and Industrial Arts Building in Pembroke (KY) stands along Highway 41, right next to the Minit Mart on the west side of town. The inscription across the top of the building reads, "19-  Physical & Industrial Arts Building -39". I think I've taken a better picture, but I can't find it, so this one will have to do.

I've been curious about the building for a while. When I passed through Pembroke yesterday, I decided to stop and take a closer look. At the right side of the double doors, I found two plaques (pictured at left). They answered my question of whether the building was a government-funded project of the Depression. It was indeed a project of the Public Works Administration.

In the Kentucky New Era archives (viewed via Google news search), I found a little more information about the building's history. On October 14, 1938, the Pembroke superintendent of schools, Mr. L. W. Allen, said he was nearly ready for bids on the construction.  A loan and a grant, $35,000 in total, had been approved by the Federal government, and the old, frame gymnasium had already been torn down to make room for the new one.

The new facility was to contain a manual training (shop) classroom and a home economics classroom. Shop and home economics classes had not previously been offered at Pembroke. However, the biggest room in the structure would be the new gymnasium.

Pembroke's new gym will have a basketball floor measuring 48 by 80 feet, which will probably be the second largest playing space in the county. Hopkinsville has the largest playing floor but county teams have maintained for years the Tigers' gym was entirely too large. The old Pembroke gym, although the scene of several important tournaments, was too small for real offensive play and had only a limited seating capacity and no out-of-bounds arrangements.

Source: "Pembroke to Ask Bids on Project" by staff, Kentucky New Era, October 14, 1938.

The first basketball game in the new gym was scheduled for Friday, October 27, 1939. Pembroke's first and second teams played against Guthrie's first and second teams. Pat McCuiston was the coach of the Pembroke team. I did not find any information on who won the game.

A Halloween carnival was also held that night. The community was invited to come to the new facility and support their school. It was surely an exciting night for the students.

The new building was adjacent to the existing school. In September of 1940, the school building burned, but firefighters managed to save the gym. A newspaper story stated that a new building would be built so close to the gym that they would almost appear to be a single building. I am not sure whether that came to pass. There is an old, brick Pembroke School building located several blocks east of the Physical and Industrial Arts Building. The two buildings are very similar in architecture. That must surely be the new school that was built. Do you know this part of the story?

Pembroke High School was closed at the end of the 1957-1958 school year. Students from Pembroke High  and other rural high schools of the county enrolled in a new school, the newly-formed Christian County High School, in September of 1959.

Quilt and Craft Auction at Fairview, KY

Second annual consignment

Grandmother's Flower Bed
by art_es_anna
 

Fairview Produce Auction

According to a postcard I received in the mail today, the Second Annual Quilt and Craft Auction will be held at the Fairview Produce Auction on June 5, 2010.  The sale will start at 9:00 AM and will include (quoting from the postcard):

• Quilts
• Wall hangers
• Pillows
• Wide assortment of crafts

If you are consigning and you want your quilt to be included in the catalog, it must be received by 12:00 noon on Friday, June 4. The consignment fee is $2.00 plus 10% of the selling price for each item listed.

The Fairview Produce Auction is located at the intersection of Highway 1843 and Highway 68/80 at Fairview, KY. The entrance to the auction grounds is on Highway 1843, about 100 yards from the intersection.

The produce auction is a (largely) Mennonite-owned-and-operated enterprise. The vast majority of the quilts and other sale items at this auction will be consigned by the Mennonites and Amish of eastern Christian and western Todd counties. ¹  It promises to be an interesting event.

Call the Fairview Produce Auction at 270-887-0053 for further information.

_______________

¹ This area (eastern Christian and western Todd counties) is often called "Greater Fairview" -- haha, just kidding!

Flood in Nashville

Photos on Flickr

Local readers who follow Nashville television news have been seeing video of the devastating flood there. For readers outside the Nashville area, here are links to a few of the photographs that have been uploaded to Flickr by Nashville residents:

Nashville Flood, set by Inyo Photo
Other Situation 2010, Nashville Flood
Nashville Flood, set by Jett Loe
Nashville Flood, 2010, set by Richard Call
Nashville May 01, 2010 Flooding, set by avatar28

Many schools in Tennessee are closed tomorrow due to flooding, including Montgomery County (Clarksville), our neighbor just across the state line south of here. School closings are merely a slight inconvenience, compared to the muddy mess that some people are facing in their homes and workplaces.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/avatar28/ / CC BY 2.0

High Water in Christian County, KY

Heavy rains cause flooding in low areas

South Fork of Little River, east of Hopkinsville

Here in Christian County, KY, we've had 24 hours of rain and thunderstorms, and we're expecting more of the same for another 24 hours.

High winds last night snapped off one of our hybrid poplars about six feet above the ground and tore several branches out of other trees. About 4:00 AM we had a tornado warning for our immediate area, so I got out of bed and sat in the hallway until that storm passed over. Twice, the wind took on a frightening volume, and the house shuddered under its force. I suppose the tree broke during one of those episodes.

I heard on the radio that Hopkinsville has received about 5 inches of rain. Fort Campbell is reporting about 4.3 inches of rain. I don't know how much rain has fallen in our part of the county, but all our little streams are very full of water.

The photo above was taken about 5:00 PM today, just west of the Little River Church of Christ on Highway 68/80 east of Hopkinsville. The vehicle in the distance (center left) is at the bridge on the Little River Church Road.  The South Fork is running over the bridge and road there. Backed-up water is threatening the Little River Church and parsonage. Those buildings have endured many floods.

The flooded ditch at our mailbox

On the Little River/Vaughn Grove Road, the water was very nearly over the Warrens Fork bridge. I called Isaac and warned him to use a different route when he came home later.

We saw several wild turkeys feeding at the edge of a cornfield. At first, I thought that they might be picking corn seeds out of the ground. Then I realized that they were probably feasting on earthworms that had come to the surface.

Right now, Fort Campbell's radar shows a big, fast-moving mass of intense weather coming into Christian County from the southwest. Currently, we have a tornado watch and a flash flood warning. A mighty blast of wind and hail passed through here a few minutes ago. I read on the Weather Underground for Hopkinsville that golf-ball sized hail was reported on a road about a mile from us. We will see in the morning if any damage was done.

UPDATE: WKDZ Radio's photos of flooding in Christian and Trigg counties