Skill Sets and Fun Classes

Tommy Towery

LHS '64

"Preface: Lee's Traveller was never designed just to highlight the events in my own life. Most of the time the reason they are included is because no one else has sent me anything to feature. Today's issue is no different, but is offered to you to get you to thinking about your own memories on this subject and to share some of those memories with your classmates or just reflect upon them alone. Whichever way you accept it, please don't think this is a way of bragging on myself in any manner. I am only looking for an interesting topic to share with you."

Now that we have already seen our own children graduate from high school a long time ago, we are now in the process of seeing our grandchildren attempt to do the same thing. It is no secret school kids today encounter things in their lives at school that we never had to face. Many high school kids are taking college credit classes which were never available to us and have choices of subjects we never dreamed of.

I have repeatedly written about some of the subjects I took at Lee. You must be tired of hearing how my greatest skill set I would ever acquire was formulated in Mrs. Jane Parks’ typing classroom. It was not a class in which I made good grades, but one which prepared me for many challenges I would face later in my life.

When I look back, I think the class which I liked the most, and which came almost natural to me, was one well away from my liberal arts studies. It was a subject which gave many of my fellow classmates a hard time, but it always seemed easy to me. It was one which later would surface to make me wonder why I had not read the writing on the wall. That class was geometry. It was the only subject I studied in high school in which I received straight A’s.

“Geometry is defined as “a branch of mathematics that deals with the measurement, properties, and relationships of points, lines, angles, surfaces, and solids. Put simply, geometry is a type of math that deals with points, lines, shapes, and surfaces.“

I think back to my classroom days and I remember phrases like “If A equals B, then C equals D” and all the different types of triangles and their angles. I remember things like side-angle-side (SAS) and angle-side-angle(ASA). When I was studying it I never felt it would be of any real value in my life, but the problems were like big puzzles to me which I really enjoyed and loved to solve. What I failed to recognize at the time was that I was learning more than math, I was also learning logical thinking.

So, following graduation at Lee, I spent four years earning a liberal arts degree in Journalism, taking advantage of my typing skills but ignoring the things I studied and learned in Geometry. It was not until earning my commission as an officer in the United States Air Force and was in training to be a navigator that the angles, degrees, and distances all once again became a part of my life. Getting from point A to point B required a major amount of geometry, when you consider altitude, crosswind angles, speed and distance. The same goes when you are obtaining your aircraft’s position on the globe by using a sextant to obtain a fix by “shooting” three different stars or three different timing shots of the Sun or Moon. The tool used by most aviators back then was the E6-B Flight Computer. It was manual mechanical and not electronic.

Once I got my wings I attended an advanced electronics training course and that was when the logic part of my learning took over. When I became a reconnaissance officer was the first time I ever touched a computer keyboard. Then, and not before, was the moment my two high school subjects merged into one skill set. The logic guided me through computer programming, which was documented and recorded using my typing skills. One had to augment the other.

So I pose the question to you readers and hope at least some of you respond via the comment section below. What was your favorite (or most fun) subject in high school, and which subject played the most important role in your later years? I’m interested.

Last week I suffered a major computer crash. With the ice storm hitting Memphis and the power transformers popping all around me I did not have a clue what was happening with my desktop computer. I have been using it since 2017. When I finally got back on it, not only had my Windows interface been corrupted, the whole partition on my hard drive which held my recovery program was also erased. I have been working on it solidly for four days trying to "fix" it, and finally today decided I just had to reinstall the operating system along with all the programs which were also corrupted. I am lucky I was wise enough to store all my documents and other vital files on a second hard drive in the system.

This issue is being done using my laptop, which is a lot slower and does not have access to the second hard drive so I have having to copy things from one computer to the other one via USB flash drives. I will be spending this coming week trying to get my desktop back to full operation.

Comments on Last Week's Issue

Janet James Holland, LHS ‘67, "We have had 3 power outages this winter. The winds have been stronger than ever. I, too, have a generator which Lee gets started for me. It was left with the house when I bought it, and he never used it in the 15 years he was here. I have used it every year. Climate change! The summers have been hotter, and the winters have had snow every year, not at all usual. I remember the winter of '64 and the tree that fell on out house, and the most unusual loss of power, Monte Sano."

Barbara Teeter Kennamer, BHS '66, "I know I’m not an LHS alumni but I couldn’t resist commenting on this subject. I lived in a tiny house at the foot of Russell Hill and off Holmes Ave. We didn’t have central heat and air either. Winter we heated with a gas furnace and summer we cooled with fans just like you Tommy. I remember many times when the power went out in the winter we didn’t have heat because although the furnace was gas, the pilot light was electric, so the furnace didn’t work without power. But the good thing was our stove was gas. So we all gathered in the living room and opened the door to the kitchen and closed the door to the hall and the rest of the house. Because the house was so small we were very warm using this technique. Growing up during those years required ingenuity."

Bob Pierce, LHS ‘64, "Jimmy Dorritey? and Tony Driver both LHS were The Generals Three. Tony made the 50th reunion. They would say "Bob would mumble in key" better then not in key. But the real reason was Kay, my bass, she has taken me many places. She has been a true blessing. Maybe more about her at another time. Also, (I remember) Joan Graybill, cute girl in the band."

Photographic Memories - Who Are They?

Each week I plan to share a group of photos from the 1960 "The General" yearbook without disclosing the names of the individuals. You may stop and try to identify them here, and when you are through you may scroll to the bottom of this page to see the identities of your classmates in the photos.

Slow Song Selections

You Picked in the Past

Try A Little Tenderness - Otis Redding

"Try a Little Tenderness" is a song written by Jimmy Campbell, Reg Connelly, and Harry M. Woods. It was first recorded on December 8, 1932, by the Ray Noble Orchestra (with vocals by Val Rosing). A popular version in an entirely new form was recorded by soul artist Otis Redding in 1966. Redding was backed on his version by Booker T. & the M.G.'s. In early 1967, it peaked at number 25 on the Billboard Hot 100. It has been named on a number of "best songs of all time" lists, including those from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. It is in the 204th position on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 greatest songs of all time.

The Identites of the Classmates in the Pictures Above