Activities

Practically everything anyone would want were provided. Athletics included baseball, basketball, and football during the appropriate seasons. Each was divided into two classes, Varsity and "B" for the younger crowd. Games with similar schools provided competition often more than we could handle. A description of the 1952 Varsity season tells it all. "Well coached by Arnold Gaynor of UCLA this gridiron squad never did quite came into its own. Handicapped by injuries and lack of experienced replacements the team fought hard but vainly to hit the win column." In other words, we never won a single game and I don't remember any injuries.

As evidence that Frank Brick did not see the sale of the property as imminent, he invested a lot of money in the building of horse stables and corral to provide additional services for the student body within a couple of years of the sale. Horse back riding was a weekly event for everyone. The school had hired horse specialists to care for the horses and teach the students the finer points of equestrian activities.

In this picture you can see Blankenship leading some of the younger kids. He was an accomplished horseman and that could have been the reason he was hired.

The swimming pool was a big deal for all of us. Located on the north-east corner of the property, it was also the highest point of the property. In this picture, you can see the city had grown up to the north and east sides of the property. The west side, however, was still scrub brush for quite a distance. We would go on the occasional supervised hike into that wilderness. South of the school toward Culver City was fully developed in residential property. Swimming was a privilege they would hold back for students who had earned demerits. I managed that distinction a number of times in my early years.

The auditorium was located in the large rectangular extension you see in the color picture of the building on the first page. Besides regular student body meetings as shown here, band practice, music lessons, dances, parties such as Haloween, Christmas and some birthday parties if sponsored by the parent, and gynmansic and other athletic events utilized this facility. On Sunday evenings they turned this into a movie theater and showed a movie, often Hopalong Cassidy.

Every evening all students were required to devote one hour or more in study hall located in the lower level of the main building. This included those who didn't have any homework or had finished theirs. The lower grades were either exempt from this or studied elsewhere.

In a corner room on the upper floor (1949), the school had placed a 12 inch black and white TV set for our benefit. This was the first time I had seen television. On weekends, many of the cadets remained and each Saturday they marched us about five blocks or so to the Meralta Theater for a movie. The cost was nominal and picked up by a parental fund established for such occasions.