Senior Ball 1914

After a brief hiatus, I’m back to my grandmother’s scrapbook!  And the next page shows memories from the Monterey High School Senior Ball, 1914. 

My grandmother, Loraine Gunzendorfer, was a junior and her brother, Wilton, was a freshman so both would have participated in this event. 



And once again, DANCE CARDS!  Here’s the cover – someone was quite an artist and this almost looks like an original drawing.  Would someone have hand drawn each cover?



And inside, we can see my grandmother’s dance card was quite full.

These are difficult to read since they were written in pencil and are now almost 100 years old but once thing stands out to me – she danced the waltz with ‘Lacey’.  As I learned when I wrote about the Salinas High School graduation in 1914, this may have been Dean Lacey, future husband of her friend, Dorothy Streining.  It is clearly the same writing on both dance cards.  Hmmm, I’d love to know more about the connection between Loraine, Dorothy, and Dean Lacey.

And she danced the Grand March Waltz, Two-step, and Good-bye Everybody Waltz with her date, George Hunter. 



So George was from Salinas, too? 

And it looks like Loraine helped organize the Senior Ball as she worked on the Door Committee.  I wonder what her duties might have been – collecting tickets, perhaps?  Speaking of which, just what does someone on the ‘dressing room’ committee do?



All in all, it looks like the Ball was a great success!



Congratulations, Grandma, her friends, and even her little brother, Wilt, for preparing such a splendid event!

She saved napkins?

My grandmother, Loraine Gunzendorfer, had a wonderful scrapbook with a lot of mementos so why am I surprised to find napkins?  Not just napkins, but descriptions from where they came from and why she saved them.



Isn’t this a beautiful napkin?  Grandma’s description says:  Went to party at Margaret Wright’s Friday night May 15, 1914.  Had very nice time.  Neil Best brought me home.

Neil Best?  That’s a new name.  I don’t see him at Monterey High School in 1915.



The Wave must have been where kids hung out in 1914-1915.  I looked quickly to see if I could find anything about this place in Monterey and was unsuccessful.  Maybe my friend and her husband, who live in Monterey and know the history, might be able to tell me something about it.



This is to remember the minstrel show at Arbolado on the 4th of July.  A wonderful affair (oh, yes) but we should worry.

While the comment “we should worry” sounds exactly like my grandmother, I’m not sure what she meant by that.  It seems like she had a “fine time” at most of the affairs she attended.  And there were a lot!



One night Carleton, Margaret, Hallie, Frank, Neil & I went to the “movies” together.  We had some time.  My “instructor” was overly nice to me.  But alas – he gave me this match for my precious memory book.

Why would movies and instructor be in quotes?  Was this code for something else?  I can’t imagine you would need an instructor at the movies.  And just what did “overly nice” mean?  I think I need to rein in my imagination!



Here’s another beautiful napkin and Grandma’s description:

Went to a little party at Helen Otis’ Monday night, July 20/14 with Earle.  Had an awfully good time.  The napkin is to remember it.

We’ve heard about Earle before – sounds like she and Earle spent a fair amount of time together.

In other news, last week I wrote about Grandma attending the Salinas High School Graduation in 1914 as the guest of Dorothy Striening.  I was able to connect with Dorothy’s great granddaughter through ancestry.com. – what fun!  Dorothy’s married name was Lacey and her great granddaughter pointed out to me that Grandma danced several dances with Lacey.  And now I have found Lorin Lacey a few years behind Grandma at Monterey High School.  I might just be able to connect the dots yet!