Should I Go Bottomless On Beach?

17 - High School (1948-50)

I entered the world wine

without further training

a certain delicacy of good bottles.
Colette

The farm club of the Brothers of the Sacred Heart

École Jean-Baptiste-Meilleur is located in one of the most Popular Montreal, in what was then called the "Park m'lasse" because, they told me, the smell of molasses, which emerged from the manufacturing of cigarettes MacDonald located at the Within this perimeter.

The district also included the Delorimier baseball stadium of the Montreal Royals (whose owners were the first in the history of baseball to hire a black player, Jackie Robinson, who underwent a subsequent meteoric career in the United States.)

The brothers are in charge of this school since 1900. In 1906, over 700 pupils already attending. Sixteen brothers teach there.

persuasions In August 1948 we are thirty brothers named Best in school with the brother Eulogio as director. Thirty brothers staying in a home ad hoc located opposite the school, community property. To add personnel to staff the three brothers and brother Provides Goupil, editor of the magazine "The Flash" has just been founded by the Brothers of the Sacred Heart for the youth in their schools from ten to fifteen years .

ago to over a thousand students enrolled in school. They are divided into seven grades of elementary school and eighth and ninth years of high school.

I will be the holder of the fourth grade D. Other classes in the same level will the burden of my colleagues Novitiate, brothers Albert, Luc and Liguori.

's brother Alexis, who was appointed deputy director, will be immediately responsible classes from Grade 1 to Grade 5. Some teachers teach pupils in the first, second and third years. The brothers Jean-Pierre Henry and teach at second year.

After sixty-two years, this community of thirty-four brothers, one of fourteen brothers died, six are still in community and fourteen who returned to secular life, a retention rate of 58.8%.

Best School, a farm club of teacher training

It is rare to meet a brother of the province Montreal community who has not taught a year or two at the Best School. This school which involved the largest number of siblings was also seen in the province as an excellent community center for training young brothers. That's where I've really learned my craft of teaching.

The recipe was in High School three ingredients: the assistant the colleagues who taught the same degree and community.

Wizard

Brother Alexis was a man how-to. No major educational theories to lull us or give us stuff complexes. He was a coach more than a scholar of pedagogy. He went regularly to our class. He took note of absentees, monitor special cases (children disruptive or negligent) and cut to any unruly tendency to recur. We felt supported by his brother Alexis.

In addition, he cut to the program each week the subject to be taught in classes at the same level. He was preparing for tests and examinations that measured the effectiveness of teaching and encourage healthy competition among students and between their masters. In short, it was for my brothers and me a guide for discerning and discriminating, a motivator who, beyond the enthusiasms passengers, brought forth in each of the two sources of success: the organization that gives people confidence and pleasure which supports all efforts.

Confreres

Noous were four of the group of profession duty to teach fourth grade. Four friends who have known and have the Juvénat teaching a very small or very short experience. We were made for each other. For us, mutual well was combined with emulation.

exams each month, uniforms for all fourth, we stimulated without creating too much animosity. It was heading almost headlong before any proposed animation after school children who were entrusted to us: dodgeball tournament, a flag, hockey teams on an ice rink divided into quarters lengthwise, preparing small game scenes during many celebrations in school, etc. ... Even for twenty minutes, it was worth it to get playing and organizing games that were taking the importance of the playoffs.

Any initiative was supported and encouraged by colleagues. Together we were proud of our young people, their results and we were ready to do everything to give them a taste of the school and the pride of a job well done. The contagion of pleasure generated unsuspected energies which contributed greatly to our learning the wonderful art educator. This dynamism was quadrupled conquering both the students and their teacher in a learning situation.

A vibrant community

What is the topic of conversation amongst parents meet? Their children, of course. Unmarried brothers and educators who live to thirty, side by side in their daily meals, and their hobbies and their common task? Their classroom and their students naturally. In

this community that could be called motley There were thirty-four brothers of all ages, all experiences and all the quirks. Each had its office in the large community room that served both recreation room, study hall and spiritual reading.

A multitude of tricks learning indescribable found its place in this chamber and osmosis positive atmosphere fruitful source of generating attitudes prevailed.

In the silence of study time or in the barrage recreation, everyone is working to its task. Which corrects copies, writing his preparation for class the next day, which falls to gelatin exam papers, etc ... And in doing so, we tell his exploits, describing its methods, it is abundantly playful. A supermarket of education that offers everything from masterpieces of the most authentic.

Education is a tough business, but it is also an art. It is to meet artists that you learn the trade.

is below image the anthill I remember those days of community life.

I remember Brother Joseph-Octave, eighth grade teacher, head of steel wool, busy sewing a softball holding between his knees. Originality proverbial breaks down barriers; his apparent nonchalance arise unexpected dynamics.

Behind the curtain of the stage, there was always the brother Urcize. He leads the variety theater school. Gilles Latulippe has tested its first gags.

Brother Marc-Antoine has highlighted the extraordinary talent of drummer Guy Nadon. He was at his side when at 12 he has lost his mother.

The image of brother Jean-Pierre is associated with the family Caron. They were four in school, and poorly attriqués scapegoat for all. One day in May, they all arrived at school the head shaved. They felt sorry. The mother had wanted to save on costs hairdresser. Brother Jean-Pierre, for special attention, took them under his protection, thereby saving them from hurtful jokes. This age, we know, is merciless.

Georges-Emile's brother seems always dignified and with his solemn altar boys in starched surplice, styled like puppets.

lines passers t ll ages on both sidewalks stopped to see pass the bugle band led by brothers Edward and Louis Jean-Marcel, in a cassock was of course ... wonderful to see these bits of hit man with a determination that any such large military drums they could hardly bear.

From 12:30 p.m. to 1:00 p.m., four hockey games at the same time for children from 3rd and 4th on the ice which occupied almost the entire school yard, it an organization called thunder. And the scenario resumed power r the greatest at 16:00 and even after dinner. Winter Carnival also occupied all the ice and any place throughout the weekend. I was using

brothers Marc -Henri Leoma in charge of sports. The equipment to store, schedule of games to check, to alert teachers, coordinate everything so that the eyes of these little guys turn on the lights of Maurice Richard. The job but also for pleasure and what satisfaction!

As a reward we could, we three, carry the required permissions, go see a game at the Forum Club Junior. Great privilege!

Brother Vital regularly crossed the street to go after dinner treat squirrels he kept in his class. Suspected a cover to smoke cigarettes not permitted at this time.

In the common room, while fun to jabber Creole learned Scholasticate, brother Jean-Norbert, armed with a box of Prismacolor pencils produced masterpieces of sophistication.

'poke a chatter' with Anastasius the sparkling brother who took a keen pleasure to tickle young brothers and make them get on their high horse was a sport that enlivened much free time.

Brother Cleophas, frugal, slightly bent, probably the dean of the group, was always silent and smiling, the St. Joseph catering to the needs and whims of one and all.

And our general, famous for her brother Eulogio hairstyle cockscomb, the battalion ran with an ease and a spirit who want to cut any bitch or whine.

I also think with a smile of complicity in groups of two or three brothers who look innocent, came out of the basement of the parish hall of the church where we planned on Friday evening, for children, small and large, films in 16mm Fernandel, Laurel & Hardy, Abbott & Costello or Walt Disney. You had to be at the residence before 20:30 for spiritual reading, followed by evening prayer and sunset. We pretended to go back to school or a walk. The top was probably not fooled by our schemes, but nobody spoke with him, "he did not know." An evil that we know will not hurt!

And this year, Saturday morning of May and June, we could see a couple of brothers in cassocks, get in the box truck driven by his brother to make us Albani to St. Theodore de Chertsey [i] work on the construction of five camps about thirty rooms that each student would receive the brothers during the holidays.

Some memories revealing

Brother Henry, an artist, my friend and fellow teacher by profession and second year at the Best School.

We walk on the sidewalks of the Rue Sherbrooke westward. Our destination: the Museum of Fine Arts. This Saturday is the open house, therefore, admission is free for poor or under vow. There was a long time we wanted to go. My knowledge of painting was so very basic. Dali had surprised me with his cross in diving, Michelangelo, a common reference, nothing more, we Raphael was a little more familiar because of the holy images or Christmas cards. It is the museum that attracted us, not painters. The group of seven, the overall refusal and the Impressionists did not exist for me. We

walk briskly for about three quarters of an hour. Fullum of the Museum, there are more than an hour walk.

We are marching because our manager, a little surprised by our request (we then had a morbid fear of anything that might seem mundane or curling the index finger or brush against nudity and the Museum of Fine Arts was suspect) his conscience for cutting the pear in two. He gave us each a single transport ticket. We chose to walk to get giving us the comfort of the bus for the return.

Before this half-denial, we smiled. The best antidote to recrimination and chialage. Which outlined that day at the museum? I do not remember. Single event was recorded. Saying that

Novitiate, we warned of a certain slackness in the houses of the brothers before the commitments of the vow of poverty! The bus tickets were sold for $ 0.25 then four! The same condition we had applied to visit the Botanical Gardens too remote for about an hour's walk from the school.

Getting shouting "crow "

You see the scene, thirty-four monks who dressed all in black, every morning at the same time, cross the r eu inclined to the church to attend Mass daily. Every morning the herd is bisected by a pickup truck (pickup), occupied in its rear box, by four young workers. One of them, always the same, as soon as the truck crossed the street just before Rouyn separate our two Black Sea, the Red Sea as Moses, stood up and boldly shouted with all the force of his lungs Kow! Kawwas! kawwww! repeated cawing of crows that sharp peaks as we penetrate everywhere under the skin and reach our nerves more sensitive.

there in the world worse insult? It must have been a monk for the measure in all its ignominy. All then humiliated as convicts, their heads down and come quietly and quickly in the church protector of the Afflicted. I do not think many have prayed for their abuser or they have recited with much saliva the "forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us." And every morning when there is recurrence shameless, that's enough to implore the wrath of heaven to give us justice.

Nobody dares to do anything or say anything. We suffer in silence. That lil ' guys hidden shyly behind a fence imitate the cawing of crows to no9tre passing, we smiled and we understand. But in the street, loudly and premeditated and repeated, it exceeds our threshold of tolerance and above all it highlights our utter helplessness.

Good morning, over truck, no cries. Relief. What happened?

is the smallest of us, brother Goupil, who, having noted the plate number of the vehicle is back to its owner, brought him to the parlor and made him promise ( under what threat?, I can not say) not to repeat these shows in bad taste. And the problem was solved forever.

Is it better to suffer the ignominy in silence while lightning flashes of revenge or to oppose it with the strength of his convictions for "the good of his brothers? What would Jesus do? To be or not to be! Goupil brother did not ask, he acted.

Do not pass on your lawn

Naturally, we celebrated the parish priest as it should each year. There was before St. Eusebius church a tiny corner uncemented where u grew No grass green protected by a large poster "Do not pass on your lawn" The priest was proud of his turf and his sign, there we had said. I had taken the idea of a skit in tribute to the priest on the occasion of her birthday. Seven or eight of my students were the actors and extras. It was a success largely because of the originality of subject and its treatment.

few days later, wanting to leave a memory of these young players, I asked the brother A. photographed us costume at the scene of the real scene. For some unknown chance, the priest saw us crowded on HIS turf. He went out quickly from his presbytery and his temperament, we are railing against this lack of etiquette. There was no photo. To avoid a scandal before these young children, I had to submit to the rectory to explain the situation. Monsieur le Cure had not made the connection between the sketch of tributes and sign planted on his beloved grass.

Brothers and sisters in cinema

The film was so frowned upon by church authorities and religious. Cinemas were thus tacitly forbidden to all who wore cassocks.

In 1947, Maurice Veloche had filmed the story of St. Vincent of e Paul under the title of Mr. Vincent played by Pierre Fresnay.

In the middle of the week, we are told there the next day, a Thursday, I believe, leave in all schools on the island of Montreal. The reason for this unexpected holiday? Probably at the suggestion of Brother Marie-Cyril of Christian Brothers, who was secretary of the meeting provincial superiors of teaching brothers, the Archbishop of Montreal, Monsignor Charbonneau had decreed that leave to allow all brothers and sisters all attend the performance of "Monsieur Vincent", not in church halls in 16 mm, but in real movie theaters equipped with chairs and projection of 36 mm.

It was a surprise, a wonderment, a glare. I think even to save the conveniences of the time, namely the cinemas were assigned to each community. In any case, it does not appear that the brothers have attended the same movie that sisters. After all, when we lived under separate schools as places to church, boys on one side and girls on the other. The brothers from one side and the other sisters ... And " swingnez " your company. What weather!

Religion and politics

Two events

High School was equipped with a large hall and a theater. This room was often v Ent rented this weekend with all sorts of groups who gathered a large number of members. Thus, "the patent" College Jacques-Cartier she clung meetings two to three times a year. The College then mobilized the whole school, the whole weekend. Closets lips all windows on the first floor. It was a "top secret" absolute. It was also

in our hall political meetings. I saw with my own eyes, the candidate Mr. Fauteux in full assembly contradictory supporters pray kneeling to recite two dozen rosary so, he said, to attract the blessings of heaven upon the elections and the future rulers. Some have also suspected of trying to purify themselves and a reputation not too honorable described him as "a Christian with four wheels" [ii] . The cause of God and of the policy at that time was often gave the hand.

The other event which illustrated the climate of turbulence which began to shake the very calm and very Catholic province of Quebec was the Asbestos strike. The bias in favor of the church workers, Archbishop Charbonneau recall and the arrival of Prince Light, support of the Church, had made headlines and even aroused community, heated debates. We are young, we listened to the older blame or bless the actions of the Archbishop or those of Mr. Duplessis.

This was the first time I realized the interest of some brothers in political issues. It was a good ten years before the brother Doe.

My two years at school Best I were in many ways beneficial. The vitality of the community hello did work in this population of peasants still unaccustomed to urban life. This dynamism emanating from the community it was made. We were proud of our school and we proudly proclaimed his deeds. My religious life, though well below my dreams, followed the trail of my life. I was ready to stand on my own.

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i] The Province of St. Hyacinthe had split in the province of Granby who kept the Isle La Motte as a study center Vacation, Montreal and the province who had bought the same purpose in St. Theodore de Chertsey a lake called the "tub Stan" in honor of Brother Stanislaus director of studies. Is to build this camp that we were working Saturday in May and June: the main camp had to add a refectory and a chapel seating about two hundred and five camps divided into small rooms (a big advantage over the camps open area of the Isle La Motte) equipped with electricity and running water and toilets attached to each camp.

[ii] Christians to four wheels were those which did in church four times in their lives: for baptism, for confirmation, marriage and funerals.

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Next issue: 18 - Saint-Gabriel-de-Brandon - 1950 Moon Christmas