BABY BOOMER ALERT: A “Big Chuck” Valentines Memory, circa. 1957

One of my earliest memories from my school days was giving out Valentines Day cards to my classmates.  I was in first grade, so the year would have been around 1956-57.

Believe me it was a big deal.

The whole thing began with a trip to Kent's Department Store on Main Street in Sidney with my Mom where we would pick out a big bag of Valentines cards for little kids.  I attended Pearl Street School, which was just around the corner from my house so I usually walked to school.  By the time I arrived it was usually a whole mob of kids tumbling through the front door.  Boys and girls. This Valentines card trading was a big deal and we were all excited.  Our teachers would send us home with a list (mimeographed, of course) of each student in our class so as to leave none out.  At night I would sit with my mother and my older sister Fran at our kitchen table and write out a Valentines Day card to every single kid in the class.  My other siblings would not have been school age yet.

The next day Fran and I walked hand and hand to school clutching our little brown bags stuffed with cards.  As our friends gathered along we could see that they had their bags too.  It is hard to explain how really exciting this was.  At school, the day was all about these cards.  I also remember that our teacher provided cards for those students who couldn't afford them (although I don't think Louise Kent ever turned a customer away, money or no money).

A certain time of the school day was set aside for the actual exchange.  No doubt our teacher did this with discipline and order.  Everything in my day was done alphabetically so I would probably have had to wait for Rhett Day and Phyllis DeRock to finish before it was my turn.  I then I would stand up nervously and go around and hand each kid a hand written Valentine.  "Thank you, Chuckie" would be the response, often prompted by our teacher.  And of course we gave our teacher a card also.

It was perfectly charming, so 1950s and impossibly nostalgic to think that we ever did this.  I found some of my old elementary Valentines Day cards the other day.  Its actually hard to get rid of them, even though I cannot remember the names scrawled across them.

I am out of the "kid" business now, but I wonder if they still do this in elementary school?

I hope so.