A Walk Down Memory Lane

Raised voices and laughter filled the halls of Delmar-Harvard and Pershing Elementary Schools over the weekend, but the people excitedly darting in and out of classrooms weren't kids, but adults.

The District is closing Delmar-Harvard after this school year. Saturday the building was opened for community members, parents and alumni to tour the building take photos and share memories.

Gloria Grodsky and Eunice Stoliar met in kindergarten and have been friends ever since. The women who are now in their mid-60s said being back in the school brought a flood of memories.

"I can walk in this building and know exactly where all of the classrooms are." said Grodsky, who now lives in Chesterfield. 

They even remembers all of their teachers. "All of them," said Stoliar, who now lives in Creve Ceour. "All of a sudden their face flashes in front of me," said Grodsky. "They all had gray hair," said Grodsky laughing at the memory.

Stoliar who lived in the Delmar Loop area remembers having to walk through a tunnel to get across Kingsland or Delmar to the school building. "You would walk downstairs, and it was the smelliest, most disgusting place you could possibly think of.  But that was the only way to safely cross those two busy streets," she said.

The women said this year is their 50th high school reunion.

"A lot of it is the same, but a lot of it has changed," said Abe Lumpe, who lives in North County and attended Delmar-Harvard from third through fifth grade.

"Looking up and down the hallways, looking outside the buildings , you just get flashbacks," said Lumpe.

"I remember just playing outside with my friends," said teen-ager Arlo Frantz-Greene, who attended kindergarten through 4th grade. "It seems a lot smaller since I'm a lot bigger."

Stacy Shupe who went to Delmar-Harvard for kindergarten and 1st grade in the mid-1980s remembered the tunnel that connected Delmar and Harvard. 

"There was always water seeping in so we had those little wooden , pellet crates that we walked on, and the walls were just graffiti."

Delmar Harvard, which was built in 1913, is the oldest functioning school building in the University City School District. district. Harvard was built in 1920.

Camille Casmier and Devi Acharya, both 15, have been friends since meeting at Delmar-Harvard. They toured their old school together on Saturday along with their families

"My best memory is the library," said Casmier. "During gym we'd always go to the library and talk to Ms. Allison." 

Acharya said their teachers would make books out of the things the students wrote, and she still has copies of all the little books.

"I'm glad they did stuff like that so that I can have all of those memories," she said.

Over at Pershing Elementary, a very similar scene played out Saturday, with groups of former students walking through the halls. 

"I was the third class that went into the new addition. We called it the 5th grade pod. And that was a treat to go there because you had air conditioning and you had your own bathrooms, your own drinking fountains," said Chrissy Johnson Spears, who went to the school from kindergarten through 5th grade and still live in University City.

"I had a good experience at Pershing," said Johnson Spears. And it's evident in the line of work she went into - teaching. Sometimes she even substitute teaches at Pershing.

"Lots of memories," said  Gail Stobaugh as she toured Pershing Elementary. Stobaugh, who recently moved back to University City, attended kindergarten through 5th grade at Pershing from 1965 to 1971. "They really haven't changed the structure of the inside that much," she said. "You can hear the voices, that's why I came," she said.

"It brings back some memories , the old doors,the (window) panes" said Leah Rubin who attended kindergarten through 3rd grade at Pershing from 1954 to 1958. She now lives in Wildwood.

While some people commented that the building seemed so much smaller Rubin said she felt the opposite. "It's huge," she said. "I love this school." 

Melinda Parker Murphy, attended Pershing from kindergarten through 6th grade, starting in 1954. "I just had to see it," said Parker Murphy who drove in from Kansas City for the building walk through. 

Sisters Christina Dellard Grove and Tiffany Dellard attended Pershing in the 1980s. "I love this school and I loved my time here," said Dellard Grove. "I had a great foundation here."

"Fantastic times, fantastic school, a lot of memories," said Dellard. 

The Pershing Elementary School building was built in 1919. The building will be demolished shortly after the conclusion of the current school year and construction on a new school building will start. Construction is slated to be completed  in time for students to return to the building for the start of school in fall 2012.