The Seniors of 1917 ~ Grove High School ~ Class Prophecy

While I was in Chicago last week, I
went by to see Ouija, the magician, to
have him tell me my future. When he
had finished he asked if there was any-
one else in whose future I w;as interes-
ted. I told him yes, there were lots of
people I would like to know of, but, as
it was near the end of school, I be-
lieved I was most interested in my
classmates. So he told me of a peri-
scope which Mr. Edison had invented
that under certain conditions you
could look into and see in the far dis-
tance, the future of anyone you might
wish to. So under these peculiar con-
ditions I read the future of every mem-
ber of the class.
First, I saw Margaret whom we had
all expected to be a great prima donna,
singing on the streets of London as a
Salvation girl. Our expectations for
her had been far from this. But
she is of more worth to the world as a
little Salvation Army girl than she
would be as a great prima donna,and of
course the sweetness and unselfishness
of Margaret would lead her to choose
that in which she could be of more ser-
vice to her people, regardless of self.
Then came Claude, whom we all
feared would sleep through life, as a
most noted doctor. All of that Spence
negligence had left him and it seemed
that the cause of this was the same as
that which caused the Spence negli-
gence to so entirely leave Lowell—
the inspiration of a loving wife.
The most impossible to me was the
future of Eva, who used to yell and
hollow if you even mentioned a bug or
worm. Picture her, if you can, as a
great Botanist with rooms filled with
these little creatures, but more than
that she goes into ecstasy over every
new and peculiar one she can find: the
more slimy and horrible the creature,
the more she appreciates it.
It seemed that this present day war
had passed over, but the Germans still
hated us for our timely aid to the al-
lies and never gave up the idea of re-
venge. Thus ten years from '17 we
are again drawn into war with them,
and that Plant! Plant!'. Plant!!! is
again so much the cry of Uncle Sam
that Lister, Lexie, and Ather, as far-
mer boys, are as great heroes as Her-
ron, Edward, and Claude are soldiers.
The war has just started but Looney
has won great fame for a very wonder-
ful invention, one that every scientist
in the world, almost, especially in Am-
erica, has worked for for 15 years.
This invention has made him known
world-wide. Every citizen of America
praises him, while every citizen of Ger-
many hates him fiercely and the Kai-
ser longs to get his hands upon him for
his most precious submarines are fast
being destroyed. But—Looney does
not share, this fame alone for he gives
Mary Sue, as his wife, more than half
share. Of course though it is not to be
supposed that she ever worked out an
atom of the real work but—oh I guess
I had better refer you to Emerson's
"Essay on Manners."
We could not expect that the mem-
bers of our class are anything but pa-
triotic, and they certainly are. We
have two girls as Red Cross nurses,
Lillian and Clara Barton, who are only
waiting for a couple of patriotic heart
wounds to be healed and the war to
close to end their bachelorette days.
War is not all, for among the social
workers, and they certainly hold a very
important place ,for imagine how mis-
erable and dull a place must seem
without a girl around to sympathize
and cheer one up, is Annie Dug. But it
seems that she has caused a great deal
of war in camp, as captain, lieutenant,
and private, all, have fallen captives to
her many charms. Fuqua preferred
the navv and Lucille is daring the
dangers with him as stenographer and
wife.

Eunice and Edith are still interested
in skating but are horribly at outs, on
account of this sport for they are vying
with each other for world champion-
ship as skaters. Each is sure of ob-
taining the championship, but there is
still a doubt in the mind of each when
they think how well the other used to
skate.
If you have never seen one of these
periscopes you cannot conceive of any-
thing so peculiar. Many times they
merely suggest, for instance with La-
vinia—it only showed her as living in
Memphis and at the phone calling
someone at William R. Moore's and
from the conversation that followed I
was sure she was talking to her hus-
band but could not decide who it was.
The future of another was not very
plain, I could see the name, Vergie
Glasgow, in large bright lights at the
theatre—in New York City but could
not make out the rest, so I asked Ouija
and he said "dancer" was the only oth-
er word he could make out. But that
is too strange to believe.
Poor Fisher never reached the goal
which he tried so hard to attain. There
were no platforms and large audiences,
but stumpspeaking, yes—only upon the
stumps around little country stores,
though.

Christine seemed to find life ex-
tremely pleasant on the farm with the
chickens and cows and—everything.
We have all heard the story of the
poor old violinist who hated so to give
up his violin because of his great love
for it; when—wrote this story, he
wrote an exact account of the life of
Ralph.
Everyone found in Irene's class
poem great talent and insisted that she
take up poetry as her life work—the
result is that Longfellow has lost his
place as America's greatest poet, but
is now second to Zimmerman.
Kate and Inza, as of old, are in
search of a man. At the present, they
are touring the U. S. in a brand new
motor car ; if they are not successful
here, they will fly still higher in one of
the latest flying machines.
Edwin has changed somewhat: he is
a regular social lion and his motto
seems to be "I love the Ladies."
All that I could find out concerning
Quay was that she was interested in a
Smith. I am sure it wasn't a black-
smith but believe 'twas a "Dick-
Smith."
Mary Lou and Ethel are just the
same old girls, while Roselle is the
"lucky" girl of the class.
Frank has always been extremely
interested in Fords and traveling
therein. Now he travels to his hearts
content for he has billions of them at
his disposal as he is owner of the Ford
Motor Car Company.
Leslie Mai's life should be a fair ex-
ample to every boy and girl as to the
value of four years at Grove for she
had only three months here and a ter-
rible amount of trouble after--among
the worst is that she was left a widow
in a very short time after being mar-
ried.
This ended the class and I was so
anxious to ask about the faculty but
the poor old instrument looked so
weary and tired after enumerating the
essential facts of these 34 lives that I
did not have the heart to make it go
through the ordeals of the positiveness
of Mr. Zimmerman, the rigidity of
Miss Newell, the adorableness of Mr.
Clements,the sereneness of Miss Pearl,
the firiness of Mr. Judd, the flirtations
of Miss Matthews, the. meekness of
Mr. Gist, the frivolity of Miss Cun-
ningham, and the foolishness of Mr.
McCoy. So I left Ouija's apartment
happy in that every member of the
dear old class of '17 was to have so
brilliant a future.