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 How
many of you remember a very special teacher in your
school experience? Almost everyone has had that
special teacher who reached out and helped you in
such a way you thought you were special. This
assistance helped you succeed in school, in life or
both. Most of us have read about history and legends
in my column, but for 32 years I have been involved
in education. I taught Jr. High School classes for
15 years. I would like to share some of these
experiences with you. Many of them were involved
with the mountains and land that I love so much.
When I walked into my first class room in August
1973 with my lesson plans I was a pure idealist. I
sincerely believed I could make a difference, change
the world and I planned on doing it. Still to this
day I believe I have made a difference. As I looked
at my students that day, for the first time, I had a
little anxiety about what would happen. This was my
first day of school, but it was their seventh year
of experience with a teacher. They were experienced
at being students; however I wasn’t experienced at
being a teacher. To teach them was one thing; to
gain their respect another.
The first time I saw my isolated class room sitting
at the north end of Davis Field on the Apache
Junction High School campus near Southern Avenue I
felt like Robinson Crusoe on an abandoned island
cast far away from society. I could look to the
southeast and all I could see was Creosote, Bur
sage, and an occasionally Mesquite and a few Barrel
cactus. I felt like I was in the middle of the
Sonoran Desert. Actually, I was! To the north of my
classroom was also a desert. My classroom, an old
military barracks, had been salvaged from Williams
Air Force Base. There were no communications between
my class room and the office. The walk from the
office to my class room required a minimum of five
minutes if you really hurried. I handled all of the
emergencies in my classroom by myself. These
emergencies ranged from accidents, irate parents,
animal attacks to seizures.
I experienced all of these emergencies in my first
year at the shop shack as the students
affectionately called it. Please don’t let that
bother you; the students called the snack wagon the
“roach coach.” A lot of parents called my shop class
the “sweat shop” and for good reason. We had no real
cooling in the shop. I had a worn-out evaporative
cooler that didn’t produce enough air to cool the
shop. Students would stand in front of it to cool
off. In desperation I placed a beautiful scene of
mountain glaciers and snow-pack on the wall. This
large photograph would hopefully psychological ease
the hot conditions of our class room in those days.
Of course I was always worried the glaciers and
snow-pack would melt in the picture during those hot
humid August days in our class room.
 The Jr. High School principal, Dale Hancock had very
little budget money for the shop, but made every
effort to help me secure enough tools and supplies
to teach my classes. Most of the tools and supplies
were donation from the community. I was loaned a
power plant to run the cooler until electricity was
installed in the class room. Hancock wanted me to
round up as much equipment and supplies from the
community that I could. This became my first
community relations job with the school district. I
had lived in the community off and on since 1955 and
I knew many wonderful people in Apache Junction who
would contribute to the shop program.
I taught a class titled World of Work. It was a
basic wood shop class for junior high school
students. I taught basic shop safety. I had a list
of objectives that I taught. These objectives
included; how to use a tape measure, how to cut a
piece of wood, how to square a piece of wood, how to
sand and finish a piece of wood, how to properly
drive a nail and how to read a simple set of plans
and to draw a simple set of plans. Teaching these
objectives to a group of junior high students was
certainly a challenge. However, I had a lot of
interest and determination among my students that
made my job easier and by all means more successful.
My enthusiasm to teach and their determination to
learn made a successful combination.
When I started teaching at the Jr. High School there
were only two clubs for the students. Mr. Jay
Mitchell had a chess club and Mr. Tom Johnson had a
math club. A couple of my student expressed their
interest in hiking. We soon formed a hiking club.
The club provided me a great opportunity to get out
into the mountains I loved so much and at the same
time provided some recreation for my students on
Saturdays. The Apache Junction Jr. High School
Hiking Club was formed and we hiked many of the
trails of the Superstition Wilderness Area. I found
an enormous amount of support among the parents. I
had all the sponsors I needed to hike with us. Our
hiking club covered close to five hundred miles in
the Superstition Wilderness Area in the first four
years it was organized.
Yes, I was teaching on the Arizona frontier in the
1970’s whether I wanted to believe it or not. Most
mornings when I arrived at the shop early I would
watch the coyotes chasing the rabbits on Davis
Field. Sometimes there would be four or five coyotes
chasing a dozen or so Jack rabbits. The coyotes
chasing the rabbits reminded me of my high school
days at Phoenix Union. What a metaphor? Our school
was known as the Coyotes and Mesa was known as the
Jackrabbits. You must realize this was the only
patch of green grass east of the county line
(Meridian Road). This grass attracted insects,
rabbits, snakes and coyotes from out in the desert.
There was nothing to the south of the school in
those days. Almost all of the roads were dirt south
of Main Street or the Apache Trail.
Each morning it was quite entertaining watching the
Coyotes versus the Jack rabbits in the open field. I
never saw a coyote catch a rabbit. It was usually a
tie between the two groups. When the sun was above
the horizon, it warmed up and the rabbits and
coyotes would retire for the day. The game was over
and I prepared to meet my first period shop class.
Those wonderful days will be etched in my memory for
the rest of my life. It certainly had been a long
way from the back of an old Quarter Circle Ranch
horse to a classroom at Apache Junction Jr. High
School.
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