These days, this time of year brings a 10 day vacation, with the boys heading for home after classes on the Friday before Thanksgiving. It is a welcome respite after a long fall of work. In the founder's era, though, Thanksgiving brought ONE day off - and even that day was not entirely off. Instead of students' going home, parents came to school for the holiday. The boys would play the last football games of the season in the morning - in '35, the Senior Eagles and Junior Diogenes won the day - before everyone, parents and even alumni included - went to the refectory for a traditional turkey dinner, "such as only Mr. Candels can make and serve." After the meal and a brief speech by Dr. Kammerer, many of the parents went to the provost's house to meet Mrs. Riddle before taking their sons off campus for the afternoon and evening. There was no study hall, but everyone was due back for the regular weekday lights out.
The Thanksgiving ('35) Issue of the
Avon Weekly News-letter reports that the boys doing community service at Hill-Stead that fall had learned a great deal about preparing for Thanksgiving. They had cut, brought in, husked, and shelled the corn ("What they haven't learned about corn harvesting just isn't there to learn"), and they had picked and sorted the apples for cider. This was on top of the usual Hill-Stead chores of milking and caring for the cows, pigs, and sheep, etc.
This fall, by the way, Avon students have returned to Hill-Stead. They are not going over to do farm chores, of course, but they are taking advantage of the farm work others are doing. Graham Callaghan takes a group over on Sundays to visit the Farmers' Market that Hill-Stead hosts.
