HIGH SCHOOL MEMORIES SCRAPBOOK 1931 COLORADO SPRINGS PALMER HIGH SCHOOL RAINBOW GIRLS ZETA LITERARY SOCIETY SNAPSHOTS
Item #1667
A richly assembled 1930s Colorado Springs high school memory scrapbook kept by Lorene Elizabeth Duckels, a Palmer High School student whose album preserves an unusually vivid record of school life, friendship, dances, clubs, plays, graduations, parties, outings, and young womanhood from the early 1930s into the 1940s.
The green “My High School Memories” album measures approximately 9 1/2” x 9” x 2 1/2” and contains 56 leaves / 112 pages, densely filled with photographs and ephemera. Duckels saved and arranged telegrams, dance programs, invitations, valentines, restaurant souvenir pieces, menus, play programs, Christmas cards, congratulatory notes, newspaper clippings, wedding announcements, school-related writings, and other keepsakes. The album is especially appealing for its lively visual material: colorful Art Deco-style dance cards and party favors, silhouette decorations, hand-lettered invitations, printed school memory pages, handwritten autographs, ribbons, strings, and small attached novelties.
Lorene Elizabeth Duckels was born January 13, 1913 and died in August 2012. She graduated from Colorado Springs High School / Palmer High School and later from Blair’s Business College. Her careful saving of names, dates, gifts, dances, menus, programs, and signatures is very much in keeping with someone who later worked as a secretary and bookkeeper. She remained connected to the Palmer High School alumni community.
A photograph of Lorene appears near the front of the album, dated 1931, with additional photographs of friends, classmates, family, and social outings in later sections. There are 139 snapshots in total. The “Chums,” “Photographs of My Classmates,” and “Snapshots” sections include informal portraits of young women and men, school friends posed in yards and gardens, outing photographs, costumed “Kid Day” snapshots, scenes at North Cheyenne Canyon, Green Mountain Falls, Tulsa, Kansas, and other trips and gatherings. Many are captioned in a youthful, teasing hand: “Whoopie!,” “Happy?,” “Why frown?,” “A doll — and how?,” “Bathing Beauty,” “Just Posin’,” “We two short pants and short dresses,” and similar remarks.
The scrapbook also documents Lorene’s involvement in clubs and social organizations, including the Order of the Rainbow for Girls, the Order of DeMolay social orbit, and the Zeta Literary Society, where she appears to have served as secretary in 1931. One page includes a Zeta Literary Society mother’s meeting invitation; another preserves a Depression Dance card from the Rainbow Girls dated October 1, 1932. Later loose or tucked-in material includes colorful printed menus and programs, including a “Rainbow Ranch Menu Round Up” dated March 6, 1940. School sections include class colors, class flower, motto, prophecy, history, officers, activities, and autographs from classmates and teachers. One commencement-related entry exclaims, “At last, Commencement! Our destination!”
The graduation material is particularly charming. Lorene kept cards recording friends’ names and the gifts they gave her, including a slip, purse, stationery, compact, perfume, underwear, and pajamas. The autograph pages are filled with affectionate, sometimes funny, sometimes formal notes from classmates and teachers. Tucked inside the last page and attached to the inside back cover are additional invitations and envelopes. One handwritten note reads: “Love to a man is a thing apart, to a woman — ’tis her whole existence.”
The album is full, visually strong, and highly evocative, with expected wear from age and handling. The covers show edge wear and fraying, and the pages have toning, chipping, small tears, loose edges, and some brittle areas. A number of attachments are held with old tape, ribbons, or glue, with some lifting or detached pieces present. The scrapbook remains intact as an appealing and content-rich record of a young Colorado woman’s school years, social life, friendships, club affiliations, and memory-keeping during the early Depression era and beyond.
Price: $350.00