In the first couple of years, our class (fifth class of '52) was housed in the top floor of the main building, aka "the barn." My fading memory says that classes of '52, '53', and '54 were all together there. The showers and jakes were a sprint down the hall. And when the early AM bell rousted us out of our army cots (sans mattress), the cold water (no hot water available) basins and adjacent mirrors were crowded with adolescent faces. Some were shaving, some had nothing to shave.... Somehow we all made it to chapel for early mass, (kneeling in alpha order within each year's class, youngest in front . . . to eldest at back, before we could be released for breakfast, in yearly class order, youngest to eldest, etc. Whatever complaints you might hear about those early regimens, they taught us LIFE lessons that shaped our futures as adolescents growing into adulthood. And in those early "primitive" beginnings, we absorbed what it meant to be brotherly to each other. Stronger guys, helped weaker guys, physically, or with advice based on personal experience. We were bonding as brothers, with more in common than we had ever dreamed of. One time up in the Barn, we witnessed a stunning event! (First, you need a reminder that all of us had numeric IDs stitched into all of our clothes. (Mine was 155---what was yours?) That ID was good for all 5 years at SAS, before being shipped to San Miguel for novitiate.) (Second, you need to remember that our clothing (pants, underwear, shirts, socks, etc could be submitted for laundry, to be recovered about a week later in our stack of clean stuff with our ID on everything.) (Third, you need to know that the only way for us to submit our dirty clothes for washing was by tossing them down the laundry shoot that was clear, open, and receptive 3 (maybe 4)floors below us.) Back to the Barn one Saturday.... Dozens of us were wandering around, hanging out, taking it easy, when a small guy in a class or two above of us made a huge bet. With his dirty clothes on, he said that he would personally deliver them--body, soul, and dirty clothes to the mo laundry room 3 floors below, in the basement , via the laundry chute!!! He told us to wait a minute, during which time he apparently ran down to the basement to make sure that the laundy bin below was sufficiently padded with lots of clothing from the Barn. Quickly back upstairs, he hovered over the laundry chute, and asked how many of us would bet next Friday's pie that he would not survive the drop. Dozens of guys said Survive?
No Way! The bet was on and he had a buddy taking names. If successful, no problems, no injuries, he wins pies from the NaySayers. Wel l l l l llllllllll..the next Friday, the kitchen crew was enormously busy delivering pies to the laundry chute hero! There were more pies stacking up at his table than could even cover Fr. Martial's table. He finally declared that the winner should return as many pies as possible, whether they went to the betters or not. I I learned later that the good Franciscan Brother who worked the laundry room, and shall remain nameless (to protect the guilty!) never got even a piece of the pie for assuring that the dirty laundry was sufficiently dense and bouncy enough to withstand a 3-story free-fall from the Barn!!! Crazy, fun days that i shall cherish forever! Let me hear your stories! Please, "I'm on ya..."
----Best, Leo W 1951