Chicago Visitation High School

MEMORIES

From Patricia Burgin Sumner (Class of 1953).

"As I recall, we didn't have school colors or a school song. The high school was on one corner and the convent was across the street just east of the school so that we could see it from our classrooms. The nuns could see us when the standard punishment for our classmates was to hang them out the window. We kept the windows open in good weather so we could hear them laughing and singing and playing badminton.

"Our uniforms were navy blue suits with white open neck blouses and they were never to be repaired. The badge of honor for a senior was to have the most raggedy jacket imaginable.

"We did have sports and plays. I was a guard on the basketball team and was too shy to play Puck when asked by the Drama teacher. I can't remember her name but met her again as an adult when she was the date brought along by my date's roommate. She again chastised me for turning down Puck and I spent the whole evening trying to get used to calling her by her first name.

"When I contracted polio and spinal meningitis in sophomore year, the whole school went out onto Garfield Blvd. to pray for me. High school may have been painful for a lot of people; but, I had the best classmates in the world."

From Lee Bormet:

"I attended Visitation kindergarten, 1st, 2nd, and a few months of 3rd grade up until 1952. The nickname of the school and parish was "Viz." The convent was across the street from the high school and the nuns gave piano lessons on the first floor of the convent. Recitals were held in the auditorium of the high school."

From Sarah "Sally" (Flemming) Toblesky (Class of 1959):

"I graduated from the class of 1959. Yes we had class plays. In fact, I was part of the back stage crew at our Sr. Class Play. We did have a student Council. I played basketball only because I had to in gym class. I can't recall if we had a team who played other schools. We held special dances (girls asked the boys)....Senior proms and Sock Hops.

"Unfortunately I lost all of the paraphernalia from my senior year except for my class ring which my daughter now wears. I sure hope someone out there knows the words to that song because I still remember the melody.

"I had the most wonderful 4 years of my life at Visitation. I was just an average girl but had good friends and loved all the sisters. Yes we called it 'Viz'...There was always so much offered to us you couldn't help but be proud to be a student there.

"We had a very well-rounded curriculum. They offered clerical classes for gals who wanted to be secretaries. They offered all the courses girls needed to attend college. They also offered cooking, sewing, etc. I received a very good education.

"I remember once we actually had a ballet company come and dance at the school. There was always something going on in that regards. Another time we had musicians playing classical music. We were always exposed to many facets of life. In my senior year we had a mother/daughter tea, and a father/daughter square dance. I also seem to recall that our 1959 class had the distinction of having some of the smartest seniors in the city of Chicago.

"The freshman and sophomore's uniform was a dark navy blue jacket and skirt with a white blouse. The Jrs and Srs wore light blue jackets and skirt with a white blouse. We had to be able to tell who were upper classwomen!! First Friday of every month, we could wear street clothes so that we could get our uniforms cleaned.

"When I was a sophomore our class got into a lot of trouble. Toward the end of school, as we were going home, we started ripping up our uniform jackets as this was the last time we had to wear them. It was a sight seeing all those girls leaving parts of their uniform jackets on the street! Well, word got back to Mother Superior, who was livid over the stories she was being told. When we got back to school Monday morning, on the bulletin board in our respective homerooms was a note stating that all Sophomore's would be required to continue wearing their dark blue uniforms! Oh my gosh....happy ending, I found a friend who still had her dark blue uniform jacket and loaned it to me, thank goodness I still had my skirt! That was quite a blemish on our class. But by the time we were seniors, we had resurrected ourselves.

"Viz also had a lot of after-school clubs like, English, Math, History, creative writing, etc. We had a senior year book. In fact, we had everything available to us that any other high school had - except boys :)!

"That's all I can recall...pretty good considering this year is my 50th anniversary since my graduation in 1959!"

From Donna Williamson Gullo, (Class of '67)

"I went to Visitation Grammer School from 1st-8th grades - graduating in 1963. I also went to Vis High School - graduating in 1967.

"We wore blue jackets and blue/white skirts in Freshman/Soph years. Jr and Sr years we wore Grey Jackets and a Grey/White Skirt. We also had a Glee Club, which was an elective class for Jrs and Srs.

"Freshman and Sophomores had no electives. Depending on your entrance scores you were given your classes by the school. The order was: Latin I & II, French I & II, Spanish I & II , or Home Economics / Cooking. Math: Algebra or General Math Freshman Year followed by Geometry or Algebra for Soph. year. We had Gym class in Freshman Year but then the Gym Teacher quit and they never got a new gym teacher until our Sr. year (after the Sr schedule had already been made) so Srs did not have gym that year either.

"We attended school from 8:00 am - 3:00 pm. Each of our classes were 55 minutes long. We had 5 minutes to get to our next class. They made the halls and stairways into one way corridors, so depending on where you were you would have to go up or down and across the floors to get to your next class. They even split our lunch period up. You would have, study, lunch, study or lunch, study, study or study, study, lunch, all in one hour and the Lunch Room was in the basement of the Grammer School! You had to go to 54th Place and enter the lunch room from the back door and after lunch you went out the front door back to the High School. They did allow us the choice of going to a study hall or going to the gym to play volleyball during the lunch hour.

"Our Jr Class Trip went to Springfield Illinois and our Sr class trip was the first not to go to Washington, DC. Instead, we went to Montreal/Quebec for the Expo '67. We took a chartered flight there and one of the priests came out to the plane and gave us all final absolution before the plane departed. It was a 6 engine plane and don't you know that they had a problem with one of the engines before take off and had to restart the engines a second time. As it was a private charter the pilots let us come up to the cockpit in groups of 2-3 and they showed us how the plane flew and let us hear the traffic instructions through their earpieces. The stewardess's showed us where the glasses, soda and ice were at and to help ourselves through out the flight while they sat back and talked to the nuns. They really gave us alot of freedom on that trip.

"In Quebec we toured the old part of the city, an island in the St.Lawrence Seaway (where they only spoke French) and had a sock hop held just for us at a College with guys from the school invited even! In Montreal we were given an envelope with money for food at the Exp, told how to get back to our motel via public transportation, in case we decided to leave the Expo earlier than the rest of the class. We were told to stay in groups of 3 or more and if we were leaving early to find another group from the school and pass on that information so they would know why we did not show up at the gate at closing. Considering the size of the Expo and all the exhibits the group I was with never saw anyone from our school until the gate that night. This was really trusting of them because all with the Expo was the Navy Fleet, where I know alot of the groups spent the whole day! We all made it back to Chicago without any problems.

"We had many clubs at the school. Their were among them the Drama Club (put on the play "Mrs O"Leary's Cow), Art Club, French Club, Library Club, Big Sisters, Sodality Club (the president of this club was the girl who did the May Crowning) to mention a few. We were the first class that did not have the big May Crowning on the Blvd. with the whole Grammar and High School lined up in the grass in front of the grotto outside the rectory.

"We also had the mother/daughter tea and father/daughter square dance. Of which I had the priviledge of attending with my parents.

"I will never forget the great times, great people, great neighborhood and great school. I am proud to be an Alumni of Visitation."

From Kathleen Brennan Mammoser, (Class of 1966):

"There were no athletics teams, but there was a Senior Class play put on every year. We had the Junior-Senior Tea and the Mother-Daughter Tea and the Father-Daughter Dance. We had Student Council, Alumnae Club, Art Club, Big Sister Council, Biology Club, Catholic Action (the president of this club crowned the Blessed Virgin statue on the Boulevard on Mother's Day), Drama Club, French Club, Glee Club, History Club, Library Club, Math-Science Club, Mission Club, Quill and Scroll Society, National Honor Society, Spanish Club, the VAA Board and Sodality. The name of the school literary magazine was Vista and we had a yearbook. Until 1965 the yearbook had a soft cover. The only formal pictures in the yearbook were the seniors."

From Virginia Heckert (class of 1960):

"A VERY INTERESTING fact about Visitation parish is in about 1940 they built a separate building to house the Kindergarten students. This one-story building was VERY unique and it was BEAUTIFUL! Inside it had a mosaic tiled fishpond (BEAUTIFUL) with a waterfall. Everything was in small scale: the toilets, the sinks, tables, chairs and it had a separate kitchen with little electric stoves whereby the children did learn to bake. It had a fireplace (BEAUTIFUL stonework) with a huge oriental rug on the floor for story hour.

"Also, rather interesting is the fact that in the 1940's & 50's thru 1960 (when I attended Visitation grade school & H. S.), the convent housed 64 nuns. Music lessons were also taught after school hours in the convent for reasonable fees. The dining area for the nuns was something to behold and each nun took her plate & silverware, etc. and scraped it off in the kitchen area aft. meals. Likewise, the laundry area was massive. The chapel was not that large; but it accommodated the nuns for daily Mass and Office and was a very comforting space. Can't explain it, but you felt spiritually fulfilled there or something. This chapel was only for the nuns and very few of us ever got to see it.

"In the grade school we had 4 rooms of each grade with 60+ kids in each room (we were the "War Babies" so they had to add on an add'l. room for our class (to total 4 instead of 3 rooms) as we progressed ea. yr.). (1948-1956). The entire grade school went home for lunch and returned within an hour. We marched down the stairs of the 3-story building every day as the school band played a march. We could NOT touch the banisters and had to stand tall (single-file) and march.

"In the basement of the grade school was a cafeteria for the High School students and also in a separate area, a bowling alley for aft. school use (evening leagues) for the H. S. students and other adult parish organizations. The H. S. had a gym and an auditorium with a professional stage. The grade school had a yearly St. Patrick's Day Show that the entire grade school participated. Tickets were sold and each class performed.

"Between the Church & the Rectory (in the late 50's) was a shrine of Our Lady of Fatima with a kneeler whereby people could stop and kneel and pray in the outside air.

"VISITATION HAD THE LARGEST AND MOST ELABORATE AND BEAUTIFUL MAY PROCESSION/MAY CROWNING OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY!!! All of Garfield Blvd. was closed for blocks and blocks. The entire school (High School and Grade School and perhaps the Kindergarten students) took part in this thrilling event. It was beautiful!!! Then, Monsignor Burns (1940's-50), or Monsignor Wolf in later years, would always give us the next day off which was always a Monday.

"The May Crowning, I know, must have made an impression on all the kids and their parents. I know my playmates and I always reenacted it in my backyard . . . complete with saying the rosary out loud and some neighbors joining in. This is true.

"Visitation was a wonderful parish. I understand there is another Visitation parish in Elmhurst, Il, and I have been told that the pastor there (now or in the recent past) was a Visitation (Garfield Blvd. - BACK OF THE YARDS/SHERMAN PK.) parishioner when he was young and I was told that he tries to run Visitation in Elmhurst, IL, the way our Visitation was run. If so, it must be a great parish!"

from Mary Gaskin Tully (class of 1957):

"My name at Visitation was Mary Gaskin, class of '57. I truly cherished my days at Vis, I loved the nuns, especially Sister Marie Daniel who tried so hard to teach us Latin. She was a character. Loved reading the information and I especially loved seeing the beautiful building that housed all of us."

WE'VE GOT A LOT OF GAPS TO FILL IN...

and that's where we need your help. If you are an alumnus of Visitation, had a daughter attend the school, or even just have information that would help fill in this page, then we want to hear from you. Information such as school colors, nickname, what activities did they offer, memories, and more are what we need. Photos are also acceptable. Please contact us by email or USPS at the addresses listed below. We appreciate all the help we can get!

email: dr.veeman@gmail.com

by USPS: Illinois High School Glory Days

6439 North Neva

Chicago, IL 60631