When my friends today look at pictures of me from my school-age years, I’m sure they find it odd. How could she possibly have been that skinny back then? It seems rather odd to me, too. I never had an ounce of fat on me. Perhaps that was from trying to keep up with five siblings and a plethora of male cousins. Maybe it was the races we would have on the dirt road behind our house. My long legs could go pretty fast- for the short haul. It could have been from playing hide-and-seek in the cotton fields in the summer or maybe skinny-dipping in the catfish ponds (yes, we used to do that). The hula hoop became popular when I was in kindergarten. I tried to perfect that for years- didn’t happen. I stood in the front yard and practiced the cheers that the high school cheerleaders like Ann and Sue Rodgers, Vicki Wade and others performed every Friday for pep rallies and ballgames. Hmm, couldn’t do that very well either. The only thing I learned to do was to twirl a baton, but not like Terri Stevens. She could twirl fire batons! I remember so much physical activity. We were always outside doing things. Now that I think of it, I’m sure my mother wanted a break from all of us and locked us out! We made the best of it.
It’s a good thing we were active because we didn’t subscribe to the “lite versions” of recipes. We cooked with Crisco and ate lots of fried foods- fried okra, fried chicken, fried pork chops, fried green tomatoes, … We had our grease can in the refrigerator. Milk was whole, bread was white, and tea was sweet. (Well, some things don’t change!)
The cafeteria at RFHS subscribed to that same method of cooking. Portion sizes were plentiful, the food was fattening, and almost everyone ate cafeteria food. Mmes. Thomas, Fuller, Williams, Mason, Robinson, Wells, and Sharp were awesome cooks. Actually, they were all pretty awesome ladies. As best I can remember, all of them were at RFHS for the duration of the Colonels years. I even remember Mrs. Thomas, Mrs. Robinson, and Mrs. Fuller being at Cary school. (I never even went there, but I remember!)
I have such memories of chocolate milk breaks throughout the elementary grades. We would bring three cents for milk. Someone would go to the Cafeteria to pick up the milk and bring it back to the classroom. At other times, I can remember going to the back door of the cafeteria. The ladies handed us our milk and we sat out there on empty crates to drink it. When we were finished we ran (I mean, walked) back to our classroom. I can remember one day walking with Libby Jones, each holding a side of the crate. I don’t remember much else about that day, except that we must have gotten in trouble, or I wouldn’t remember that image!
The cafeteria had two serving lines. Although our times were staggered, I think the elementary went first, by grade level. When junior high and then high school were being served, the last remnants of the elementary grades were just leaving. Back then, students helped in the Cafeteria. Sixth graders would help with the serving lines for the younger grades and maybe their own. If you were helping serve, you wore a hair net, plastic glove, and a smile. No one was ashamed to work there. Girls served in the food lines while boys worked at passing out milk. Some kids even helped clean the floors afterwards. I believe the helpers got a free lunch. Once I remember working in the dishwashing area. I believe the upper grades had gone on a field trip that day, so the ladies were short on helpers. I may have been a third or fourth grader. We had so much fun. I don’t know that the dishes got clean, but it was so much fun pulling down on that hot water nozzle to spray the trays before loading them in the Hobart machine that cleaned and sanitized them as the crate of trays moved through.
Between the exit of the food line and the dishwashing area was an ice cream box. I believe one day a week, you could buy ice cream after you finished your meal. There were Push-ups, Fudgesicles, ice cream sandwiches, Heath Bars, and Orangesicles. I may have been sent with “milk-money” each week, but I doubt seriously that “ice-cream money” was in the envelope.
Then there were the lunch lines for junior high and high school students. High school students, upperclassmen boys, took up the lunch money every day. I seem to remember that they were always football players. Willard Miller and George Quarm both come to mind. They would leave class a little early and go by the office to pick up the money box. It contained change and a hole-punch. You could pay by the day, but for $5.00, you could buy a 20 day lunch card. (Lunch for 25 cents, wow!) There were numbers across the top of the card. You would hand the card to the guys, they would punch and you would go on through the line. I suppose you had to be careful to keep up with the card and to make sure you didn’t leave it in your pockets and suffer the fate of the washing machine!
I think we all had our favorite foods from the cafeteria. Mine was a sweet cake that had a peanut butter/honey icing. I have remembered that often over the years, hoping to find the recipe. One friend said to me that she remembers the fish sticks everyone had to eat on Fridays “because of you damned Catholics!” I remember it a little differently. I know you didn’t have to eat fish sticks EVERY Friday. Sometimes you had to eat tuna salad. However, there were some Fridays when you got a break. I remember this because on the days that you didn’t, Mrs. Mason always made sure she had something we could eat. It may have been peanut butter and jelly sandwiches or perhaps tuna salad, but I know she took care of us.
I think the ladies tried to take care of all of us. On Fridays during football season the Colonels plates were piled a little bit higher than everyone else’s. Of course, I think the food tasted much better when you could look up and see all of the Colonels sitting together at tables, wearing their red blazers, and each sporting a gray Colonels paper lapel pin!
Holiday meals were also pretty special. Just before Thanksgiving and Christmas every year, those ladies prepared a feast. Turkey, dressing, cranberry sauce, and those big green peas produced wonderful aromas. No meal was complete without bread. Usually it was the homemade rolls. Those smells permeated the campus.
As it has been stated, “Food is the most primitive form of comfort.” We were comforted each day of our school years. The tastes, the smells, the memories, they all bring us home to our roots. We are reminded through the years of those etchings on our brains and in our senses. We experience those deja vu moments with the foods from our youth.
Stop for a moment, close your eyes, and remember…. What was your favorite cafeteria food? Your least favorite? Your favorite memory?
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Over the next few days, I will post what you have to say. Send me your memories. I've gotten a few already. Thanks!
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