Submitter’s note: Continued from 12-23-2020, this week we are sharing part two of Mr. Leonard Lehman’s memories of his days at Helmsburg High School as a teacher.
Mr. Roscoe Barber was hired as athletic coach in the Frank Hill/Superintendent Brown/Trustee Melvin Richards years at Helmsburg High School. Mr. Barber’s home was at Terre Haute in Vigo County. Under Barber’s leadership and coaching, the basketball team executed smooth cooperative efforts of the best order, and climbed virtually through all tournament challenges except the state championship title in 1947. The particulars of the year must be better recounted by persons who enjoy athletic statistics. But Helmsburg celebrated with bonfires as the excitement built to white heat.
Mr. Barber had an overpowering respect and admiration for football hero Jim Thorpe (1888-1953). It should also be remembered that Mr. Barber thought of athletics as a means or arena where students could be taught mathematics or English or history — the academic disciplines — as well as or better than in the formal (stuffy) classroom. I’m convinced that he was sincere and that his philosophy has merit. All we need to do to put it into perspective is to consider the failure of the classroom. I am not at all convinced of the essence of effective education. Nor am I able to state what constitutes a spark passed from generation to generation.
Certain individuals distinguished themselves to my family as we went about our work here at Helmsburg High School. The home of Ira Glenn and Mary Tomlinson Yoder was a lighthouse in Helmsburg. Nuncie Scrougham was custodian of the high school and a gentle delight in his faithful devotion to duty. Bertha Zody quietly exerted a strength in maintaining an open door to worship in years when no man could be found to point tourists and neighbors churchward. Rodney Smith and the Barber sisters have been pillars of the church, true to their vows, through nearly four decades.
Arthur, Verna and Wilson Helms kept a store in Bean Blossom. Their motto, as listed in the 1949 school annual Tiger Tales, was “The best in good things to eat.” Mrs. Helms was a good teacher in the sense that she meant business, and though congenial, allowed no monkey shenanigans among study halls or classes.
Dr. Ross Lockwood lectured to classes at colleges, impressing firmly the memorized speeches of men and women, pioneers, framers of documents, and heroes in peace and war. Dr. Lockwood took his classes to the very spot now possibly marked, or totally obliterated, where history in separate incidents unfolded. I copied that technique and have bussed students many times to the scenes of significant happenings. Thus, we try to visualize once more where churches now long gone, or where Indian treaties or battles took place, or where the decision of assembled men have shaped our total destiny under God. “Those who will not profit by history must live to relive it.”
Can rural charm, such as Brown County unpretentiously exudes, be analyzed? Does the enchantment, instantly acknowledged by all who are touched, stem from spring redbud and dogwood? Is it that we identify with the nooks, shops and eating places and their cozy nostalgia? Can rustic, backwoods traditional wisdom and sincerity color a culture, drawing admiration to itself? Do we unconsciously crave unspoiled landscape?
The outreach for ultimate meaning, or the perpetuation of beauty, could constitute the transcendent idealism that continues to call folks back — always for more of Brown County.
Submitted by Pauline Hoover, Brown County Historical Society
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If you can identify the basketball team as they are seated on the bench in the photo we shared with you in the Dec. 23, 2020 issue of The Democrat, page A6, we would love to hear from you. We have a list of the basketball team, but we don’t know in what order they are seated on the bench. (See photo below.)
Also, we are looking for Brown County High School yearbooks from Helmsburg, Van Buren and Nashville. We have several Nashville yearbooks, but are missing a few random years. If you have a yearbook from any of the Brown County high schools you would share with us, we would like to either scan or photocopy the book, or we would make a good home for your yearbook. Please give us a call at 812-988-2899 and leave your name and phone number.
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