Clemmons Courier
By Ann Sheek - Marion “Bud” Harper was terrified when he entered the new Clemmons School in 1926 as a freshman.
“My knees were knocking,” said Harper, 97, as he recalled his first days in high school. “I was used to a one-room school over at Warner’s (on Styers Ferry Road), and there were more students in one class at Clemmons than there was in the whole Warner’s School of eight grades. I was afraid to raise my hand to answer questions. It took me awhile to get used to the new ways.”
Harper graduated in 1929 from Clemmons and is one of, if not the oldest, living graduate of the school. Students went 11 grades until 1945, when the 12th grade was added.
“Clemmons School was very modern. There were new desks and central heat from a coal furnace in the basement. Our principal was J.F. Brower and he was all business, and did not tolerate foolishness. If anyone misbehaved, he would be sent home. Professor Brower also taught math in high school, and his wife Annie Brower was our English teacher. Now she made us cross every T and dot every I. It was not easy to get an A in her class.” said Harper, who was the champion speller for his last two years in school.
School began in September after all the crops were harvested.
“When Clemmons School first opened, there was no lunch room, so everybody brought their lunches. A lunch room was added on the west end of the school while I was still in high school,” Harper said.
He recalled the school put on plays, but he was too bashful to participate. “We had a band and a good library. Girls were required to take home economics in high school and boys took shop and agriculture. We also took science classes.”
Sports was important to Harper. He played on the 5 and later 6-man basketball team on outdoor courts. “We did have an old one room school building (near Meadowbrook) that we practiced in during the winter, after we took out the interior walls and had room to play. At one time we also played soccer before football came to our school.”
Bud Harper was raised on a farm, and his father, A.B. Harper, ran a country store on the corner of Dull and Styers Ferry Roads. A.B. Harper also repaired cars at the store, so his son learned to drive early.
“We did not have to get drivers’ licenses. I started driving and moving cars when my feet could barely touch the pedals. Guess that driving experience came in handy, cause’ I was asked to drive three bus routes to Clemmons School, and also because I lived at the upper end of the Clemmons School zone,” said Harper.
None of the roads in Clemmons were paved, including Highway 158. “It was rough going, with all the pot holes that became big mud holes in rainy weather. Just like wash boards!” Lewisville-Clemmons Road had only farms, and no businesses.
Harper recalls there were two stores, Blackburns on the corner of 158 and Lewisville-Clemmons Road (that sold a little of everything from groceries to furniture) and Strupe/Cooper’s that sold monuments and gravestones. Clemmons Milling Company was popular and where farmers bought seeds, plants and had their grains ground. The old post office was on Idols Road near the train station. That was called Old Clemmons, and where the school was built, that was New Clemmons, Harper said.
“My first bus route was along Styers Ferry Road and Center Grove Church Road. Then I dropped off that load and drove to where Griffith School was later built, and hauled in that load. After I dropped off that load, I had a route that went to the city limits of Winston-Salem on Highway 158,” recalled Harper. “Sometimes I didn’t get all the kids to school until 10 a.m. And, it was pretty late when I finished and got home.”
“We used to have big snows, and I remember once the snow was so deep I could not get the bus out of our driveway, so there was no school on days like that,” said Harper. He said the buses in the 1920s had two side seats under the windows and a long middle seat where the little kids said back to back. “I guess I am one of the oldest bus drivers in the state still driving my car.”
“Not everyone could ride the bus,” said Harper. “If they lived anywhere near the school, they had to walk, no matter the weather.
“There was very little traffic on the roads when I drove the bus. And there was no heater, so it could get pretty cold on that bus,” said Harper. “If any kid got to fighting, I would put them off my bus and let them walk home. Sure couldn’t do that today!
“When I was a freshman, I dated my science teacher, Helen Braswell,” Harper recalled. “I met my future wife, Mary Brewer at school. When we were seniors, we started dating. After we graduated, she went to college to be a teacher and I went to work at Reynolds Tobacco Company, and retired from there in 1974.”
The Harpers built their home on Stadium Drive and raised two children, Lynn and Steve. Mary Harper died several years ago.
Harper likes to have breakfast at Clemmons Kitchen and lunch at Arby’s. He spends a lot of his time reading and likes to watch college basketball and baseball on television.
He looks forward to attending the Clemmons School reception/reunion of graduates on September 9, when all graduates are invited to once again visit the school and see the complete renovation of the building, now owned by Edgar Broyhill.
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