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Lucille (Gehrke) Jorgensen: Home Economics Class of 1940
"My grades were B's until the last semester when a C appeared. I think that must have come after the
problems of the matched plaid experiment in a dress--lines of different sizes and colors and sleeves
had to be shortened to be matched. the placket then was snaps and a hook and eye instead of a zipper."
Lucille Gehrke Jorgensen - 1940
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Dressed for food class.
In the late 1930's students wore uniforms to food class. Pictured here is Lucille Gehrke and
Marjorie Snyder Clinton
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Advanced Sewing Class Project, 1939
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Dorothy Averill: Home Economics Class of 1943
Lived in Nelson Hall with over 100 other girls. Worked the front desk in exchange for her room which only cost $6 a week. Tuition was $25 a semester. Taught Home
Economics for 38 years, four of them in Rib Lake and 34 in Antigo. Retired at age 62 and lives in Merrill, WI.
Dr. Bernadine Peterson: Home Economics Class of 1945
(Remarks taken from a video tape of Dr. Peterson Fall 2001)
When Bernadine remembers Central State Teachers College, the first thing she thinks about is the war. There were few
men on campus and she wonders how they even kept the place open. She recalls when they bombed Pearl Harbor and all the
students were called into a room to hear about it. Bernadine is from Neillsville, Wisconsin and came to Point on a
legislative scholarship so she was a very serious student. "I took many liberal arts courses to make the best use of my
time. The names of the teachers I had are now the names of buildings: Knutsen, Roach, Schmeekle, Allen. Some of the
best teachers I ever had were here." Bernadine recalls, "The food science I learned from Miss Meston I still use
today."
Bernadine recalls the "rural school on campus; a brick school house where rural elementary students were bussed onto
campus to provide practicum experiences for the college students. Bernadine has many memories of life in the home
management house, then called Sims Cottage. Bessie May Allen was in charge of the house at that time and Bernadine was
one of "Bessie's girls". Miss Allen liked her because she would "do it right." Because that was a time of war the
girls had to make due with ration coupons when buying their food supplies.
When Len Gibb, then the Director of The UWSP Foundation, asked Bernadine what she would like from the home management
house when it was torn down, Bernadine told him she wanted the door knob from the pantry door. Mr. Gibb removed it
himself and delivered it personally to Bernadine. She has since donated the doorknob back to the University's
historical collection along with the gym suit her mother wore when she was a student at Point and her 1916 yearbook.
Glenna (Johnson) Voller: Home Economics Class of 1945
"No one expected anyone from my family to go to college. But I was determined. I came from a family of ten
children. I came to Stevens Point because I could live at home while going to school. I started in science
and math, but switched to home economics because I took note of the graduates and I knew I had an interest in
that area from taking home economics classes in high school."
"I lived at home for three out of four years in college and I worked to support myself so I didn't have the
time or the money to get really involved in campus activities, only the academics. One year I took care of
five younger siblings, went to school full time, and worked while my parents were in Milwaukee getting a
business started. I had to walk to and from campus and one time, Bessie May Allen gave me a ride home and so
realized how far it was. Once after that, I wasn't at a required home economics meeting and some of the girls
commented to Bessie May and she said to them 'You wouldn't be here either if you had to walk so far'."
"I remember the belching furnace during my semester in the home management house and how I would have to cover
myself with a big scarf to keep from getting dirty while shoveling the coal into it. I lived in the house with
Bernadine Peterson, Doreen (Short) Stewart, and Helen (Lundgren) Brochman. Sometimes the girls would sing a
popular tune of the time 'Bessie May Mucho' as if they were singing about Bessie May Allen. I had excellent
teachers at Stevens Point, Bessie May Allen and Miss Meston especially."
"I taught for thirty-seven years in home economics, starting in Cassville, and then in Elroy."
Rita (Pejsa) Christ: Home Economics General Class of 1948
"There were thirteen graduates in my class and I think that only eight of them are still living. We were all very
close. There were hardly any men on campus at that time because of the war. Those who were there were 4F. I
am still very good friends with another Stevens Point graduate, Dorothy Parker, whom I taught with at Milwaukee
Area Technical College for many years. I have worked in the Home Economics Department at MATC for over thirty
years."
Doris (Ockerlander) See: Home Economics General Class of 1948
"I have a myriad of memories from UWSP, known in the 1940s as Central State Teachers College, or CSTC.
Although we had exposure to specialist fields that could be pursued by home economics majors through many
required science classes, and classes in art, childcare, family relations, home management, marketing, nutrition,
etc. back in the 1940s, most of us became home economics teachers. I feel very fortunate to have had home
economics classes from Bessie May Allen and Helen Meston, because they gave us the basis for maintaining a
solid home life, to teach it and to live it."
Mary Noble Fick, Home Economics General Class of 1949
Memories!� The best of years.� Just after WWII - with more men than women!� Not a huge class but with lots of individual
attention.� Bessie Mae's habit of "just resting her eye lids" in class.� We all thought she'd sleep but she always knew just
what was going on while she napped.
Then Helen Meston's food class was usually an experiment of combining what you usually did at home vs. her Boston School Cook
Book directions.� A wonderful time for all of us.
My first teaching Home Ec. To 8th graders from training school turned out a disaster!� One girl "fell" into the flour bin and
another got her foot stuck in the oven.
I met my "husband to be" while at CSTC while he was playing football.� He loved to eat and always said that he went to Home Ec.
to find his own "chief cook and bottle washer."
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