The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1913-06-03

Roberts high school alumni. spoke as
follows:
ITO the honored principal Of the
Roberts High School to the Alumni
Association and to all former pupils
and friends:
I'VE meet this evening in a rare ca
pactty, on a rare occasion.
We meet IN a great reunion Of the
former pupils Of Prof. James NJ. Tate,
who have attended his school during
from lar and near TO join with each
other in paying a well earned tribute
Of love and appreciation to one who. in
a large measure, has made US what we
are.
I'VE meet to revive the precious
ever blooming flowers Of loving re-
membrane upon the graves Of all
those happy days ana years IN which
we first began to love each other.
affection which now bind US so closely
together in gladness for success: in
sympathy for sorrow.
Eve meet to see each others faces,
to listen to the music of each others
voices, to feel the surging anxiety
within our bosoms to catch the import
of each word it falls from the lips
of those we love and honor.
1--WE meet to make this evening the
most delightful resting place on LIES
road from school days to the grave.
Our relation to each other is sacred,
none save the ties of family, bind
more firmly than do those of child
hoods associates.
Many Fond RecoIIections.
so many fond recollections of other
days are twined about with the mem
DRY of school friends, and of the days
when innocence and the gentleness
knew no care
In the sunshine of our youth,
Love had birth and warmed our
hearts,
With the dreams of joy and truth
Which its truthfuiness imparts.
Years appear but to cement
Firmer still the blissfui chain,
And our hearts with glad content
Beat more quickly in meeting again.
CAS- I stand here, surrounded by the
friends of my early childhood-r1y
friends of today, ] realize this to be-
one of the dearest occasions of my
life; since the days we played together
and were happy on the green slopes of
the hill on which we meet tonight, and
as I scan your faces / read in them
the same old love I've often seen be-
fore, and through the lustrous beauty
of your eyes I see that same interest
in this grand reunion that brings a
strange moving within my own breast
and I know that all our hearts still
beat in loving sympathy for each other
and for him whom we all delight to
honor.
Let US go back in memory to the
days when we were all together and
dwell upon the influences which were
brought to bear in making our own
loved school the center of education in
West florida.
Proud of Prof. Tate.
Il voice the sentiment of all the pu-
pills gathered here, when I say tonight
that we are proud of being pupils of a
school with the record which this has
made. Proud of being pupils of a man
like Prof. Tate.
similar institution of learning which
has had a wider influence, or which
has given to the world a larger per-
centage of useful, honest, substantial
lives than this one, at the head Of
which Prof. James NJ. Tate has stood
for thirty-five years, and who looms. up
tonight as the great central light
which has reached out enve,oping the
whole. However there have been
others, as well, who have aided much
in making this school count for what
it has and does.
First we would mention that peer
of all primary teachers, Mrs. H. T
Mitchell, who was the embodiment of
all that was gentle and refined, that
was loving and painstaking with little
children, that was pure and good and
beautiful irr face and life. I ask you
tonight as you have come down the
crowded thoroughfare Of life, have you
met another like her? She stands out
in memory single and alone as one
whose patience could not be overtaxed,
whose ability was unquestioned, and
who claimed the love Of every pupil
who ever sat in her room. She was
an invaluable assistant to Prof. Tate,
and a great factor in the building up
and success of the school.
NJ. 3. Cooks Aid
''T feel that ] must not omit the men
ton of ex-Supt. N. B. Cook, as I sum
up the aids and Influences which have
made an unparalleled success of the
educational work done here. He was
always to be relied on for assistance,
advice and encoura cement, and had he
hot seen the possibilities of the school
and lent his powers to securing equip
ment, assistant teachers and higher
gra aiding, the hands of Prof. Tate would
have been tied and the influence of the
school 1essened.
'Then, too, / must mention Mr.. B. NJ.
Bombay, ST., who was for many years
the faithful supervisor and whose in
terest never abated. There have been
others as we'll who have contributed
worthy part to the success attained,
and to them all ! desire to say: You
have stood behind a great man in a
great enterprise when you have aided
school No. 5.
st want to say tonight in regard to
the class of work done here by Prof.
Tate, that it is second to none. The