Daughters maintain mother's photo collection

Monday, November 15, 2010
Cloverdale High School graduate Jean Clearwaters Norman kept this picture of her graduating class until her death in the 1970s. Her daughters now share their mother's old photo album. Members of the class of 1933 included, front from left, Paul Hoffa, Juanita Gobel Smith, Richard McCurry, Wayland Herbert, Edith Cassida Williams, George Taber, Louise Day, Nick Larkin, Morris Cooper; middle, Kenneth Morrison, Carlota Cummings Spann, Pauline Alkire Morrison, Alberta Nichols Sendlinger, Edith Cline Coombs, Telitha Greenlee, Frances Farmer Weaver, Mable Cassady Wooden, Jean Clearwaters Norman; back, Gene Denny, Howard Shake, Kenneth Akins, Venice Greenlee Lawrence, Garwood Frazier, Principal Lee Walters, Delbert Freeman, Morris O'Neal, Tom Sandy, Lowell Snider and Orris Nichols.

FRESNO, Calif. -- A small piece of Putnam County history currently lives on in central California.

Nancy Norman Murphy spent part of her childhood in Cloverdale. Her mother, Jean Clearwaters Norman, was a 1933 Cloverdale High School graduate, and saved all of her pictures over the years.

"My mother, what she did before she passed away back in the '70s, she made an album for each one of us children of our pictures and then she had an album of her and my father's family," Murphy said.

This photo of the Cloverdale High School class of 1929 was kept for years by Jean Clearwaters Norman, but only some of the people in the photo are identified. Anyone with information on the people in the picture may contact Jared Jernagan at jjernagan@bannergraphic.com. Class members included, front from left, (first name unknown) Williamson, Vint Keller, Helen Lane, Vivian Sandy, Ivan Jones, (first name unknown) Tabor, Lloyd Cummings, Lois Herbert, (first name unknown) Goodman, Meryle Rogers; middle, Pauline Hoffa, Meryle Mitchell, Carrol Bourne, Emmet Shoemaker, Kenneth Sinclair, Floyd Morrison, Eugene Meeks, Roy Sandy, (name unknown), Marjorie Coffman, (name unknown), (name unknown); back, Leland Shoemaker, Barbara Duncan, Mildred Rubeck, Paul Cassidy, Charles Brannaman, Mary Rogers, Laura Opal Brannaman, Beryl Cook, Marie Hall, Croxton O'Mullone and Maurice Knoy.

Of special interest to Murphy were a pair of pictures of the 1929 and 1933 CHS graduating classes shown with this story. As a member of the class of '33, Norman had identified all the members of her own class. The class of '29 had a few blank spaces in the identifications.

"I've had these for years. My sister Gretchen Norman Crider lives in Lafayette, and between the two of us, we share my mother's picture albums," Murphy said. "I was looking at some of the pictures one day and thought of calling (the Banner Graphic)."

Murphy said her mother simply had a love of pictures, and she kept them for both herself and her children.

"She liked pictures, so she collected the pictures and kept them all those years. It was her picture album, and my sister and I sort of share it," Murphy said. "I have it a few years, and then I give to her for a few years so she can show her kids.

"She even had a picture of the Quincy basketball team, and she went to Cloverdale. So why she had the Quincy basketball team, I have no idea," she added.

Anyone who can identify any of the unnamed people in the class of 1929 may contact 653-5151 ext. 21 or jjernagan@bannergraphic.com

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  • awesome! History means so much and could teach us a lot about today!

    -- Posted by talkymom3 on Mon, Nov 15, 2010, at 9:49 AM
  • Surly after 81 years the Cloverdale Community School District located at 310 E Logan would have the info of where there old records were kept for that class and would make the information available as historical record's past 50 year's are usually given to historical socialites, and declassified as not a security risk to the institution.

    -- Posted by Persistentchickainti on Mon, Nov 15, 2010, at 6:34 PM
  • I have an old book that belonged to Carlota Cummings from the first picture I believe. I live in wv and would like to talk to her family to send pictures

    -- Posted by jchafins on Thu, Jun 25, 2015, at 11:31 PM
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