“I took a little trip to my home town, I only stopped just to look around.” — Paul Anka, 1960
The sad and shocking recent death of Peggy Feist Wells prompted a series of events that have led me to pen a nostalgic column about the small town where I grew up — Croton.
I came to Wayland with family on Aug. 18, 1962, from Croton, where I spent most of my youth between the ages of 5 and 14. Though Wayne Goodwin’s job caused us to travel a lot in a mobile home in four Midwestern states, our home base was Croton, on the august banks of the Muskegon River.
I was one of the groomsmen in Peggy’s wedding to Art Wells in the fall of 1968. The two were high school sweethearts and their marriage lasted for more than 52 years. I posted condolences on her obituary and Art got back in touch after all those years.
Art and his fraternal twin brother, Blaine, were perhaps my oldest friends, having met in kindergarten under the watch of a Mrs. Wolf. We remained classmates under Miss Robbins, first grade; Mrs. Duvall, second grade; Mrs. Johnson, third grade; Mrs. Horton, fourth and fifth grades, and Ralph and Coral LeBlanc, eighth grade.
I spent my entire sixth grade year in Carrollton. Ohio, and split my seventh grade academic year between Imperial, Mo., and Bay City.
Croton Rural School was one of those backwoods institutions, not much more than a one-room schoolhouse that were absorbed via consolidation by larger districts in the mid-1960s. It was in the fall of 1963 that Newaygo beckoned the Croton kids to the Big House.
I remember first, second and third grades being in one classroom; fourth, fifth and sixth in another, and seventh and eighth in yet another.
In my eighth grade year, my class was said to have Croton’s largest in its history, with 14 students. In spring 1962 graduation exercises, Art Wells presented the valedictory address, Nancy Mee salutatory, Patsy Boeder and I the class will, and Blaine Wells and Amber Yunker the prophecy.
To this day, I have yet to meet anyone who has given the class will twice in their academic careers. I joined Jill Wilde in that exercise at Wayland High School commencement.
The other eight class members of Croton’s largest class were Adelbert VanHorn, Billy Scudder, Elaine Kreuzer, Tom Maurer, Alice Fredenberg, Diane Adrianse, John Cook and John (Lenny) Grant.
The class of eight seventh-graders that followed us would be the last in Croton history. It included my cousin Susan Fedell, wife of Newaygo Mayor Ed Fedell, and Gary Allen, who later rose to the ranks of school superintendent.
Perhaps one of the most interesting highlights of Croton School’s history was that a gymnasium was built in 1957 next to the three-room school house. It served for several years as the home site for Newaygo High School basketball games because the old high school gym was in a state of disrepair. Newaygo built a new high school and gym in the mid-1960s.
So a big part of the social life in Croton was the Friday night basketball games, when the high school kids would come to Croton to watch Ron Compton, the Straight brothers, Jim Lantz and local boy Clare Maurer play the likes of Hesperia, Tri-County, White Cloud and Morley-Stanwood.
Our eighth grade basketball team went 10-0 in 1962, but we learned later that half the time we were playing and routing seventh grade teams.
My most fond memory was that the gym was connected to the school cafeteria, so after phys ed class, the boys would line up and walk the tunnel to eat lunch. Today it breaks my heart that it’s entirely filled in.
The old Croton School serves today as a pre-school and the gym is a church. In 1995 I decided to drop in with my wife and two children to walk those hallowed halls once again. I was introduced to pre-school director Joanne Robinson and found her to look familiar.
I asked her if her maiden name was Maurer and if she was often referred to in her childhood by the nickname “Skeeter.” She replied in the affirmative and asked me how I knew. I told her I used to hang out with her older brother Tom and used to sleep overnights in a pup tent in the back yard at their house.
After she asked me for my name, she commented, “I don’t remember you.”
As you can see, I made a lot of impact on my old home town.
“The Young Ones… Yes, dahling, WE are the young ones. And we should not be afraid to live, love while the flame is strong. For we won’t be the young ones for very long.” — Vivian Stanshall
FRONT PAGE PHOTO: Croton Rural School today. (Photo courtesy of Art Wells)
