“This little book of poetry aims at nothing but to give to its limited number of readers a glimpse of a new phase of the development of the High School students of today.” So begins the preface of A Book of Verse, a collection of poems written by Westinghouse students published in 1920. The book features 92 poems written by 15 poets. Find the book online here.
The poems cover a myriad of themes including the natural world, human emotion, and the first world war. Most of the poets are women, such as Lois Halderman, who penned 40 of the poems. Women’s poetry has historically been seen as a lesser form of literature. The Westinghouse students that contributed to A Book of Verse prove otherwise. The preface reminds readers that the poets whose poems make up the book “felt the call to express their embryo philosophy of life.”
Modernism
The 1910s and 1920s were key decades in the modernist movement. Modernist literature came from a self-conscious break away from traditional ways of writing. Notable American Modernist poets include T.S. Elliot and Walt Mason, whose voice Lois Halderman imitates in a handful of her poems.
The First World War greatly impacted literature; during and after the war, dominant beliefs about society had to be reassessed. Modernist writers strove to express the new sentiments of the era. The students at Westinghouse wrote about the war and their feelings surrounding it. “A million staunch and fighting men, | A million birds and beasts across the sea, | Are side by side upon the battlefield” wrote Lois Halderman in a poem dedicated to America’s allies. Months before the States’ entered the Great War, Ruth McFarland wrote a poem titled “A Prayer From the U.S.A” in which she expresses gratitude for her country being spared from the war. In a poem titled “My Son,” writer Irene Scrine takes on the voice of the American mothers whose sons were sent to fight in Europe.
“Take up this book then at intervals and read it. It is offered in the humble hope that it may be a stimulus to other students, and a source of pride as the first literary triumph of the students of the Westinghouse High School”
Poetry’s Impact
Poetry lets writers express emotion and describe the world in ways no other form of literature can. The students whose work appears in A Book of Verse mastered this art form. Mary Brown, with 20 poems in the book, covered a vast array of topics from the natural world to love to death. She is not the only Westinghouse poet to do so.
The book’s preface explains the students’ intent in publishing their poems. The students as Westinghouse High School felt the need to prove the integrity of youth in the early 20th century. “This book is proof,” the preface reads, “that youth is not all-absorbing, not selfish, that it often touches the infinite more closely than most people suspect.” Every generation of teenagers struggles to prove its worth to the elder generations and A Book of Verse‘s preface expresses the very feeling: “It is the desire of all young people to express themselves in some way…”
Selma Derry, a student with three poems in A Book of Verse, later published some poetry in the March 1925 of Poetry: A Magazine of Verse, the oldest monthly journal dedicated to verse in the English-speaking world. Those poems can be found at the Poetry Foundation website.
In the 1960s, Dr. Helen Faison served at Westinghouse High School first as a counselor and then as a vice principal. She was remembered by alumni of the 1960s for setting a tone for behavior in the school.
“She was a very tall woman with a very flat voice, but she was always in control, impeccably dressed,” Richard Morris, class of ’69, remembered. “when the bell rang, she would walk from the third floor to the first floor. And the only thing that you could hear in the hallway was her high heels.”
When she got to the first floor, she would sometimes call out someone’s name if they were, for example, running in the hallway, and they would have to go to her office.
“And when you got to the office,” Richard added, “she would hand you a white sealed envelope, and she would say to you, ‘Bring your mama back.’”
She knew many of the parents in the community and was also the Sunday school superintendent at the Baptist Temple Church. This gave her extra leverage over the students. The student who was in trouble would take the sealed white envelope to their mother to open, which would explain why the parent needed to come to the high school to discuss their child’s behavior.
Dr. Faison earned her doctorate from the University of Pittsburgh in 1975 and was the first woman and first African American high school principal in Pittsburgh.
In 2015, Dr. Faison passed away at the age of 91 after an illustrious 60-year career in education. According to the New Pittsburgh Courier, hundreds filled Baptist Temple Church to pay their respects.
Richard fondly remembered how she gently but forcefully set a high bar for student behavior.
“She was a person that she would listen to you, but at the end of the day, if you were wrong,” he said, “you were going to get a white envelope.”
1934. Sophia Phillips Nelson graduates at the top of her class — the first Black valedictorian from Westinghouse High School.
1936. Nelson’s sister, Fannetta Nelson Gordon — a gifted student, scholar, and musician — was poised to be the second. The principal had other plans. “He said, after me there will never be another—the word was not Negro—valedictorian on his watch,” recalled Nelson to the New Pittsburgh Courier.
According to family members, the principal threatened her teachers to change her grades. The music teacher, Carl McVicker — newly hired and fearing for his job — complied. Overnight, her A became a B, and she was denied her recognition.
According to Gordon’s nephew, Nelson Harrison — a gifted musician in his own right — Gordon was “robbed of the valediction at fifteen years of age.”
Subsequent analysis by the Westinghouse Alumni Association found clear eraser marks on the transcript — an A replaced with a B.
Success
Fannetta Nelson Gordon would have a prestigious career — one filled with education, music, and family.
After being denied an education in music performance at Carnegie Tech because of her race, she graduated from the University of Pittsburgh with a degree in language. She taught German in the Pittsburgh Public School District for nearly two decades. In 1969, she was appointed as the State Language Supervisor at the Pennsylvania Department of Education in Harrisburg.
She remained a gifted concert pianist throughout her life. Touring with the National Negro Opera Company in her youth. Harrison fondly remembers her playing accompaniment with him as he developed his own musical prowess.
Recognition
According to Gordon’s nephew, Nelson Harrison, Gordon “was heartbroken ‘til the day she died” because of the valediction denial. McVicker would later reach out to the family, confirming and apologizing for his actions.
She “was heartbroken ’til the day she died.”
In 2011, 75 years after being denied, the Westinghouse Alumni Association posthumously recognized Gordon as the rightful valedictorian. The Pittsburgh School Board also voted to posthumously recognize Gordon as the Westinghouse High School class of 1936 valedictorian.
Though Gordon didn’t live to see the recognition, her sister, Sophia Phillips Nelson believes “her spirit [was] with us. And she appreciates this—I won’t say tardy—recognition.”
