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A COUNTRY KID GOES TO THE CITY SCHOOL MILDRED HOLST REMEMBERS HER YEARS AT CALAIS ACADEMY.
In September 1942 Mildred started at the Academy and boarded with Wilson and Loretta Frost. Stephen Wilson Frost (1881 – 1958) was a son of Augustus and Josephine (Quimby) Frost. This Frost family was from Alexander. Wilsie married Lottie Flood, divorced, then married Loretta Coleman. Wilsie and Lottie had Norman, Frank, and Roger. The two children that Mildred cared for were Lorraine and Shirley from the second marriage. Wilsie operated the Corner Lunch at the corner of Maine and Church streets. The Frosts had two children. They lived in two large rooms above the restaurant. As with most kids from the country, Mildred had to work her board. For the Frost family, that included hanging out the wet wash (that had been sent out for washing, but returned wet) then ironing all the clothes. That was before drip dry and permanent press. Mildred had to look after the children and cook supper if they didn’t eat in the restaurant. She also had to help clean the house. The Frosts and Mildred moved to 8 High Street, then to 120 North Street and then at the beginning of her junior year to Union Street. At this time Mildred’s mother felt Mildred was working too hard for her board and Mildred moved in with Floyd and Vira Frost on South Street across from Cleveland Street. Floyd Frost (1897 – 1955) was a son of Thomas Edward and Dora (McGraw) Frost of Alexander. He married Vira Beany; they had 4 children; Fletcher Richard, Alice, Norris, and Wilfred. Here Mildred looked after their granddaughter Diane, daughter of Alice, a much easier task than things had been in the other home. During her senior year, her mother Eva (Seavey) Flood moved to Swan Street in Calais where they rented rooms from Harold ‘Shorty” and Marion Hartford. Marion was another daughter of Ernest and Gertrude Seavey. Mildred’s mother died that fall and her father sold the cows and the family moved to an apartment on Church Street. Mildred graduated from Calais Academy in June 1946. The Academy burned on February 2, 1945 so she had classes in improvised classrooms for her last year and a half. The one thing that Mildred wants understood that going off to high school was the total disruption of her life. Mildred, like others then, moved out of her home and away from her family to live with a different family with different expectations, rules, and food. She, like others, moved from a small comfortable hometown environment and the security of a familiar school and teachers to attend a strange school full of strange faces in a city full of strangers. It was not easy for a country kid to go to a city school. The following generation had only to overcome part of the problem. Most of these scholars lived at home and traveled to Calais or Woodland by private car, often operated as a business by the driver. Mildred’s son Roger drove to Calais for high school. For the school year 1969–70 the Town of Alexander started paying for transportation to Calais for high school students. Even then country kids had to over come the strange school and teachers and also their lack of background in many extra curricular activities. Today the town has a bus haul pupils to Calais and another bus haul them to Woodland. Now teachers and community members volunteer to lead after school activities such as sports, chorus, band, and art. With this background, country kids are better prepared as they go off to that strange school with the strange teachers.
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