Members of the Fremont Ross High School graduating class of 1956 commemorated the former site of the school on Tuesday with a monument to the building that stood on the Birchard Public Library land, at the corner of Croghan and South Arch streets.
The idea for the polished black stone monument, with a sandblasted photo of the now-demolished school, came during a monthly lunch that graduates have on the second Tuesday of each month.
Classmates Dick Stevens, Arlene Martin and Tom Wadsworth were the founders of the committee that put the event together. Wadsworth couldn’t make it to the unveiling, because of a COVID-19 diagnosis, but sent his regards to his friends.
Dick Stevens said that they were all real people, who led lives that might be familiar to people today.
He laughed while explaining why he jumped out of one of the first-floor school windows in 11 th grade.
“I think because it was there, and you could,” Stevens said. “Listen, you talk to some of these guys and they tell you some of the horror stories of stuff they did. We just did a lot of stuff, and got away with it.”
With a big smile, his face lost the 85-year-old lines, regaining a mischievous look, and talked about having fun.
“We did. We did. I never learned anything. I never learned anything until I got out of there. I had to learn through the school of hard knocks,” Stevens said. “I was in trouble all the time. I was always fighting.”
Directly after high school, he joined the Marine Corps, where he learned discipline. He then briefly went to Capital University, and dropped out, to find work. He then got into real estate. He later owned a couple of craft breweries, including the Elevator Brewery and Draught Haus, with his son.
Arlene Martin, 86, had a career working for the Ohio Bureau of Employment, which later became the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services.
“I guess our generation was always trying to move forward and trying to do something different with their lives. We were not a class to be lackadaisical. We were a class that wanted to move forward, and always on the move to do something better,” Martin said. “I was an adjudicator, making decisions on unemployment claims, based on the facts and the law.”
Mike Gilbert, of the Sandusky County Historical Society and a former Fremont Ross teacher, gave a short history of schools that had been on the property.
The building that was the Fremont Ross High School was demolished in 2013 and moved across town, coinciding with the expansion of the Birchard Public Library. It was the high school from 1909 to 1958, then became the Fremont Junior High. He said that various school buildings had been on the site pretty consistently from when the first school was built on that property in 1816.
He noted that 40 skeletons were found during the construction of the building expansion, which took place in the 1930s, with Native American artifacts and British military uniform buttons.
"I think this is relevant today because since 1816 to 2012 there has been education taking place on this area. This is a beautiful monument to that, and I was privileged to teach when it was a junior high," Gilbert said.
Martin talked about the members of the Class of 1956.
“We worked and worked and worked, toward getting this, and kept collecting money. Then I even sent out letters to family members of classmates who were deceased, thinking that they might want to be part of this,” Martin said.
With about 40 showing up for the unveiling, including friends, family and interested community members, a large group of the class of 1956 showed up.
Of the 178 in the class of 1956, Martin has a list of 67 remaining on the class roster, with contact information for 50. 13 class members posed for the photo, with several shying away.
“Even if they are not here, maybe in a nursing home, all that matters is they are a part of our class and we want them to see what our class has been able to accomplish. It’s a class project,” Martin said.
Fremont Schools Superintendent Denice Hirt spoke.
“I want the students today to recognize that they come from somewhere else, that they come from the people that came before them. This is an amazing opportunity to look at history, and what being a Little Giant is all about,” Hirt said. “I just think is a great idea for them to look at what is in the past and propel them into the future.”
Fremont Mayor Danny Sanchez also spoke, noting that he is also a Fremont Ross little giant. He was also a member of the school board that approved the building site sale for the library, which cost $1.
"At that time we knew there was a vision and what could come out of it. With strategic planning, under the previous administration here, we have a beautiful addition on here [to the library] for the city of Fremont," Sanchez said.
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This article originally appeared on Fremont News-Messenger: Fremont Ross Class of 1956 commemorates school site
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