College High Jinks

 

This poem was tucked away in an envelope.  I'm not sure if it is one poem or two, and what the Bunker Hill Monument has to do with Syracuse is beyond me.  There was no title, so I gave it one.  The photos give you a sense of the carefree college days of Moon and Herbert.  Rue de Crouse refers to the avenue and the venerable Richardson Romanesque structure, Crouse College, built in 1888, that was home to the College of Fine Arts when Moon was a student.  Such carefree days changed forever when Herbert was called up for the Army and sent to France, and Moon was unable to claim her scholarship to study abroad in 1919.

 

Dreaming of Herbert Campbell

Mary Wands Campbell ca 1917

Syracuse University

 

Last night I lay a dreaming

There came a dream so fair,

I dreamed I saw the Rue de Crouse

And Campbell standing there.

Herbert Campbell

As he stood among the sunshine,

A-tying on his hood,

The monument of bunker hill

Fell on him as he stood.

 

The sidewalk was an awful mess.

The household flocked to see

The pulverized anatomy

That Campbell used to be.

 

Herbert boarded at the McViccar household, that is him, the tall one at the back.

 

We gathered Campbell up with care

And with a garden rake –

We did it not for love of him –

But for his mother’s sake.

 

And all the world seemed bright + gay

Our hearts were full of glee,

We packed him in a sardine can

To ship him C.O.D.

 

Herbert's friend Paul Vickland

 

Then up spoke the mighty Vickland

As he stood on his bended knee –

“Oh, who will lend me thirty cents,

To buy a wreath for he?”

 

And answered all the hearers-by,

“Your credit’s on the blink!

We wouldn’t trust you half an inch

With such a bunch of chink!”

 

And Vickland’s woe as he turned to go

Was pitiful to hear.

The sighs came rolling down his cheek

He heaved a mighty tear.

 

So, over the hills to the poorhouse

He departed far away.

All weary and broken hearted

And was seen no more for aye.

That's Herbert, second from the left.  Note the racy pinups on the wall -not!

Of all the boys that are so smart

There’s none so sweet as Don,

His hair all brushed, his teeth all combed

His new B.V.D.s on.

 

We’ll slam him on the sniff-sniff

And knock him galley-west

We’ll pull his lovely curly hair

And jump upon his chest.

 

Moon, second from left, and Herbert at the center.

Oh, we’ll spoil him!

We’ll wreck him!

And when the fray is o’er

I will take a broom + scrubbing brush

To clean him off the floor.

 

But went he in the cold blast,

On yonder lea, on yonder lea –

The angry air, for all we care,

Might go upon a spree.

Moon made these characters she called "Emerson"

Our Emerson he’s locked in a suitcase,

Our Emerson he’s locked in a trunk,

They have taken him to keep him

And mourn his life away.

As he spoils mid the rubbish + the junk

 

We dream of Emerson by night

We think of him by day,

And nothing but the Constable

Can drive our care away.

Us.

"Our Little Wandsy" - Moon strikes a pose.