Girl Graduate - Her Own Book
A glimpse into the life of Meridian teenager, Ardath Lillian Caldwell
Contents: About the Girl Graduate Scrapbook | The Class of 1922 | Tech
About the Girl Graduate Scrapbook
Ardath Caldwell’s scrapbook contains a rare insight into the life of a Meridian High School teen in the early 1920’s. Raised in a middle-to-upper class family in 1922, her life wasn’t that different from today’s typical teenager - with the exception of modern technology! She enjoyed parties, socializing with friends, school dances and other activities. The scrapbook documents various milestones in her life and gives us a glimpse into her time at Meridian High School.
The Class of 1922
The Meridian History Center has many of the original Meridian High School yearbooks dating from 1921. According to the 1922 Mana Ha Sa yearbook, the class of 1922 started with 53 freshman and graduated 36 students. This was an accomplishment at a time when children frequently dropped out of school to assist with farm work or family care.
The yearbook’s dedication is as follows:
To our parents and to all
Who have made possible
The Meridian High School
We dedicate the second volume of the
Mana Ha Sa
Ardath Caldwell participated in several class plays, as depicted in the scrapbook. The yearbook’s “Class Prophecy” predicted she would become a famous actress. The “Class Will” for Ardath reads: Ardath Caldwell, the future city “dadess” leaves her council capacity to “Chuck” Morford.
The below “Liars License” is folded into the scrapbook and appears to have been awarded to Ardath years after her high school days. It’s a tongue-in-cheek award that reads “KNOW YE ALL that Ardath Caldwell having satisfied the local Council A.R. and I. O. of P. that he is a duly qualified First Class Liar, is hereby entitled to lie at any and all times until the 31st day of December, 1930”. Witnessed by “Old Nick” and signed by “O.B. Dam” the license is numbered 10002.
What became of Ardath Caldwell is unknown. We would love to know if she was able to fulfill the class prophecy! Anyone who has information is welcome to contact us so we can update our records.
This project was made possible by a SHARP Operations Grant, funded by the Idaho Humanities Council and National Endowment for the Humanities.
Technical Credits - CollectionBuilder
This digital collection is built with CollectionBuilder, an open source framework for creating digital collection and exhibit websites that is developed by faculty librarians at the University of Idaho Library following the Lib-Static methodology.
Using the CollectionBuilder-CSV template and the static website generator Jekyll, this project creates an engaging interface to explore driven by metadata.