At Kensington High School in Buffalo, academic year 1945-46, our CAMZ was a Junior and took the Art and Design class taught by Miss Davis. The class practiced yearbook production tasks, such as layout and script-writing.
Clara's art folio for the year included this exercise in ruling subunits of a page. The vertically-oriented rectangle is scored with a diagonal line. At given distances along that line, horizontal and vertical lines give the dimensions of the subunit. This is, I suppose, why a "half page" ad might not be a top or bottom half, or a left or right half. It might be the subunit determined by going halfway down that diagonal.
We still use the diagonal dimension, to size our computers.
I never did yearbook in school, so the whole production process was and remains mysterious to me. One improvement over the good old days is the deliberate openness of the clubs at a school or a college, with more Open House events and Campus Club Fairs and the like.
One disimprovement, at least at my school, was complete lack of instruction in the technical skills of drawing, painting, or sculpture. We were just urged to be creative and expressive. Well, you goofs, it is hard to express creativity without technical skills.
Here is the CAMZ concept for the yearbook cover:
And here are two CAMZ concepts for what I am calling the Senior Propaganda Page, or the Senior Exhortation Page:
Well! They didn't use her stuff! They picked Bill Schmidt's cover design. It signifies three different meanings of "compass," which is darn clever.
As well, the compass directional points encompassing the globe are reminiscent of Lady Liberty's crown. Also darn clever.
"Footprints in the sands of time" is the well-worn theme of the back cover design.
I'll glue the binding back together. Don't worry; I won't use tape.
There are four entire pages of this endpaper in the volume. Let's check it out.
Men are physicians, sailors, microscopists, chemists, artists or maybe salesmen, builders and architects, and saxophonists. Women are secretaries and waitresses.
That's the thing: they urge "Study, study, study, girl! and then they express incredulity when girl resolves to use all that studying for something outside of the box. In my own case, a generation later, it did not stop me, but it did make me resentful enough to have disdain for motherhood as a career choice. Now girls are overtly taught to have disdain for motherhood as a career choice. It's the opposite extreme, and it's just as harmful as the original extreme.
Fascinating how Carol Wilfert, below, sees the world. Kensington High in fact sits at the North Pole, emitting clouds of bubbles and a bunch of radiation. Is it Santa's workshop? Is she Elvish? Are we all Elvish?
Or has she just gone many times to see The Wizard of Oz?
Switching settings here to Mad Ludwig's Alpine castle, we see the chosen Senior Exhortation Page. Sorry, the kid looks creepy to me. I can't see his eyes. Is he going to smash those books and that toy factory together? Sorry to be paranoid, but robed figures who float up out of bubble clouds make me nervous.
One of the contests that year had for theme meat consumption - an upbeat postwar theme.
Clara is indeed in the group photo of the Yearbook Art Staff, in the back row. Scan from the left and go three faces. Once you recall the face you are looking for, it's easy to see that face even when it is tiny in a picture:
