Vintage Stella Barnett

(Click on photo for larger image)

I haven't written an entry in a dog's age.  Not only have I been busy, but the premise of this blog is My OCHS or the high school from my era.  I have pretty much run out of content from the mounds of negatives of the photos that I took when I occupied those halls on Stevenson Road North in Oshawa.  I still get over 1,500 hits a month, but it has really slowed down since I started, and the 50th Anniversary of the school has come and gone.

As of late, I have written a software bot to troll through online records, and it was harvesting some newspaper archives from 1962.  More specifically, it was the Canadian Statesman newspaper out of Bowmanville.  My grandparents lived north of Bowmanville and the local correspondent wrote up the weekly goings-on of the village.  It was like the Facebook of olden days.

So the bot harvested a copy of the paper from Wednesday July 11th, 1962.  The bot puts them in a directory after finding a key word, and then I manually look through the paper.

Imagine my surprise, when I saw a picture of my typing teacher, Stella Barnett.  She was younger than when I encountered her.  I guess that previous to her stint at teaching OCHS, she taught at Oshawa Business College located at 10 Simcoe Street North in Oshawa. With that address it was just a stone's throw from the Four Corners (King and Simcoe).

The ad was for Oshawa Business College, and this is a transcript of it:

MRS. STELLA BARNETT --

Joined the staff of the Oshawa Business College in September 1954 as Registrar and College Secretary.  She is the head of the Typewriting Department and gives expert instruction in typing and duplicating machines and is Manager of the College Public Stenographic Department.

She is Registrar of the College and is responsible for student registrations, accounts and supplies.  She is Placement Officer of the College and maintains a constant contact with future employers of the College graduates.

She too, brings to the classrooms some years of experience in telephone technique, banking, bookkeeping and procedural experience.

Further bios in the ad showed one for Mr. M.C. Barnett. It must have been her husband.  He was the owner of the Oshawa Business College and had a branch office in Lindsay, Ontario.

Running across this satisfied a curiosity on the background of teachers that were seminal in my life.  I am grateful today for the ability to type. I type accurately and quickly and it has been a boon in my tech career.

Addendum:
Further digging around newspaper archives shows that ("Stella") May Estelle Barnett (née Pursel) died in Oshawa on January 17th, 1975.  Her husband, Malcolm C. Barnett died on January 16, 1983 in Oshawa.

Just got a note from Len S. staying that he knew that Stella Barnett was still alive in 1981.  I guess that my research source (below) is wrong.

Sister Theresa Rodgers in the Library

Sister Theresa Rodgers is sitting in the library. Behind her is teacher Bill Higgins. Sister Theresa took over from Stella Barnett to teach typing and she taught me accounting. I wish more of the accounting stuff stuck with me. I could use it now when I am looking at balance sheets.

Stella Barnett's Typing Class

I was in Grade 9. I had a camera in my hand. Stella Barnett's typing class was in the first class room in the northwest wing of the school, past the office, down the few stairs, turn left and it was on the left. Ivor Boyagoda's classroom was across the hall. I hurriedly snapped this picture.

Miss Gardini and Stella Barnett

I don't remember how Miss Gardini fit into the picture of the staff of OCHS. I don't even remember her first name. I invite comments to explain. Stella Barnett, the typing and business teacher is in the background.

Update 11/04/2017 - I just heard from Gloria Wrobel who was in Miss Gardini's French class in Grade 9 in 1974. So the mystery is solved for me. She was a languages teacher.

Sister Theresa Rodgers Typing Class

The line down the middle of the picture is because the photo was printed across two pages. Sister Theresa Rodgers took over teaching typing from Stella Barnett.

Stella Barnett Getting Shot

Stella Barnett taught typing. I took the course because it was considered a bird course where one could get high marks. I am grateful for learning to type, especially considering the career path that I followed.

My typing marks were not that good. I took the exam at the electric typewriter. There were only one or two in the class. As I put my fingers on the home keys, the typewriter went off like a machine gun. Immediately my paper had "asdfjkl;" typed on it. Ten words per minute shot right there.

If you talked or misbehaved in typing, Mrs. Barnett would go and make cryptic marks on the board in shorthand, either Pittman or Gregg. It was worse than say Lorna Harris' history class where you had to write your own name on the board. You just didn't know what she was writing about, and it was a little scarey.

Stella Barnett was a gentle soul.