[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 80 (Tuesday, June 10, 1997)]
[House]
[Pages H3643-H3644]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       TRIBUTE TO MRS. BERTHA MUSICK OF CLARK CENTRAL HIGH SCHOOL

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Kingston] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. KINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, in 1973 two significant education-related 
events occurred in my life. No. 1, Clark Central High School teacher 
Bertha Musick retired after 37 years of teaching. Mrs. Musick had 
taught social studies, science, and English in elementary school, 
junior high school, and high school, but during my time in high school 
she was known as the 11th grade teacher in that feared and hated 
subject of grammar.
  On the 12-year bumpy road to a high school diploma, Bertha Musick was 
the gatekeeper. If you could not pass 11th grade grammar, you could not 
get a diploma, and Mrs. Musick did not give away any freebies.
  I, along with most Athens, GA, kids, started hearing about Mrs. 
Musick's 11th grade class as early as in the 9th grade. Pray you do not 
get her, it is the hardest class at Clark Central, the upper classmen 
would warn us, yet nothing could be done to prevent it. Student 
placement and teacher selection was done in some dark, secret chamber 
far beyond the influence of watchful eyes of 16-year-old students. What 
would I do if I got Mrs. Musick?
  The luck of the draw was such that I did get Mrs. Musick, and I guess 
from her perspective, she got me. My deepest fears were realized: How 
was I, a mere average kid, going to live up to her high standards? My 
first task was to know all of her many ground rules. She was known as a 
strict no-nonsense instructor; no talking, no napping, no note-passing, 
and never forget your grammar book. I did all these things, and because 
I knew she was not going to change, I would have to.
  Mrs. Musick, let me say this now if you are listening: I only tonight 
feel comfortable in confessing that I did forget my grammar book once, 
and it was one of the most dramatic days of my junior year, but somehow 
you never noticed. But I can promise you this, it only happened one 
time. My game plan was to try to fit in as a quiet, even smart student. 
I decided that I could get by being unnoticed and not rocking the boat, 
stay under the radar screen.
  But I soon found I had a problem, because in the 1970's in Clark 
Central High School students in each grade were divided by ability. 
They were four groups. I know the board of education had more suitable 
terms, but for us kids the four groups were known as the smart group, 
the medium smart group, the medium group, and the dumb group.
  The smart group contained all the future doctors, lawyers, mechanical 
engineers, accountants, miscellaneous eggheads, National Merit 
Scholars, and professors' kids. You see, Athens, GA, is a college town. 
All the University of Georgia professors' kids were in the smart, 
advanced placement class.
  Actually, Mr. Speaker, I, too, am a professor's child, but through 
some genetic defect I inherited none of the accompanying brains. I was 
in the average group. But early in 1971, through some quirk of the 
board of education, I was put into the dumb group. I had never been in 
this group before, and it bothered me greatly. How did this happen? 
What strange alignment of the stars put me in this place?
  Not knowing what to do, I stumbled into the guidance counselor's 
office; another great lady, Mrs. Hackey. I asked for her advice. In 
short, she told me the decision to transfer would be made by Mrs. 
Musick. My heart sank.

                              {time}  2045

  She will think I am dumb. She will not have anything to do with me. 
Teachers like that think less of you, not more of you. A week passed, 
and I still lacked the nerve to talk to her. Finally I could not stand 
it.
  I caught Mrs. Musick after class one day. ``You see, Mrs. Musick, I 
have already read a lot of these books that we are supposed to be 
reading, and I just think I would be better off in the medium class.''
  She replied, ``There is no room in the medium class. Besides, you 
have a conflict with algebra. What about the advanced group?"
  Was she joking? The advanced, that was where all the real smart kids 
were like Richard Royce and Alice Cooper and David Bowman, certified 
geniuses from way back, kids who made 1500 on their SAT score and 
played with slide rules when the rest of us were fiddling around with 
Etch-a-Sketch. I stammered, ``Well, not that much of a leap.''
  ``Do you want to stay in the class you are in now?'' I dreaded the 
thought.
  She looked at me and said, ``I think you can do it.'' Now, was not 
this a surprise? Teachers like this do not give students like me a 
break. This was

[[Page H3644]]

strange indeed. A teacher I feared and fretted about giving me a 
promotion, based on speculation. No one had ever done this for me. I 
had had plenty of good teachers. I liked plenty of them, and they liked 
me. But no one had ever gone out on a limb on my behalf.
  Then something even more wonderful happened. If Mrs. Musick thought I 
could do it and she believed in me, maybe I could do it and maybe I 
could believe in myself also.
  Mr. Speaker, this inspiration given to me by a schoolteacher over 25 
years ago always has stuck with me. I transferred to the new class and 
got to work. I doubled my efforts, my enthusiasm for learning. I did 
not want to let the other kids know I did not really fit in, and I sure 
did not want to let Mrs. Musick down.
  During the Christmas holiday, I worked on my term paper for the 
winter quarter. I read ``For Whom the Bell Tolls'', ``Thanatopis'', 
``Tess of the D'ubervilles'', ``Red Badge of Courage'', ``The Last 
Leaf''. I ended up the year making A and B's, mostly B's, but B's never 
felt so good. But above all, I was in the advanced class in everything 
else, algebra, science and history.
  What else can I say about the woman who made this possible? She was 
strict but she was clear. She gave us the rules. We understood them and 
we followed them, and we if we did not, punishment was sure and swift. 
There was no pink slip, no parent-teacher conference or gray area. 
Fairness and certainty were her trademarks in discipline.
  On her subject matter, she was passionate. No sentence has been 
constructed that she could not diagram. Infinitives did not get split 
and participles did not get dangled on her watch. In fact, I am still a 
little afraid now, if she is watching, she will catch all my mistakes.
  On literature there was none so devoted. One day it snowed, and in 
Athens, Georgia a snow day to students was worshipped like manna from 
heaven. No school. While all of the students rushed to the hills for 
sledding, Mrs. Musick later confessed she could not wait to get back to 
a good book or two, and with good reason.
  She was intimately acquainted with Fitzgerald, Thoreau, Emerson, 
Huxley, Whitman, Oliver Wendell Holmes and company. She was their peer 
and they were her friends. Once Lewis Nix suggested Hemingway partied 
too much in Key West. Mrs. Musick neither confirmed nor denied this but 
took us all to a higher plane with her admonishment, ``Do not talk 
about one of America's greatest authors in such fashion. He went 
through a lot in the war.'' A classy way to handle such a statement. 
Her love of literature was contagious and many Clark Central students 
left with reading as a lifetime hobby.
  I will close with this. I still do not know what Thanatopis means, 
but I do know what the poem was about. I traveled with Hemingway to 
Mount Kilamanjaro, spent some time with Thoreau at Walden Pond, dined 
with Fitzgerald and Gatsby at West Egg and wept with Oliver Wendell 
Holmes on the Gettysburg battleground. As they have become immortal, so 
has Mrs. Musick.
  How many students like me left her class with a lifetime habit of 
reading and yearning for knowledge or even an appreciation of grammar? 
Our lives live on in the influence that we have on others, and Mrs. 
Musick's legacy is indelibly etched on thousands of Athens, Georgia 
kids. I am blessed to have had her and forever better for the 
experience. I am sorry for those who did not.
  I started out, Mr. Speaker, saying there were two significant things 
that happened in Athens, GA. One, Mrs. Musick retired. The other, Jack 
Kingston graduated. After 12 years of study, I walked down the aisle 
with my diploma, a product of lots of classroom hours and homework and 
wonderful teachers like Mrs. Bertha Musick.

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