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Chapter 4: Grade School


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        my Dad and older siblings had gone. My teacher was Miss Fox. She ar-
        ranged us in little circles of chairs with about eight kids per circle. The
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        – later a wonderful member of the Presidency of the First Quorum of the
        Seventy in The Church. Marion was a friend – never a close buddy, but
        a friend – always.
               I liked school but I also dearly loved the summer vacations. In
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        tory. Early on in my life, reading became a great pleasure. My Mother
        contributed greatly to this. As she prepared the evening meal for our
        family, she would have her younger children, one at a time, sit on a stool
        near the kitchen sink and read aloud to her. She would listen carefully
        – she corrected and taught us the proper pronunciation, word meaning,
        and to read aloud with good oral expression. It was excellent training.
        Mother’s education and experiences as a schoolteacher were constantly
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        descendants would have their younger children read aloud to them for a
        half-hour each evening.
               During the summer school vacation, I read books in our home
        library and I took out books from the Salt Lake City Library, which at
        that time was located on the east side of State St., just south of South
        Temple Street. My brother Sam also took home books on loan from the
        Library and I found it convenient to read any book he read (though he
        was four years ahead of me in school grades). In the summer between
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        library – Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables. I read all four volumes, though
        some of the implications were beyond me as an eleven-year-old. When
        we returned to school in the fall, my sixth-grade teacher asked each
        student what books he or she had read during the summer. When I told
        her Les Miserables, she doubted me, so she asked me several questions
        about the content of the plot. When I was able to answer her questions,

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