I was born in early 1938, and started first grade during World War Two.  At that time the town of Falls Church had only three schools:  Madison (a grade school), Falls Church High School, and a third I’ll get to soon.  The high school was located on South Cherry St. at Hillwood Avenue.  Madison was on the east side of N. Washington St., near where Sunrise Assisted Living is now.

At that time Falls Church did not offer any pre-school classes.  No kindergarten.  Nor did any other district in the vicinity.  So my mother started a private kindergarten, Mrs. White’s School, in 1935.  Initially it offered classes from 9 a.m. to 12 noon, but it was so successful (with waiting lists) that an afternoon, 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. class was added.  My mother ran this school, in one side of our house, until she retired and closed the school in 1970.  Many in Falls Church attended my mother’s kindergarten, as I did myself, of course.

I lived then, as now, on Tuckahoe St., just east of Broadmont, and until I got a bike I walked everywhere in Falls Church.  My walk to Madison School was about a mile, most of it on East Columbia St.  Although Madison faced N. Washington St., I never entered through its front doors.  I always came in the back way, crossing the playground to one of the back doors.

In August of the year I was to start first grade I and my peers attended a session one afternoon at Madison where we were shown our classrooms and teachers – an orientation session.  It lasted maybe half an hour and after it was over I was standing in the playground with several of my friends when a “big” boy – a third-grader – came up to us and, without any warning, punched me in the stomach.  I had never been hit like that before (or since).  I doubled over, grasping at my stomach, and wondered if I’d ever again draw another breath.  The bully walked away, smirking.  (He remained a bully throughout his years in the Falls Church school system, and, during one summer vacation in high school he killed a man in a bar fight in Florida.  Many years later my daughter went to school with his daughter, who was not a bully.)  That was my introduction to public school.

During my time at Madison the Oak Street School was built (and has since had several name changes) but I never attended it.  But there was another school in Falls Church, now forgotten, the Jefferson Institute, located on North Cherry St, but with a long walkway (through woods) from East Broad to its front doors, almost a block further north.  I attended it for eighth grade, in 1951-52.  It was to be that building’s last year of use. It was around 100 years old, and showed it.  Bricks were loosening and the building was dilapidated.

Some of us created a mythical organization, the Anti-Teachers League, or ATL.  Its symbol was a round bomb (of the cartoonish sort) with a sparking fuse, the letters ATL on the bomb.  This symbol popped up at odd moments on blackboards, to teachers’ annoyance, but nothing was ever done beyond this – until our final day of school.  This was a day to show up, get one’s final report card, and say goodbye to friends and teachers for the summer.  No classes, no programs.

Around 6 in the morning several of us showed up at Jefferson with a long rope, a ladder, and a croquet ball painted black, with white ATL letters on its sides.  The wooden ball had been drilled out, and a small firecracker placed in the hole.  Fixed to the firecracker was a fuse we’d made which (we’d timed it) would last for five or six hours – until around noon.  We strung the rope between two trees, at least 20 feet above the ground.  The “bomb” was hung from the middle of the rope, midway between the two trees.  It was obvious and very visible – and well out of reach.

When I went back to the school around 9 that morning, I saw several teachers standing on the ground, staring at it.  “Those fools,” one teacher said.  “They don’t realize the danger they’ve put us all in,” said another, a teacher known for his pomposity.  I collected my report card, but hung around to see what happened next.  The fuse was steadily smoking and growing shorter.  One teacher warned us all that we could be blown up.  

Then the big moment arrived.  The fuse burned all the way down.  There was a shower of sparks and the (dud) firecracker went “futt!”  A total anticlimax.  And a fitting climax for the ATL.

That summer the Jefferson Institute was torn down and that fall I attended the first year of George Mason Jr.-Sr,. High School.