Dorchester Times: Looking Back: Freshman Initiation At DHS

Tuesday, February 27, 2024

Looking Back: Freshman Initiation At DHS

Dorchester High School freshman class, 1946-47 school year.

To any high school freshman who may be reading this, you might think you have it rough right now. After all, you've endured months of new routines, new classes, a faster pace of life, and those mean upperclassmen.

A freshman's life can be tough.

But here's a reminder that you don't have it so bad, at least compared to the Dorchester High School freshmen who came decades before.

We searched through the old yearbooks in our history vault and found this excerpt written by the DHS Class of 1947.

Read it with a smile on your face.

DHS Freshman Initiation

When we, the seniors of 1947, were mere freshmen, we were subjected to the trickery and pranks of the seniors of 1943 in the form of Freshman Initiation.

After preparing us for weeks in advance by telling us weird tales of the fate that awaited us on our initiation, the seniors finally announced the day. We were instructed to wear all our clothes backwards, our hair uncombed or unbraided. The girls could wear no makeup and the boys were forced to wear makeup, with ribbons in their hair and donning aprons.

At school, we were expected to salute the seniors and carry their books from class to class. The seniors lined us up in front of the student body and painted green "F's" on our foreheads.

In the evening, the seniors made us do humorous tasks. Some of us had to measure the stage with wieners, while others were forced to drink milk from baby bottles or throw tomatoes at one another.

At the end of the night, ice cream was served to everyone.

The Class of 1947 got the chance to show their senior power on September 27, 1946. When we initiated the freshmen class, they were ordered to come to school dressed in the fashion of Mother Goose characters. Every hour, they were to bow down and say a prayer suitable to the occasion.

At noon, the seniors marched the freshmen through main street. In the evening, a final ceremony was held with various stunts played on the freshmen. A watermelon feed followed the activities.

7 comments:

AnonymousAugust 21, 2014 at 11:23 PM
I am not sure, but I think the class of 74 was the last to go through this. All in all, it was a good time..............the best part was the trip out into the country where they dropped us off to walk back to Dorchester. I knew most of the county roads and convinced the guys that took us out, that we were a couple miles away from Wilber. They dropped us off about two miles south of town. Little did they know we turned the tables on them.
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AnonymousAugust 22, 2014 at 1:07 PM
OH the fun that was had back in the day. Unfortunately by the standards set forth today, this would be a form of bullying. Even though it was all in fun, I'm sure someone would take it too far.
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AnonymousAugust 23, 2014 at 7:50 PM
Lawyers + life's losers = end of a lot of fun traditions
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cynical richardNovember 16, 2016 at 12:31 PM
........................now you just cry ........................... everyone gets a+ ...................... everyone wins ........................... yay .............................
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AnonymousNovember 16, 2016 at 10:15 PM
The last freshmen class to be initiated was the Class of 1975. They were also the last class to have a senior sneak trip. This is from a member of the Class of 1976.
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Dorchester: A Good Little Family Town

Dorchester, Nebraska (est. population 630) is located in northern Saline county. Close in proximity to Interstate 80, Dorchester is only 25 minutes from the state capital of Lincoln (est. population 250,000) and about 55 minutes from Omaha (metro population 725,000).

Dorchester's median resident age is 37 years. In 2005, Dorchester had a median family income of approximately $35,600. The median house value was about $63,000. About 95 percent of Dorchester residents commute to work via Interstate and highways.

The village has a quality public school, which received a $4.1 million expansion and modernization in 2008; it offers a small classrooms and individualized attention. Total enrollment of grades K-12 is around 230-250 students.

Ancestries of the Dorchester area are primarily German (42.4%), Czech (24.9%), Irish (12.5%), English (5.4%), and Dutch (4.9%).

Dorchester Historical Facts

* On July 4, 1871, the railroad reached Dorchester.
* Incorporated in 1881, Dorchester's population grew from 200 to 500 by 1882.
* In 1882, Dorchester had 90 buildings, 35 of which were businesses or public facilities. Brick buildings lined both sides of Washington Avenue for two blocks.
* Dorchester's longest-running newspaper was The Dorchester Star, which was published until the late 1940s.
* By 1889, Dorchester's population is said to have reached 800, while the town housed an opera house, a two-story brick schoolhouse with a bell tower, and four churches.
* By the 1910s, Dorchester had electricity, a water tower and a fire department.
* Dorchester's main arteries, Highways 6 and 33, were graveled in the 1940s.
* Dorchester's first irrigation well was drilled on Chris Weber's farm and rural electrification was finished following WWII.

A Village with History

Dorchester is one of the "alphabet towns" on the Burlington & Missouri River Railroad line built west from Lincoln. The town site was selected for its pleasant location in the northern part of Saline County, about eight miles west of Crete. This situation is an attractive one, being on the level prairie land, midway between the West Blue River and Turkey Creek. The first named stream is three miles north, and the latter about the same distance south from the town. Dorchester was platted in 1870 and incorporated in 1881. The name "Dorchester" came from either for a suburb of Boston by that name or a town in England. No one is sure. Two of the very first settlers were James Seely and Edward McIntyre, who both made Dorchester their permanent home.

Dorchester: In The Beginning

Here is a look at Dorchester around 1890, less than a decade after its official incorporation, as documented by Andreas' History of the State of Nebraska:
* POPULATION: "About 300, and is made up of a substantial and progressive class of citizens, who are moral and industrious. ... The town grew but very little until the year 1879, for the reason that Pleasant Hill, on Turkey Creek, a short distance south, was the county seat and naturally drew a trade for quite a large scope of country."
* BUSINESS: "The business and professional interests of the town are represented by three general merchandise stores, two drug, one grocery, one furniture, two hardware, and two millinery stores, one bank, two restaurants, two hotels, three livery stables, a post office, one newspaper office, two elevators, two lumber yards, two coal yards, two blacksmith shops, two lawyers and four physicians."
* SCHOOL: "The schoolhouse is a good one. The schoolhouse was built in 1872, since which time the public schools have been continually kept up. The present schoolhouse is 24' x 40' in size, two stories high. The school is graded and consists of three departments. The house is found too small, and arrangements will soon be made to increase its size."
* CHURCHES: "There are three substantial churches."
* HOMES: "The residence portion of the village is made up of neat houses of different styles of architecture, but none of them very large."
* NEWSPAPER: "The Dorchester Star, which was established August 21, 1881, by H. C. Bittenbender, who edited it until January 19, 1882, when he sold it to Ryerson & Bullock, the present proprietors. The Star is a bright weekly paper, five-column quarto, in size, and is Republican in politics."