A lively group of former Fayette County High School graduates met for a combined reunion and birthday lunch for classmate Weyman Newton Monday at the Broadway Diner in Fayetteville.

What makes the group special is that they graduated in 1936.

Now a mere 73 years later, several of the graduating class shared their observations and memories on a variety of topics as they placed their orders for lunch.

“There were no street lights and no paved roads,” Omie Lee Bailey said of Fayetteville and Fayette County. “We were safe. We didn‘t fear anything.”

Mildred Swygert agreed, explaining that in previous years the historically rural Fayette County was a place where neighbor knew neighbor.

“We did feel safe,” Swygert said. “And during elections we walked through the streets and we knew everybody.”

As for the Class of 1936, Fayette County High School that year had 47 graduates. FCHS in those years was the only high school in the county and consisted of grades 7-11. And the county itself, according to U.S. Census, had a population of 8,865 residents.

Weyman Newton sat at the table at Broadway with his wife and underclassman Frances. For Weyman, the occasion of the reunion was also a celebration of this 90th birthday that came with a cake and all the trimmings.

Frances was quick to note that, aside from his other responsibilities as a student, Weyman was also assigned to tutor her for a math test after she had been absent from school due to an illness.

“And I made an 87 on the test,” Frances said with a smile, adding that some of the other courses common in the 1930s included biology, history, English, home economics and French.

Nearly everyone today has heard the anecdotal comments about a relative having to walk miles back and forth to school. For Weyman Newton, that was simple fact.

“After basketball practice, I walked six miles to go home,” he said of his home in north Fayette.

Beyond the academic requirements, there were duties at the homestead that could not be left undone, especially in a locale where, even into the 1970s, the family farm was as much a staple as the crops that grew in the fields that covered Fayette County.

“It was largely farming,” Weyman said. “And kids helped with chores before and after school.”

Back at school, the forwarding-thinking Elizabeth Brown turned out to be a prophet in her own time. As a student who loved to dance, Elizabeth was told that activity was one to be avoided in a school setting.

“We liked to dance, but the principal said that dancing was not allowed,” Elizabeth explained. “I told him the day would come where dancing would be taught in school.”

Looking back over the past 73 years, those present at the reunion agreed that the changes in Fayette County have been far-reaching, to say the least.

Several of the ladies commented on the number of bootleggers that populated Fayette during the days of Prohibition.

Others at the table at the Broadway Diner turned their comments to even different aspects of life in the 1930s. Unlike today, an event such as a heavy rain could mean trouble for drivers making their way along Fayette’s dirt-only roads. The job of filling in the deep ruts that would form in the roads fell to convicts that would be put to work in their black and white prison garb, the ladies said.

Still another facet of Monday’s conversation centered on the mainstay of what was the very rural Fayette County. With the proliferation of farms throughout the county, it was a time when people raised their own livestock and grew their own food.

“We were eating organic and we didn‘t even know it,” Elizabeth Brown observed, adding that some of the changes that have occurred in the past 73 years are a much appreciated improvement.

“I’m glad we don’t have to heat water on the stove anymore to take a bath,” she said with a chuckle.

The birthday and reunion group from Fayette County High School included Janie Fleming, Mildred Swygert, Sarah Rivers, Weyman and Frances Newton, Omie Lee Bailey and Elizabeth Brown. Also on hand for a portion of the occasion was current Fayette County School Superintendent John DeCotis.

The lively group from Fayette County High School’s Class of 1936 placed their lunch orders and got back to catching up on news and celebrating Weyman Newton’s 90th birthday.

Like their counterparts across America, the group from Fayette County and others here locally represent the living history of their community that many would benefit from knowing.

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