Evelyn Gary Boudreaux – 1937, 1949, 1955

Evelyn Gary Boudreaux

University of Southwestern Louisiana

Graduate 1937, 1949, and 1955

            I graduated from Erath High School in May of 1934 and first attended SLI, as it was known then, in June of 1934.  I am happy to have this opportunity to share with you some of my fond (and not so fond) memories of what it was like to attend the university in those days.

During the summer of 1934, I commuted to SLI on a bus driven by a man named Baker from a small community between Gueydan and Kaplan.  He would come down Highway 14 through Kaplan, Abbeville, and Erath then up Highway 339 through Youngsville on his way to Lafayette.  I lived in a little community called Charoigne about half a mile off of Highway 339.  He would pick up passengers along the way who were attending SLI and some boys from Youngsville who attended Cathedral High School.

          One of my most vivid memories of that summer was a hurricane.  While we were attending classes, word came that there was a hurricane approaching, and the bus drivers had been told to stay at the university.  The commuters wanted to get home, so we convinced Baker to get on the road anyway (a gravel road, mind you).  It was raining really hard when we left and got progressively worse as we continued down 339 back toward Erath.  About half way there, Baker could barely see ahead because of the rain, the ditches were filling with water, and the wind was blowing so hard, he was having difficulty keeping the bus on the road.  So, he decided we would stop at the nearest farmhouse and ride out the weather.  The wind was so strong, Baker couldn’t get the bus door to open, so we had to climb out of the bus through the driver’s window.  All of us crammed into that little old farmhouse, soaking wet but still feeling very brave and adventurous until lightning struck the chimney and scared us to death!  When the weather began to subside, the parents of a friend of mine came and picked up a few of us and took us home.

           By the fall semester, Baker’s route changed and the bus didn’t run down 339, so I had to live in Lafayette.  At that time, SLI had to approve off-campus housing.  I roomed at Mrs. Rome’s house on Jackson Street from September, 1934 to May of 1936.  There were two of us in a very small room with a potbelly stove for a heater.  Room and board was $18 a month (each paid $9).  In those days, that was a lot of money because it was during the depression.  We had to take in the coal and kindling to light the fire in the mornings.  We weren’t allowed to use much because Mrs. Rome didn’t want our fire burning long after we left for class.

After breakfast in the morning, we walked to SLI to attend classes. Between classes, we used to gather on the bottom floor at Martin Hall.  It was called the Social Room.  There were tables and chairs, lockers you could rent to store your books, and a housemother to assist you.  There were also cots to lie on in case you were sick.  We used to do our homework as we waited between classes or we gathered around the piano in the Social Room where Margaret Chauvin and Thelma Williams used to play music for us to sing along with and dance to.  We also played cards while we waited.  Bridge and 500 were the favorites.  In the afternoons, after all our classes were over, we walked back to Mrs. Rome’s.

From September of 1936 to May of 1937, I lived at Dean Griffin’s house.  The Griffins had an apartment to rent – two bedrooms and one bath.  There were four girls – two in the front room at $20 a month (each paid $10) and two in the back bedroom at $15 a month (each paid $7.50).  With four girls using one bathroom, we had to get up early.  We drank coffee and ate breakfast once we got to SLI in the mornings.  We could only have certain foods in our rooms and had to keep the rooms clean at all times.  We came home every weekend so we could get some good hot meals and not have to clean.

I did my student teaching at Hamilton Training School on Jefferson Street in first grade under Mrs. Veazey.  She was from New Iberia and was a wonderful critic teacher.  The best thing about practice teaching in those days was that we very well supervised.  Believe me, if our lesson plans were not perfect, we did them over and over again until they were.  The worst thing was that they closed the training school with great supervisors.  It became the post office.

When I started at SLI in 1934, the Elementary Teacher’s Course was a two-year course.  In about 1936, it became a three-year course.  Those of us who had started with the two-year course could graduate, but we had to take all the extra physical education courses.  I graduated in 1937 and began teaching at Erath Elementary in September of 1937 at $65.00 a month.  I rode the school bus with students to and from school until 1940.  In 1940, I got married and moved to Erath.

In 1948, they began adjusting salaries for those teachers who had graduated with less than the three years or four years.  So, in 1949, with only nine hours lacking, I returned to get a three-year degree and graduated once more in 1949.  My principal believed in keeping up, so I continued taking night classes and workshops to finally finish my last year.  I received my four-year degree in the summer of 1955.  So, I’ve graduated three times from USL (SLI), and I get honored at Homecoming with three different classes!

I taught third grade at Erath Elementary School for thirty-four years, from the fall of 1937 to the spring of 1973.  I loved teaching school!  I retired at age fifty-seven only because my husband was ill, and I stayed home to care for him.  After his death a year later, I substituted for twelve years.  Since about 1986, I have learned to enjoy my retirement. I now spend my time doing a variety of things.  What I enjoy most is spending time with my children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren; visiting with close friends, and doing needlework.