Wednesday, April 24, 2024

The 'Old Bell' Has Been Pride Of DPS Campus Since 1932


The Dorchester Public School's bell monument, now located prominently in front of the school building's main entrance, features the refurbished bell from the 1890 school building. 

How many of you know the story behind the bell?

For those old enough to remember, the old school bell was showcased as part of a 1932 brick monument, just east of the 1927 school building, which was demolished in the summer of 2008. The old bell monument was razed a few years earlier due to its weakened structure and safety concerns.

Thanks to a loyal reader, the Dorchester Times was sent a May 1932 DHS alumni newsletter, which helped us uncover a little more history behind the old monument and the school bell itself.

According to an Dorchester High School Alumni Pep Bulletin article written by W.R. Freidell (DHS Class of 1907), the bell was salvaged from "the wreckage of the old red brick school house" after that building was demolished in 1930. 

That's when the DHS Alumni Association asked DHS graduate Merion Mooberry (Class of 1916), a skilled architect, to design "an appropriate mounting for this bell." (Editor's note: The sketch below is from the May 1932 issue of the Bulletin.)

The original bell monument was unveiled at the fifth-annual DHS alumni banquet May 21, 1932. The "historic landmark and "grandsire of the campus" was presented to alumni by its builder, DHS graduate and contractor Thomas Grey Jr. 

The newsletter reports the bell was mounted in "a lovely designed, final resting place just east of the new high school." 

Following the alumni banquet, toasts were made "around the traditional old bell."

Tickets for the 1932 alumni banquet were reduced to 65 cents a plate, due to "Old Man Oppression" -- or the Great Depression, as we call it today. But attendees still received the "same big three-course dinner," per the orders of Mrs. Panter, chair of the banquet and wife of the town doctor.

Following the monument dedication and banquet dinner, alumni were invited to visit the historian's exhibit entitled, "See Yourselves as Others Saw You on Your Graduation Night Years Ago."

9 comments:

  1. If you look in our old annuals, you will see photos of many of us taken on, or in front of the old Bell Monument.

    This is a good project!

    JR Wolfe
    York

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  2. What monument was demolished 20 years ago? The Bell monument was their just a few years ago.

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  3. Check the books ... I think you'll find time has passed a little more quickly than you think.

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  4. The one in the picture was there when i was in school and it hasn't been twenty years since then.

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  5. I can remember climbing on that bell when I was in elementary and also having class pictures taken with it. I think it is a wonderful idea to do something with such a well known piece of history for our school.

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  6. Whatever happened to the ticket window that was supposed to be part of the new school. Has it been placed there?

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  7. i think it was sold at the auction

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  8. I think it was sold

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  9. The old bell was taken down in 2006 or 2007.

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