Tryon School gym is gone

When I attended the Tryon School on the hill above town, a sign proclaimed that the large brick gymnasium was built by the Works Progress Administration. It had names and a date sometime in the late 30s. I don't think the gym was there when I started in Mrs. Kittrell's First Grade in 1936, nor when I moved to Mooresville the following year. We little ones played on the seesaws and small swings in the side yard between the auditorium and School Street.

The gym was there when I returned in 1940 to complete the Fourth Grade in Miss Mills' class, but we played on the Giant Strides and the big playground, not in the gym. When I reached the Eighth Grade, a new coach, Mr. Beach, had us doing calisthenics every day, and we used the gym during bad weather. A solo quality tenor, Mr. Beach had us sing "Stout Hearted Men" as we built our muscles. Inside the gym, it was like singing in the shower as we made the rafters ring.

The late Robert Dedmondt told me that he played basketball for Tryon against "Shorty" MacDonald of Mill Spring in those early days, and therefore was able to tell me that "Shorty" was 6'-8" tall in response to my question. Robert also revealed that Principal Mark Caldwell was fit and trim enough to suit up with the boys and play for Tryon when they were short handed.

Miss Elmina Wages was my Phys Ed teacher, and she decided to teach her classes to Square Dance. She would turn up the old Victrola to the max in the gym and call the dances herself after teaching us the moves. I really liked the "swing your partner" part; that is when I learned that most girls were soft, but some were quite firm to hold. They were the ones who could and did outrun the boys.

Superintendent L. K. Singley decided to start a shop class for the boys, so he had us level the dirt and pour a concrete floor under the north end of the gym. We did it the way the Chinese coolies built runways for bombers in WWII… picks and shovels, wheelbarrows and hand-mixed concrete, floated and troweled as part of our "training." Then he hired a Mr. Foster to teach us woodworking, and our first project was work tables with storage underneath.

We had a Halloween Carnival in the gym each year. Each class had a booth, usually involving something to eat or scary. Local artist Stella Sassoon helped us decorate one year, arriving in a flowing long dress, with her red hair flowing as well, and brimming with ideas we never would have thought of. We were honored to have a "real French lady" working with us to transform the gym into fantasy land.

The community used the gym as well in those days. A charity basketball game between teams of local notables brought a good turnout, perhaps because the required uniform of the evening was long underwear. One team wore "drop seat" and the other "split back" BVDs. Even so, there was no shortage of players for a spirited game that all enjoyed.

Donkey Basketball also drew a large crowd to the gym. The little donkeys wore rubber shoes on the gym floor, and were trained to make the game difficult for their hapless riders. The players had to be mounted in order to play, but they had to dismount to pick up the ball. The ball changed sides a lot, and few baskets were scored, but everyone had a great time.

There is no visible remnant of the gym at its site today, and few there be to mind its passing. The building is gone, and all too soon those who enjoyed using it will be gone, too. I suppose that some day, like the gym, we will no longer be needed either.