The book of autographs brought back high-school memories. Who doesn’t recall their senior year, getting ready to graduate and having all your friends sign their good wishes for that successful future just waiting for you.
As I recall, my autograph book was white with gold lettering on the front and a tassel to put between the pages. It also included pages for invitations, photos and other stuff. I have no idea what happened to that small padded book, probably tossed long ago like so many objects from my past.
The book couldn’t compare to a nice navy blue and gold-leaf autograph album I wandered upon at auction recently. It was a 1939 New York World’s Fair Autograph Album with zippered case to keep the gold-leaf page edges intact. It was still in its original box, which had suffered much more than the album. On an inside page in a gold-leaf circle was the inscription “Public School 77,” so I’m assuming it was given (or purchased) by graduating seniors at this New York high school in the borough of Brooklyn.
The first few pages contained a reproduction collage of photos from the World’s Fair, which was a major attraction in this country and all over the world. It opened on April 30, 1939, in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park in New York, and more than 44 million people visited it before it closed in 1940. Its pavilions and exhibits focused on the future – “Building The World of Tomorrow” through science and technology.
Graduating seniors at other schools in New York apparently had access to the album, too. On the web, I found others from public schools in the boroughs of Queens and the Bronx. I could find no other information about the distribution of the albums, but I can only assume that they were special souvenirs of the fair for graduates. I can imagine students taking field trips to the fair or going with groups of friends to ooh and aah at the designers’ vision of the “what” of the future that lay ahead of them. They must have marveled even more at the sight of the huge Trylon and Perisphere, the central symbols of the fair.
The autograph album contained much of the same snippets as I recalled from my own book, including superlatives, schools attended and favorites. The student, Andrew, liked Action comics, baseball, Longfellow, the song “Oh Johnny, Oh Johnny, Oh” (sung by the Andrews Sisters), and he wanted to be an airplane mechanic.
The first autograph was his own:
Some were insulting, as only a friend could make fun of you:
And funny:
And insulting:
And funny:
And serious. This one was from a teacher, who also wrote the date “1-29-40.” She was listed in the front of the album as part of the school staff.
With a red rose – now dried – tucked inside.
The autograph album was in such good shape that it must have been stashed away – forgotten by Andrew – and now waiting to be picked up at auction. On the web, I came across another such album that a blogger who did estate cleanouts had found in a woman’s home in New York. She had continued to update hers over more than 40 years with notes about friends’ funerals.
