Page 24 - 1926 Gleaner

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THE GLEANER
mencement, is a conclusion. It is the end of their schooldays in the C. C. I., the end of pleasant companionship and dear friend~ ships, the end of wearing the Black and Yellow, and the end of enjoying a student's privileges and of suffering a student's woes.
But this year Commencement was something more than usual because, besides making a change in the student body and staff, it designated a more material change-in the building. On the day before Commencement we took away our books from our temporary quarters in Stephen's Store, and our contamin- ating and annoying presence from the adjacent merchants, and that night we sang a paean of praise to commemorate the pass- ing of the old regime.
On the fifth of January a new chapter in the history of our school began. In the beautiful new building on Hume Street there assembled a motley crowd who came to view this magni- ficent edifice, erected to the deity of learning, by the grace of God and the l::ounty·of the citizens of Collingwood. In the lofty Auditorium this crowd finally congregated and when the Glee Club had made the rafters ring with their pleasing voices, and the building had been dedicated by prayer, the official opening took place, and his Honour the Lieutenant-Governor, Colonel Cockshutt, and the Minister of Education, the Honourable G. Howard Ferguson, received silver keys. In their addresses they urged the students to greater efforts and Mr. Ferguson predict~ ed the possibility of a broader field of education being opened to us in our own school.
In the evening several ex-students told of their own school- days and the debt they owed their Masters and classmates. They told of other students who had brought honour and fame to their Alma Mater by their work in many different fields.
Now, once more the students file into real classrooms and the new gymnasium rings with cheers as basketball teams strive for victory. The students are proud of their beautiful building and feel it their duty to keep their conduct in work and play up to the standard reached by the architect in the building itself. But this Christmas, bringing such a gift, brings back the me- mory of another Christmas, two years past, when our old school, destroyed by fire, stood, a bare skeleton, overtopping the smoul- dering ashes. We love our new school,. but we have not forgotten our old one, so surrounded with memories, happy and sad, with dreams that have been realized and dreams that have been put aside with a sigh. Nor were our two years in the Stephens Block devoid of pleasant associations and jolly times. But after all, the spirit of our school remains unchanged, though ~ow under better conditions, we may raise our former standard of 'honour and sportsmanship still higher.
But through all the years that stretch ahead of us the New Y ear Season of 1926 will stand out clear, for then, in ~ery truth the bells "rang out the old, rang in the new."
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