Pennants helped students show school spirit in 1914
April 2026
Vintage Discoveries
Pennants helped students show school spirit in 1914
by Ken Weyand
My “cedar chest of family history” produced another couple of items: a pair of college pennants, well over 100 years old. They were among the few things my dad, Elmer Weyand, saved from his college days in Kirksville, Mo.
His mother died in 1897. Three years later his dad died, and he was taken in at the age of seven by an uncle, Joseph Miller. For the next several years he would live and work on his uncle’s Black Oak Stock Farm north of the village of Granger in northeast Missouri. Miller, a graduate of Iowa Wesleyan University in Mt. Pleasant, Iowa, had donated a part of his property for the construction of a country school. He named it Black Oak School, after his farm, and became its first schoolmaster in the 1870s.
Through hard work and his with uncle’s support, my dad was able to attend a three-year college, Kirksville Normal School, founded in 1867. His college career would be made possible by doing extra summer work on the farm for his uncle, doing janitorial work at the college, and pinching pennies while in school.
The school would become Northeast Missouri State College in 1968, then Northeast Missouri University in 1972. In 1996 it acquired its present name, Truman State University.
In later years, my dad often reminisced about his college days at Kirksville, where he had to compete with city kids whose high school background gave them a big advantage over a country school graduate.
At Kirksville, my dad didn’t have much time for sports, but he did play tennis, and kept his original racquet, heavy by today’s standards, with a wooden frame and catgut strings. I eventually donated it to a local museum.
School spirit pennants.
My dad’s graduation photo, 1914 (Ken Weyand collection)
Dad graduated in 1914 with a Teacher’s Certificate that allowed him to teach in rural schools. He later told me that a friend had questioned his decision to get a college education, as his goal was to just be a farmer. He said that he felt his classes in chemistry, one of his favorite subjects, had greatly helped him with his farming, and he would always appreciate his college experience.
After teaching for a year at Black Oak School, he turned his attention to farming, helping his uncle show award-winning Shorthorn cattle at shows throughout the U.S. During that time, he bought parcels of land not far from his uncle’s, putting together a farm he would name Hillcrest Farm, where I spent my early years.
Ken Weyand is the original owner/publisher of Discover Vintage America, founded in July 1973 under the name of Discover North.
Ken Weyand can be contacted at kweyand1@kc.rr.com Ken is self-publishing a series of non-fiction E-books. Go to www.smashwords.com and enter Ken Weyand in the search box.
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