The Secret Rooms at School (& maybe other places) I want to discuss!

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Gary, the school you taught in reminds me of one that was a few hundred feet down the road from my sister's house. It was also built in 1928, and demolished about 5 years ago. I suggested to my sister that she and her husband buy it, and turn it into a nursing home (she's an RN). They said it would cost way to much, and it wasn't a good location for one. They didn't want to start a B&B in it either. A small portion built in the 50's remains as storage for school district equipment, along with the playground & ball field. Link shows pic of original bldg.

From the Spring of '85 until the Winter of '86 I did a long-term temp job at Cincinnati's University Hospital. The original buildings were built in 1915, including Pavilion J, where the office I was in was located. The patient care area had been opened in '69, and a medical science building also was built around that time. These two buildings replaced several of the original sections. Another newer building had been built in the early 50's. The office I worked in was on the 2nd. floor of a 4 story building, which also had a basement. At the basement level there was a connection to a tunnel, which at one time had connected all of the original buildings. The newer buildings also connected to these passageways, and a new tunnel was constructed between these areas. Some of these tunnels had doors leading to other tunnels that were only for maintenance purposes. These contained pipes, conduits, etc. There supposedly is (or was at one time), a tunnel leading under the street to the Children's Hospital, and another to the Holmes Hospital. A co-worker claimed she had been in it when her sister was a CH patient in the 50's, but we could never find the access point to it. Another co-worker's husband worked in maintenance, and said it had been blocked by recent construction. The J Pavilion had an area we referred to as the "attic", but it was NOT the top floor, but rather the 3rd. It had originally been patient wards, but not used as such since the early 50's. It wasn't well lit, and was somewhat spooky up there. I had to go up there to retrieve files occasionally, or accompany a co-worker who was afraid to go alone. There were old beds and wheelchairs up there, along with other old stored items. One area had an old Kaiser dishwasher in a countertop. That building along with some adjoining ones was torn down after I left there. I think a parking garage replaced it. I would go back occasionally if I had an appointment in that area and have lunch with my former co-worker Debbie. The last couple times I was there if was difficult to find my way around, as so much had changed. She retired a couple years ago, so haven't been back.

 
Hi Tom

It is difficult to go back too, you are right. The building in the picture is a wonderful example of school architecture during the 20's. If is very difficult to
use these types of for other things. High ceilings, many big windows, etc. makes it difficult to rebuild into something else. Thanks, Gary
 
The one elementary school that I went to at one time was a high school--so the gym had a Boys Locker Room & a Girls Locker Room--and each had a shower room, with a single incandescent bulb housed in a glass upside-down dome, though one of these locker rooms was used as an equipment room while the other was unused & the gym teacher gave his class, including me, a glimpse at the unused room, with the dome from the shower room in that one missing--while I can surmise that the unused room was the Boys Locker Room, as against the wall I can visualize some porcelain wells sticking out of, that was where clearly what separated Boys from Girls, in terms of which locker room was which...

The gym had a "Sys-ync" noise coming from the ceiling, we jokingly said was a "ghost" only for the school custodian to one day happening to be in the gymnasium & the teacher quoted with "yes, he's the expert--let's ask him", then all of us being quoted down to hear the noise occur, then for the custodian to say (though this many years later, I forgot, other than it probably had to do with what is a very-antiquated heating/ventilating system, possibly in relation to the thermostat, in of all places, a room like our gymnasium, doubling also as an auditorium, hence it was dubbed as in nearly all of our school system--Multipurpose Room, and this is the school I'd attended in 5th Grade, so I graduated in that room: "When I leave, Carver School, I plan to leave my helpfulness", my shy self left as my farewell address, and there were enough "I plan to leave my ____" for the whole class--my homeroom teacher gave me that sheet of paper a week before, leaving me wondering what its purpose was, before everyone at the microphone, after receiving our diplomas, clued me in--we even had caps & gowns & I quickly learned the steps of the march--as for Carver, it was George Washington Carver & there couldn't have been a better time to go there if it was when The Blues Bothers Movie came out & I likened it to The Orphanage that Jake & Elwood were trying to save--needless to say, it needs similar salvation, although trips by it--occasional at that--saw it used for some other importune function, to where even all of the graffiti is gone--$conni, frequently seen written in a lot of places, and of all: even close to the Downriver area...

Now, a trip to one of my local Sam's Clubs and around the Meat Dept. let me see their band saw--a huge "Now THIS is a SAW" also employed at the Kosher supermarket (though there its back was tuned towards me & the flat part boasting the name plate was faced away, so in the sideways glance, only saw the hub housing the upper-wheel) while the Sam's (there are Three of them locally, so I might investigate the other two) was it moved further away, and another back glance at the side of, although a blade wrapped around it giving me the only clue what it was, while in the background of the preparation area, was the couple of sinks & a sprayer not to mention an arsenal of knives against the wall everywhere in sight, and no one using the saw at either place, of which I tried to avoid the "May I help you?" that I would have been asked, as I didn't want to reveal the real nature of my well, obsession--must be the "35-years-ago" vortex that I find myself in...

Going to the Harvard Row meat place (a free standing Butcher) next--though too far west of me top make an easy trip to, right now...

-- Dave
 
I was actually part of such a mystry room

First off, during primary school, there was one area that I often walked by but never was allowed to enter.
It was a big hall like storage room being the 2nd way connecting the workshops in the basement to the main floor.

There was a washer there that I always only could spot from afar, now I'm guessing it was some old industrial machine, something like a Huwa or Schulthess, definetly not a Miele.
The house keeping ladies washed there mops in there.
At some point during winter break it was replaced by a standard Miele VivaStar.
That vanished at some point as well, not being replaced.

Another mystery room was below my old dentist. Walking up the stairs you could spot a washer (cheap brand that was then sold by Aldi) that was used to wash the prxis clothing.

But the room I was actually part of was the liberay for school books at my "Gymnasium".
In 8th grade, the different clases of my grade got shuffeled around, thus, we also had new teacher.
The teacher that originally ran that liberay was going into retirement, and a completly new teach was to take over.
By coincidence, that teacher was our (verry awesome in my opinion) chemestry teacher together with our new physics teach.
Cause the old students that were doing that job were finishing school, they needed new once.

So it was the first lesson of a new grade, our classes head teacher (we were that class that had the 15 or so people in it that were in the advanced sports course, so he was a sports teacher as well) was explaining that we as a special class would have to be a symbol to other classes how to behave and thus we would be especially carefully teached, with only the greatest sucess and order in mind.

Suddenly, the door opend and a 6ft hunk of man in his early 30s entered the room.
He just plain interupted our teacher, introduced himself as our chemistry teacher and that he would need 4 of us to help.
My and my best friend next to me immediatly recognized the chance, our hands shot up as fast as never before and luckily, we were picked.

Now, that room was in the basement, next to one of our computer rooms, so not even that far of the normal daily passages.
But it was of course behind a large metal fire saftey door.
Behind that door, you would find a simmilar door straight ahead, and 2 normal sized but also metal fireproof doors. To the left was storage, ahead was a server room and a emergency exit, and to the right was that libary.
The liberay itself was about 6 on 6 meters, with metal free standing (yes, they were not bolted down) heavy weight shelfings along three of the walls, starting right beside the door which was in a corner of the room, and ending on the opposite of that.
In the middle of the room were 4 rows of each 2 of these shelfes side by side, basicly creating 4 little corridors. The shelfes were however double sided and thus double depth compared to the once on the wall, so that you would have a wall of books to your left and right if you entered one of these corridors.

To the left of the door were 2 normal sized work desks with 2 chairs each, a computer and some other stuff you need for the job like stamps etc.

Our job was to first integrate all the books in the new digital barcode based system, then to exchange and sort out all old books (the change from a 9 year "Gymnasium" to a 8 year one was just finished and not all books had been removed yet) while managing the typical start of the year job of giving out the new books.
Meanwhile, we also had to take care of new order, integrating new deliverys into our system and doing other customer service kind of stuff (recalling broken books, helping people who need special books, helping new students or teachers).

So, we were asigned to have a mayor part of the power over the books in our school, with a room nobody except us was allowed to enter without permission, all to our self.
Oh, and we had 2 weeks we were not required to attend our normal lessons so we could handle the yearly book switchover from grade to grade.
And we got lots of free sweets, coffee, cake and pizza.

As we grew more familiar with our jobs, and with the teachers overseeing us, we kind of took the overhand over our teachers and sometimes even our principal.
For example, instead of takeing back the now finished grades books from all students before the summer holidays and handing the new once out after the holidays (both procedures took about 3 weeks combined), we were abled to shift all the takeing back and giving out before the holidays, starting at the highest grade that left the school, takeing back the next lower grade books and directly handing out all the books we just took back, working our way down all grades.
That way we only had to integrate new books and hand out the new students books after the holidays, allowing us to still have 3 weeks of free time, but effectivley only working 2. And we only ever had a small stack of each book in our storage, so the room was way less cramped.
Further, we also had the power to decide whether someones book was acceptable or if its condition was to bad to continue using it. If the book was relativley new, the student then had to pay for it.

There was so much this room enabled us to do, it gave us power, made us immune to most any teach and any other student.
We were a seperate group of people that grew from 4 originally up to a friendship group of 10 from different grades.
We didn't have to work any hard work, we had additional holidays, our teachers and principal loved us, our fellow students didn't dare to attack us in any which way and we could thrive.

Just beautiful.
 
Well, at one school the Spanish class I took in high school and a few other electives got moved to the building that housed our former middle school--close to where I grew up vs. MS moving an exact mile away...

Even some Berkeley high kids, had to get all the way out there and little did I know the blue Omini 0-24 (1980) I saw, was of the gal I would later work at Arbor drugs with--have a crush on and a few other naughty things but get involved passed her boyfriend which saw her be the 1st to give a teenage birth in her class, she'd told me, as well, marrying this guy and her son having two sisters that I had no idea could be many years apart--well, wait:

Back to topic: the lounge there in one hall I was pointedly to not go walk through had a fridge, dishwasher and stove, Admiral, Caloric, and Westinghouse, respectively...

The class only had five kids in it, me and a couple others from my school and a couple Madison Heights gals... 'Nuff said...

But, I guess like Roosevelt (where I attended) and Clinton that this place was, now an Adult Ed. Facility housing the school bus and district works facility, as well as being next to the administration building could be just as loaded with other secret rooms, of the like!

-- Dave
 
Not a secret-room story exactly, but interesting... The NASA Mission Control Center building in Houston is built in two halves, with elevator banks and stairs separating the halves. For reasons unknown to me, the two halves of the building have their floor levels offset by about 6 feet. The elevators have doors at both ends, and which door opens depends on which floor you select. To make it odder, in a couple of places, there are half-floors wedged in between, which can only be accessed from certain elevators.

When I worked on the Shuttle program, the joke was that one of the two halves of the building was offset from reality by 6 feet -- but we couldn't figure out which half.
 
But I wanna talk about SAWS--(& why the obsession?)

I got brave enough now the day before yesterday to go back into that meat room, until it seemed like I was next to the thing (that, or the room it's in is THAT SMALL!) though still haven't seen how you turn it on & off...

The other room in there wasn't near what the other Kroger I had been to looked like, or it was a regular preparation room w/o the stuff hanging in it, which we must have a similar room somewhere in those quarters, perhaps in the cooler or freezer, there are a couple doors leading to...

This other room I got a better glimpse of had a saw designed for more SERIOUS sawing--just like the big corporation I work at then to junk a good saw--the thing looked badly in disuse, hence the other one being used, once I got passed the still-thick & heavy smell of meat in the air, seemed more for cutting paper...

There's the supermarket by my dad's house, (a Spartan store) so poking my head around the meat dept. there allowed me to hear the faint Swwweeeee, Sweeeee, of the saw & the guy w/ his back turned running it, as another view through a door window allowed...

There's also another market that used to be around where I lived, known as Farm Fresh (built into an old Farmer Jack, which I'd been to /shopped at as well) now moved a few miles away, having two meat depths like each orig. incarnation had--so to pay it/them a visit...

Then, there used to be the old Chatham Supermarket near where I lived which is now a clothing store, and it tried its hand at being another supermarket--this is decades ago--that I miss, when it went from Chatham to A&P, to some other place (where I visibly saw the meat cutting in the large window there, going on)...

Oh, the Arbor had a basement, an area sealed off & musty smelling and spent time as a supermarket of some sort (also A&P most-likely) so "the dungeon" as it was called was storage for fixtures, in a couple unused restrooms (the fixtures all taken out, other than the unusable sinks) had a door leading to it you probably could be as locked in as it being the only way out--as some stairs in there led to a trap door that was really a sealed up ceiling and above it was a pattern sealing up that area of the floor, so a stair and conveyor belt in the back of the stock room was what was used for up/down for people as well as freight...

Like the Dungeon, that old George Washington Carver Elementary School had a mustiness of its own, too... (One other school, John Dewey Elementary, I was briefly in, was going to be a hospice, but I don't think the plan for it to be such ever came through, so it's a mysterious, unused & most-likely haunted building...

-- Dave
 
My school literally resembled Hogwarts so there were plenty of interesting rooms full of strange antique sports gear and stuff lol
 
Nope, no plastic Fisher Price toy at Hollywood market--that had a big Biro (red circle in the center of the square) w/ a lot of blade showing, compared to the too much guard I would see, and I looked through the door window of the door from the deli (deli & bakery & even the produce & general grocery backrooms had also got me on my tippy toes peeking around--the stairs in the backroom at the Kroger by my dad's look nicer, painted white & not in a hall, too), and another Kroger by the one I work at had a big saw (probably a Biro, or the like) there, too, along with some other machine with gears maybe for making labels, and no Mattel it is, as the machinery inside seemed fully exposed...

Last, I went to the free-standing butcher luckily a few hours before it closed (it was a Friday) and an unused Biro was by the doorway in the back, (no blade) while right behind the counter, was one that looked like it did a lot of work--just on meat...

I was surprised, when I thought of it, that I saw no meat grinder, surely grinding meat would be a frequent job and power operation would be needed there as well--but there was a lot of equipment, and people (taking orders for chicken (you can get roasted rotisserie) and Choulnt), to be seen--and me, as well, making a mention: "Biro, eh?"...

Holliday market (& probably Westborn, I hadn't gone to) as well as Save-A-Lot, and the Meijers didn't seem to have their rooms as visible... And don't know about Aldi--just know when I was at Walmart we didn't seem to have anything like that in our meat room, there...

Like I said, there are other grocery areas, and even our own produce, bakery & deli, I never got to see at my own store entirely, that I'm curious about...

-- Dave

 
More stories, more cerebral:

The special needs (severely impaired) students classroom in high school had a room in the back with an Amana top freezer refrigerator that I would have lamped everyone there to have opened or closed Kenmores and Coldspots and operated Sears Roebuck-such in their own homes (as far as probably most of the help goes, the students had parents/foster care/guardians, etc. do for them, or be supervised doing) than have their fingers wrapped around those handles of what must have been the most-reliable fridge to keep their meds and maybe treats in (they’ve easily shoveled the yucky school food in their mouths, as they’d eaten their lunches in our cafeteria in order to, as a friend of mine put it, had to “face society”)...

The door to that area had blue paper taped over with blue tape, normally seen in hospitals/medical facilities, and beds with cubicle-style curtains were in that room...

Also, years before working in food retail, I had to press my nose between swinging doors at what was the Chatham supermarket near where I live now, becoming Farmer a Jack, A&P, some independent place, then bearing a couple names of TJ Max-type of stores (clothing/small lines of home/domestic soft goods) such as AJ Wright, then Fallas, and now currently sitting around, vacant and empty...

Oh, and back then at Chatham, I went upstairs to use the bathroom, and the Men’s sign was torn, making Women’s easier to identify, just to be told by a lady worker “That’s the Girl’s room!”...

The pressing my nose between the doors? I was wondering what the bad smell was... I asked my dad (who wasn’t there with us, but he’s the kind of guy who “knows everything”) and he simply said “maybe it’s spoiled tuna fish”, still fueling my curiosity than providing any answer—but I worked at Walmart, which had a grocery department, and now Kroger, so I now know all about rancid smells at places that are supposed to be fresh...!

Then, there was a Farmer Jack that i used the bathroom at—okay, another meat area, but I went about my own biz—where one worker asked another “who invited him (me) here?”, it was in the back, and before that the A&P near my house I grew up at, had a produce area with an interesting hot water heater pipe go through the tiled ceiling above it, a door open let me peep through (a horn trill from a Sesame Street’s “letter O”, “Ox” skit popped into my head, then)...

Think I was curious about an old man worker in his smock led into a room in the back room via another door up front opened with two well-dressed men, one in a white shirt and tie, the other in a suit and tie, accompanied by another man wearing his white butchers apron, carrying a briefcase—he was probably leader with the Union...

— Dave
 
Dave,

there was a Dexter-Davison supermarket at about Ten Mile and Coolidge that Borman's also bought.
Each store had two union sterwards before the almalgamted meatcutters merged with the U.F.C.W. union. One for the meat depts., and one for the rest of the store.
Also, the chain also had a district supervisor for grocery, one for meat, and one for produce. They all wore suits. Before A&P bough the chain, there was one supervisor for each dept. for about every nine to a dozen stores.
We had 50 stores in 1976. By 1986 when we bought seven Chatham's from the Wiseberg's, we had 85 stores. They only kept the Warehouse way stores.
There was shenanigans and money/merchandise funneling going on between the Chatham upper level management and Hamidy bros. stores in Flint.
Once Chatham filed for bankruptcy and hired a young accountant to piece-meal sell off the stores, after he heard of how many lost their jobs, he killed himself.
 
The nature center which, last week, I accompanied my daughter on her field trip to...

 

Has a kitchen which may or may not be public, (whatever happened to those fancy chromed-metal bars that were door handles on refrigerators, those plastic "grips" are trying to do?!) and most interesting, the Animal Care room, also serving as likely a heating/cooling/ventilation/plumbing, etc. utility area for the building... 

 

 

-- Dave

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Plants, and Birds, and Rocks, and Things...

More pictures of the actual Center, that I couldn’t send from my phone, to the big computer, so taken from the gallery on my phone, though wish I’d photographed stuff from our actual nature hike...

— Dave

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What an interesting topic. I hadn’t thought about this in a long time but my old elementary school had been built in the fifties, at a time when the Cold War was something everyone was really worried about, so it had a full bomb shelter in the basement. My hometown is also home to a government nuclear energy testing facility so there’s always been a local concern that we would be a target of some kind of attack (though personally I doubt any foreign government really cares that much about a testing facility in the middle of Idaho). I remember being shown the bomb shelter and told if there was ever an emergency, we would all be brought down there. There were a handful of other schools here built at the same time, using identical floor plans. They’ve started tearing them down and replacing them with more modern buildings. My children’s school is one of these, the year before we moved to that school they had torn down the original, with bomb shelter, and then replaced it with a brand new one. They didn’t even keep the same footprint of the original building so no bomb shelters in the new ones I’m sure.
 
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