The Tee Jay

By Anna Segelken

On September 6th, 1927, Templeton Junior High School opened its gates for the first time to approximately 900 pupils in grades seven and eight. Later this year, on December 2nd, 1927, Templeton’s first student publication, the Tee Jay, was unveiled.

The name Tee Jay was chosen because it was “distinctive” and “took in two of our letters”. The editors also chose this name because “it makes mention of an interesting bird- the jay”. They explained that “the jay is a chattering bird and we hope to make our paper a chatty paper”.

The Tee Jay was a very comprehensive publication. It covered all news at the school, from sports reporting “a snappy basketball game was played” to gossip “a young lady dropped her milk bottle the other day in the cafeteria”. The “Sassiety Column” kept students informed of important observations, such as “a big handsome cop strutting his stuff”.

Reading the Tee Jay offers insight into the lives of students long ago. There were numerous clubs at Templeton, including the Boy Scouts club, who wrote: “well, boys you sure miss a lot if you do not belong to the Scout Club. We have thirty-two members in our club and every member is a strong link of this chain of scouts”. Students went on outings, one of which was detailed in the paper: “the majority of the school took advantage of the splendid opportunity given Wednesday, November 28th (1928) to visit the Winter Fair at Hastings Park”. The author noted that “there were many specimens of chickens” to behold. The paper also published puzzles, comics, jokes, and advertisements for local companies. They had short story and poem competitions where winners, including one poem entitled “The Warblings of a Wood Bug” were published in the paper.

Tee Jay covers were hand-drawn, as were the illustrations scattered throughout. Articles were written on typewriters and printed on printing presses. Eventually, pictures were also included in the publication. Each issue was bound in colourful paper, and they were sold to “templetonians” by the thousands (one issue reported selling 1100 copies in a month). The Tee Jays now live in the library, waiting to give us a delicious look into the lives of the students who walked these halls 97 years ago.

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