Welcome to Ethel's Scrapbook!

Ethel, 1936, graduating from
Sam Houston High School. She was a top
 student and at fourteen, the youngest in her grade. 

Welcome to Ethel's Scrapbook! I invite you to join me on a remarkable journey. Each day, I will post another articles from the hundreds of articles I discovered in my grandmother's scrapbook.

Ethel worked as a reporter and associate editor for the Thresher, the weekly student publication at Rice University. She also was the Rice correspondent at The Houston Press (a Scripps Howard paper) and The Houston Chronicle. Her prolific career as a young reporter is even more impressive, when you take into account that she enrolled at Rice, at the age of fourteen.

Today, as an inauguration post, I would like to start with a picture of the scrapbook, a photograph of Ethel and at her High School graduation, and the first article in the scrapbook. Do check the About page, and the scrapbook page of this blog for more information about Ethel the scrapbook. I will be posting everyday, so do check often!

Ethel's Scrapbook 1939-1940
Rice University

The inside cover has the following sticker identifying the owner of the scrapbook. From the married names on label, it's clear Ethel pasted this label much later than 1940.

This label must have been pasted after
1970 when she married Fred Alzofon.

And now...the first article from the scrapbook.

Psychology Teacher And Rice Student Wed in New Mexico 8/31/1939

A campus romance between professor and student was climaxed in Roswell, N.M. when Dr. Frank A Pattie, Jr., and Miss Billie Bess Whatley were married there, it was learned here Thursday. 

The marriage, according to an Associated Press dispatch Thursday, was performed last Thursday at St. Andrew's Episcopal church of Roswell by Rev. Frederick B. Howden, Jr., rector. It said that after a wedding trip to Mexico City, the couple will return to Houston. 

Dr. Pattie, assistant professor of psychology at Rice Institute  and Miss Whatley, who finished her sophomore year at Rice last June, became acquainted two years ago when she entered the institute as a freshman taking a pre-medical course, friends here said. 

The romance, which was not generally known on the campus, began last fall when Miss Whatley enrolled in Doctor Pattie's introductory psychology course at Rice. 

During her year's study of psychology, the young student had helped Profesor Pattie with several of his experimental research projects by serving as a subject. 

The young professor, a former instructor at Harvard University, holding degrees from Vanderbilt, Harvard and Princeton, and his bride will make their home in Houston. Doctor Pattie will continue his professorship.

Mrs. Pattie is the daughter of Mr. and Mrs.William Whatley of Roswell, N.M. 

Well, there you have it! Seems like this matrimony wasn't quite as scandalous then as it might be today. The professor was involved with a student and didn't lose his job!

Looking forward to hearing your comments!