The Vine: July 26, 2013
Okay, so someone out there has to know this book. Back in the ’70s (I would say mid-to-late ’70s) a photographer decided to “embed” himself in a high school class for a year and document the experience.
The kids all knew he was a photographer, and eventually they came to trust him, and the moments he captured are still emblazoned in my head, and I think the last time I flipped through it I was 14 years old. The high school was (if memory serves) in the Midwest (although I could have it wrong, but I do remember the pictures were of a very flat landscape — so maybe it was in Nebraska or Texas, not sure). He went to the dances, the pep rallies. I remember one of the senior girls dropped out to get married, and her friends gave her a wedding shower (which the photographer attended).
The photos were all black-and-white, grainy, gritty, and beautiful. With lots of feathered hair, and porn ‘staches on the guys.
I would love to track this book down, and Google results have not helped. I know that it is NOT the book What Really Happened To The Class Of ’65, co-written by Michael Medved, a book I am familiar with, but this is NOT that (Google keeps thinking it is, though).
There was text in the book, and quotes from students and the photographer, but the book is mainly about the photographs.
Thanks for any help from the Nation!
SM
Dear SM,
I hope the Nation finds it, because it sounds as good as David Owen’s High School, and it isn’t that either. (I’m assuming. I don’t remember photos in that one.)
Nation? It’s not Medved or Owen. Go.
Tags: David Owen Michael Medved popcult
I feel like this might be Jim Richardson’s “High School U.S.A.” The book is documentary photography, the images taken at a high school in a small town in Kansas in the late ’70s. I’m not seeing it on Amazon, but here’s a copy for sale on eBay: http://tinyurl.com/pl2c587.
If it is High School, U.S.A, the school is Rossville High School in Rossville, KS, which may help in the search. The cover can be seen here. http://www.amazon.com/HIGH-SCHOOL-U-S-A-Jim-Richardson/dp/B000OTM3ES
Let us know if that’s the one because it sounds really interesting!
Reminds me of South Of Heaven, by Thomas French. (That is NOT the one you’re looking for, but I wanted to mention it anyway because I really loved it.) It’s similar in that the author “embedded” himself in a high school for a year and wrote about it. It’s really well-written – parts of it read almost like a novel. I’m pretty sure I read the whole thing in one weekend the first time.
I hope someone can find yours – I’d be interested in that one, too!
Letter-writer here! It is totally High School USA – I recognize that cover. You people are so awesome! I will buy it immediately. The photographs are just haunting, evocative, beautiful stuff! Thank you everyone!
Fastest Vine ever? :-)
Oh, my – I totally remember that book, @sheila! When I saw it (did I own it? I can’t remember that, of course, and haven’t seen it in decades), I was just as impressed with it as you were. I haven’t thought of it in soooo long, but as soon as I read your question I knew EXACTLY the book you meant. Thanks for the memories! I may just go and track down a copy for my own self, now…
South of Heaven was written about MY high school! The author was there a couple years after I graduated, but I knew some of the people involved, and some of their older siblings as well. It was such a strange experience for me when I read it, since some of it was soooo familiar, and yet some of it seemed so foreign. It’s a good read!