MERE BABIES WE WERE!

If there was one constant in my life other than my parents, of course, it was Girl Scout Troop 28 of Long Beach, California. It began under the leadership of Frances Allen in 1945 and she guided us into adulthood. When we left high school and headed for college or work, we were loathe to give up our friendship, so Mrs. Allen was always there to organize another "reunion" and to see that photos were taken of us.

The photo above is not one that she took, nor did she have knowledge that we were going to have it taken. I do believe that she would have told us that we really should find another background or another "set" to show off our scout activities. This pix was taken the year we were in 9th grade; most of us had not started dating yet, we didn't know a whole lot about the sex thing yet, and it never, ever, occurred to us that this was not actually an appropriate place for us to appear.

Mrs. Allen was far and away the best scout leader that ever lived! All we had to say was "can we...." and she was ready to take us. She had a big old car (I can't even begin to figure out what kind of car it was, but it was a 4 door sedan, old and roomy) and however many of us wanted to go, she picked us up at our house and dropped us back off when the event was over. It was not unusual for 7 or 8 of us, besides her, to be in the car. When a really important occasion arose, she could usually draft one of the other parents - often my father - to help ferry the girls around. But usually it was just us and Mrs. Allen. She was divorced and a housewife, so she was free to take us wherever we chose.

On the particular occasion that this photo was taken, the 5 of us had decided to go to Knotts Berry farm for an outing. Mrs. Allen parked the car, told us what time to be back, and turned us loose. For those of you who are younger and have been to Knotts Berry Farm, you will probably not know that once it was not an entertainment park. There were no rides, no rollercoasters, no parachutes, nothing like it is today. It was set up like an old western town. There was a bench with some replicas of cowboys sitting at either end and you could have your picture taken sitting next to them. For the men, there was a bench with beautiful can-can girls (statues, of course) sitting on it. There was a jail where, when you brought a visiting relative to the Farm, one of the family would stand with the relative at the front of the jail, looking in at a jailkeeper statue, and another of the family would sneak behind the jail and feed information about your relative to a man with a microphone. He would call your relative by name and talk about what he might have done to get himself put in Jail. Of course your relative was shocked to find a statue talking to him. It got awfully funny sometimes, but this was about as big an event as you could have in that park then. Except for the staged shootouts, which were always a hoot.

There were lots of little trinket shops, little museum displays of western memorabilia, and an old church house and an old school house to look at. And I think there was a little train we could ride on. We never tired of going out to Knotts Berry Farm. There was no Disneyland, no theme parks, no "Orange County" as we know it now -- mostly just farm and dairies out in the boonies. Going to Knotts Berry Farm was a real treat.

One thing in the photo is of note: look how we dressed for going out to this farm! If we went to a camp or the beach, we wore appropriate casual clothing. But for anything else, we dressed in our school clothes. We were always "presentable." We never even thought of wearing Levis or cutoffs or shorts; dresses, or skirts and blouses were the acceptable dress.

We were pretty young and innocent at that time, and when we saw this setting where a picture would accommodate all of us, we thought it would be a great idea to have a picture taken. Dorothy, the scout leader's daughter, and I are upstairs. Kay is leaning out the window, and Barbara is welcoming Carol at the door. It never occurred to us that this house represented a bordello. Maybe an inn or a hotel, but certainly nothing more than that. I'm not sure we even knew about such things as a bordello then. We picked up the developed photos an hour later and couldn't wait to show them to Mrs. Allen.

To this day I can remember her reaction when we met at the car to go home. I don't think she had it in her system to faint, but she took such a sharp intake of breath when she saw the photo that we thought she was going to. It was then that we all learned what a bordello was. I will have to say with all honesty that it was Mrs. Allen herself who provided the sex education that we got, since most of our parents were too embarrassed to say anything and the schools hadn't yet begun incorporating it into their health or science classes. I am sure that this was not the only time we embarrassed Mrs. Allen, but she always was upfront about telling us what we needed to know when we asked, and this was one of those times. I think she might have phoned our mothers after we got home and explained that we had the photo taken without her knowledge. The reason I think this is that based on Mrs. Allen's reaction, I wasn't going to tell my mother about the picture. But after I got home that day, she said, "Say, I'd like to see that picture that you girls had taken today. " How else would she have known?

I treasure this picture. It is now 60 years old. Kay died of breast cancer and Barbara of a stroke. The other three of us stay in touch, see each other occasionally, and share our old photo when we get together. We were lucky to have had Mrs. Allen in our lives and lucky to have had each other. And I consider myself lucky to have such a wonderful token of my growing up... Bobby and friends in the Bordello!