Some of you (if you graduated from Barnwell High School in the 60s or before) will recall my father, Harold Sewell. He was principal in 1942-66. Initially, he also coached football (1942-49) and taught in addition to being principal. A few of you say you were scared of him, but I think it was more a matter of intimidation. Virtually all of you will say that he was a man of few words. It is correct to say that he had little to say, especially at school, but I think that was function of his role as principal and to maintain discipline. At home it was often the same but I learned how to elicit responses with the right question at the right time. Additionally, there was another side of my father--a much more talkative and playful side, depending upon mood, but it was seen mostly by family, and occasionally by friends. What is certainly not well known is that he was a practical joker of immense proportions. In 1948 or 1949, when I was five or six, Halloween trick-or-treat pranksters took our bench swing from the front porch of our house on Main Street. They ran it up the flagpole at the high school (then on Hagood Avenue). When Harold retrieved it when he came to school the day after Halloween, he said he could hear laughter from the library. Immediately he suspected several boys who were then-current students but didnt know which ones exactly were complicit. Time passed and everyone forgot the incident. Everyone but Harold. When the next Halloween rolled around, my father concluded that the pranksters probably had not forgotten, either. He guessed that they had so much fun the first time that they would be very tempted to try again, so he wired the swing with electricity. Harold was very handy with electricity and knew how to mete out a dose that would not harm anyone, but would certainly be remembered for a long time. I still recall him turning out the lights in the parlor and sitting in the dark, waiting for his prey. He kept me with him, whispering, Stay awake, Michael. This is going to be good. Around 11 or 11:30, we heard a loud shriek. Actually, it sounded more like WO-WO-WO-WO!! After a few seconds of purgatory as the victim or victims were unable to turn loose of the electrified chains that held the wooden swing from the porch ceiling, Harold cut the current. Screaming and fleeing, they knocked over a couple of plants on the porch and rapidly disappeared. Each Halloween thereafter, Harold would prop an old electrical transformer on the porch and scatter around two or three wires attached to it, and no one ever took our swing again. I might add that we got very few trick-or-treaters, either. It was not Harolds first practical joke, nor his last, but its the one that is embedded in my mind. When I hear former students speak of being frightened of my father, the principal, I think to myself, You have no idea.
Posted on: Fri, 04 Apr 2014 04:29:34 +0000
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