LaRue McGuire, Raymond High School Cook

I published this on Facebook at "You Know You Grew Up in Raymond..." It was a fun post with lots of comments from folks who grew up in Raymond Washington and knew my mom.

Oh my. I looked at the calendar and saw that it's my mom's birthday. Today she would be 110 years old. I've been thinking about her stories, so I thought I'd offer some anecdotes for those of you who knew her.

You may have known Mrs. McGuire as the cook at school. That job was one that she loved, and one that challenged her. When my sisters and I were all of school age, she took a part time job as a cook's assistant at Raymond Schools. Every day, she loaded lunch from the high school kitchen into the rear of a 1948 Plymouth. She took lunch to Riverdale School where she served the children there. In the afternoon, she returned to the high school and washed dishes.

Later she took on more roles, and when Florence Lundquist died unexpectedly, Mr. Carroll asked Mom to be the head cook. Though she took pride in her cooking, scaling up to serve 400 meals daily was daunting. After a while, she grew into it, and loved the work.

If you helped in the kitchen, you know how she supported each of her kids there. I know how she respected all the kitchen workers, because I heard about it each day at dinner time (where we often had leftover school lunch). She only found good in her helpers, and if someone fell out of line, she'd let them know, "You know ... I expect better of you." She got the better from them and they were all so good!

After Mom grew into the job, Raymond Schools were some of the few in the nation that had fresh baked cinnamon rolls every month or so. Do you remember? I sure do. Mom got up at 3:30, and started making rolls at 4 am, so that her favorite people would have fresh baked goods. I say, "her favorite" people, because I recall some of the immature faculty were not among her favorites when they complained that the cinnamon rolls had no frosting!

Among Mom's supporters and friends on staff were Clay Vaughn, our head custodian. Clay made frequent trips through the kitchen to service the ancient steam furnace that kept the high school and 9th street elementary warm. Clay was a neighbor of ours in Riverdale, but in those years I learned that earlier Clay had worked as a baker in a Raymond bake shop. When Mom started into the job of baking for 400, Clay offered her tips that made the job easier at that scale.

Every month among the food supplies were a ton of USDA surplus goods. Included was rice, and more rice. Mom thought it just made a sticky mess and was a challenge to serve. But she was creative and realized that the rice could become part of the mashed potatoes and "no one would know the difference." Did you know you were eating ricey potatoes?

Here's hoping you found your own memories here. It's all true, but if not, it makes a good story. See less

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