Section 2. Task 1. Autobiography, Seminole Girl, part 1.
Public School was hard compared to what I'd had before, day school on the reservation and a year at Sequoyah Government School.
I almost flunked eighth grade at the public school, and it was a miracle that I passed.
I just didn't know a lot of things, mathematics and stuff. I survived it somehow. I don't know how, but I did.
The man who was head of the department of education at the Agency was the only person outside of my family who helped me and encouraged me to get an education.
He understood and really helped me with many things I didn't know about.
For a long time, the white public school for the Big Cypress area would not let Indian children attend.
A boy and I were the first Big Cypress Indians to graduate from that school. He is now in the armed forces.
After I graduated from high school, I went to business college, because in high school I didn't take courses that would prepare me for the university.
I realized that there was nothing for me to do. I had no training.
All I could do was go back to the reservation.
I thought maybe I'd go to Haskell Institute, but my mother was in a TB hospital, and I didn't want to go too far away.
I did want to go on to school and find some job and work.
So the director of education at the Agency said maybe he could work something out for me so I could go to school down here.
I thought bookkeeping would be good because I had had that in high school and loved it.
So I enrolled in the business college, but my English was so bad that I had an awful time.
I had to take three extra months of English courses. But that helped me.