"I loved Ray Welk from the time I was eight years old," Iris Welk tells me. " The love bug bit me down to my toes. He didn't feel it then because he was busy playing war ball with the boys from the Upper School."
When Iris says "upper school," she's referring to the second story of the Red Brick School, built in the center of town in 1902. It was a staunch Federal- styled building, two floors and a low attic. Its windows were kept gleaming by teachers and students, and tea roses grew by the the door. The lower grades had classes downstairs while the older students went to the rooms above. At sixty, its capacity was full.
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