Lincoln (Neb.) - Oct. 15, 1998 - The Ruth Staples Child Development Laboratory on the East Campus of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln will celebrate its 70th anniversary with an open house from 9 to 11:30 a.m. Oct. 17 at the laboratory, 35th and Fair streets on East Campus. The open house will feature puppeteers, face painting, African storytelling and tours of the laboratory. Cookbooks with recipes to make for and with children also will be sold.
One of the earliest university laboratory schools in the nation, the Staples laboratory's alumni include a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner and some of Lincoln's best-known citizens .
Alumni include James V. Risser, who won two Pulitzer Prizes at the Des Moines Register and the child of former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Clayton Yeutter. Other students were James Stuart Jr., whose family roots in Lincoln date to the early 1900s, and the daughters of former Nebraska Supreme Court Chief Justice Norman Krivosha.
Indeed, the list of those who attended the school reads like a "Who's Who" of old Lincoln. Barbara, Howard, Marsha and Naomi Misle of the car dealership family attended the school as did John Lawlor of the longtime Lincoln store, Lawlor's Sporting Goods. Linda and Steven Schwartzkopf, children of former NU athlete and regent Edward Schwartzkopf, attended and the daughter of C.K. and Mary Hillegass of Cliffs Notes.
Risser, who now teaches at Stanford University, attended the school from about 1941 to 1943. "I somewhat remember Dr. Staples as being very kind with children. I remember there was a terrific covered, sort of circular slide that slid from the second floor of the building. But that's about it. I was 3," he quipped.
Marsha Misle, owner of Park Place Pontiac Cadillac, said, "The teachers were always very kind, very nice. They took us to see the cows milked and to get ice cream at the dairy. That was the most fun place in the world and the slide was the best part of the day. They would put you on a little carpet and you would twirl around and slide down and land outside where your parents picked you up. If only I could go back at 43."
More than 3,500 children have attended programs at the laboratory, which was one of those that first underscored the importance of early childhood education. Begun in the Agricultural Engineering Building as an experimental program in 1925, it evolved when there was rapidly developing scientific interest in early childhood health and nutrition nationally. The laboratory was the first of its kind built west of the Mississippi River and the experimental phase ended in 1928 when the lab was moved to its own free-standing two-story frame house.
The present state-of-the-art lab is housed in a one-story brick building completed in 1970 and now houses both preschool and child care programs for children 2 through 6. That year it was dedicated as the Ruth Staples Child Development Laboratory. Staples lab director from 1930 until her retirement in 1956.
In 1983, the completed outdoor play area, the Angeline Anderson Children's Garden, was named for a former teacher. It features a garden designed to attract butterflies and birds to enchant tykes at play.
"Everyone is a teacher and everyone is a learner because everyone is an integral part of the program," Torquati said. "We learn a great deal about children from parents. We consider parents to be the first, best and most important information source about children. The lab helps train teachers and provides research opportunities for undergraduates and those at the graduate level.
"Even though what we do is high quality, we never consider
ourselves to have 'arrived.' It's high quality because we are
reflective and self-critical."
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