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What Shop Class Did for Me

August 14, 2018 /

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Among us boys, Wilhelm Wolfskill gained immediate cult-hero status with a single utterance.

"Willie," as we called him behind his back, was our "shop class" teacher at South Lebanon Middle School in Lebanon, Pa. I’m guessing the year was 1968 or 1969, and I was in either in seventh or eighth grade.

Willie was showing us the proper way to use a mallet and chisel, and we were gathered around him when he said something in his heavy German accent that will remain with me for the rest of my life.

"Ach du Lieber, who let der schmelly von?" (Translation: Good heavens, who farted?)

Even my father cracked up when he heard that.

by Dean Barber