Monday, Feb. 10, 1958

The Firm One

When eleven-year-old Roscoe McGeorge refused to stop playing with cards in the back row of a fourth-grade penmanship class in Cincinnati's Washington Elementary School. Teacher Gayle Graner decided to take appropriate action. She told him to turn over and gave him a paddling. Roscoe's outraged mother had her arrested for assault and battery, but 22-year-old Teacher Graner, though less than a year out of the University of Cincinnati's Teachers College, is not one to be easily intimidated. "Yes. I paddled him," she told reporters. "I have firm ideas on discipline."

Cincinnati apparently approves such firmness. Washington's principal rushed to Teacher Graner's support. William F. Hopkins, a topflight Cincinnati criminal lawyer, offered to defend her without fee ("More paddlings like that would help to keep down our prison population"), and 40 members of the Cuvier Press Club sent her an orchid corsage with a note saying, "We salute you!" Finally, the day before her case came up in court. Teacher Graner got the biggest boost of all. Her entire class. Roscoe included, chipped in nickels and dimes to throw a "good luck" party to wish her well. Snorted Judge Frank Gusweiler, who dismissed the case last week: "It's unfortunate that a member of the teaching profession is subjected to this prosecution. This young lady should have some satisfaction in knowing her position in this matter has been approved in the community." Nonetheless. Roscoe's parents decided to slap Teacher Graner with a $2,500 suit to recover damages for Roscoe's bruised bottom.

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