Flossie Tiller


Quite a bit of humor has been derived from school nurse, Flossie Tiller's no-nonsense bedside manner, specifically her endorsement of Dr. Harvey Kellogg's method of irrigating one's lower intestinal tract to maintain a sound body and its resident sound mind. This Draconian practice served not only to ease some digestive problems but served to keep the infirmary fairly clear of malingerers. To the outside observer, Mrs. Tiller might have seemed at home in one of Dicken's orphanages or workhouses and photographs of her seem to confirm this. Looking grey and unsmiling in her starched uniform, she peers wraith-like out from the pages of the Aiken Knight.
When she wasn't taking care of sick kids, she could often be seen sunning herself on one of the green sports benches, dressed in her old army cloak and reading Time Magazine. I would like to take a moment to relate a few more things I learned about Tillie when I got to know her better.
After I grew up and Mrs. Tiller had retired to an apartment in Edgefield, I would occasionally visit her. I had come to appreciate her astute mind and sensible view of the world and looked forward to hearing about her past as well as stories about Aiken. I also discovered that she was very fond of lemon meringue pie, which she rarely had for herself. Armed with a pie, I could coax her into telling some of her stories. She had been acquainted with Aiken Prep as early as the 1930’s and had quite a bit to say about how things were then, the formality of the school under Mr. Tabor and about the transitions which took place when Harold Fletcher became headmaster. Many of the English customs remained but they were tempered with some flexibility and kindness. And so on.

But I also learned a little bit about Tillie, herself, and perhaps why she cast a rather severe shadow, aside for her bedside manner, for the largely privileged boys at the school. She was from Lincoln County, Georgia in an area now inundated by the Clark's Hill reservoir. Like many families, hers was hard hit by the Spanish Flu epidemic when so many people perished. She became an army nurse and could remember when having morphine was common. She described how so many men with chronic pain had become addicted and lived in what she described as pest houses. She never said much about her marriage or her husband, but sadly her only son had murdered someone and she never saw him.

I was left with the idea that her principal pleasures in life were reading, history and current events; she most certainly was well informed. She eventually moved to Augusta where I was pleased to take my two sons to visit when they were small. Befuddled and frail, she spent her final days in a veteran’s home in Augusta where she died in the mid 1990's.

Regrettably, I never went to see her in the veteran’s home, but I often think of her at odd times when something she said will pop into my head and remind me of her disciplined life and vigorous view of the world.

Scott Lacher '59
Aiken, South Carolina
January 2005

After graduating from the APS I went to a high school called "Woodberry Forest High School" which is in VA. Then I went to Campbell University which is in NC. I was majored in Sports Medicine and I also played NCAA (Division I) Men's golf for that University. After two years of playing I have turned into a professional. Since I am a Korean citizen, back then there were numeral numbers of international student in boarding program. All Korean males require to serve in the military for two years and I'm in the military right now. But I'm in the military program called "KATUSA", stands for KOREAN AUGUMENTATION TO THE UNITED STATES OF ARMY. I serve for both Korea and the United States. I have a year left in the army and all other Koreans that went to APS are also in the military right now. I want to hear how things are going for the APS, because I would like to give something back to the school because I feel like I wouldn't be able to stand where I am right now without the APS. APS is more than just School to me. Keep in touch.

Sung Hwan Lee (Tommy Lee) '97

I have a story for you which I believe to be mostly the way it happened…..
APS Boys Nab a Crook.

In a school where everyone wore the same clothing and lived in the same regimented space, an expression of individuality could be elusive. Headmasters Fletcher and Harrington were sympathetic to this need and encouraged some boys to take advantage of extra space in the basement of the old building or in the bike shop to set up clubs where they could hang out. These were spaces where you could play the radio as loud as you wanted, hang posters, keep contraband items like candy, and so on. They were cool places to be during free hour or on weekends. As could be expected, the space available was somewhat limited and occasionally kids would become creative in finding a place to call one's own.

This included digging caves in the woods adjacent to the soccer field. While this was not encouraged owing to the potentially dangerous problem of being covered up with dirt, the area was inspected frequently. The resulting construction was most likely to be a foxhole with a piece of scrap plywood on top as a roof. Though not encouraged, this much was unofficially tolerated. Kids had fun digging holes and imagining that they were in some exotic location, hidden in the trees and presumably away from the prying eye of the duty master.

At that time, the large brick building in the block west of the school, now the County Offices was home to the Aiken County Hospital. This was an especially great convenience to the school, not to mention the citizens of the county, and provided a feeling of safety should someone become truly ill.

The hospital was normally a busy place but certain times of the week saw more "unscheduled" traffic. This included Saturday night, owing to the higher likelihood of traffic accidents or injuries from bar fights and other complications frequently experienced through the use of alcohol. Aiken in the sixties was a very quiet town to the point that most people didn't lock their houses or automobiles, and for something to make the paper was considerably rarer than it is today. But things did happen.

On one Saturday night while most of APS was enjoying the movie, the police arrested a man on the east side of town who was very tipsy and injured in a knife fight. They took him to the emergency room to be stitched up and treated before hauling him off to the police station. Exactly what happened depends on who tells the story. But the man gulled to cops into thinking that he was more incapacitated than he actually was, jumped up from the treatment table when they weren't looking and took off into the night. Running surprisingly fast, he wove his way up the darkened street, through the fence and into the woods. It was dark, thick and confusing, but the cops soon found him, or rather heard him. Yelling from the bottom of some kid's fox hole.

When word of what happened reached the school, there were several small boys, proud that they had helped nab a crook.

Scott Lacher ‘59

AIKEN DAY SCHOOL.... 1957

I remember dance classes, maypoles, and milk in little glass bottles.
My mother would kiss me and drop me off for Mrs. Beasley's kindergarten class.
Colors, numbers, musical chairs..... Now, that was the life.
The next year, first grade, first day, my mother forgot to kiss me goodbye.
Oh, the tears, emotion, the fears... nobody loves me.
You had to walk through the kindergarten room to get to the 1st grade room.
I do not remember my 1st grade teacher; we moved that fall;
but I will always remember, Mrs. Beasley, she seemed 6 ft. tall.
She would hug or kiss me on the forehead, everyday after that.
Shame, I never was able to let her know how much, she meant to me.

A.P.S. '65

It was the fall of '64; one day, after soccer practice,
Mr. Fletcher and I slipped off from school.
He was going to the quail farm for some birds.
He assumed that I had told Ms. Handy, the housekeeper,
where we were headed. We had a quiet trip, peaceful;
not to be compared with the up roar upon our return.
A trip to see Miss Flossie Tiller, the enema nurse, would have been better.
Ms. Handy, bless her soul, the 60's were our "Separate Peace".

Boy Robin, Wildman Robert

Robert Henry Wilds, '65