A Lifetime Ago: Before the Death of Childhood

Jeremy Joyell graduated from CLAS in 1964, where he met his wife, Irene, '65. He received a master's degree from the University of Hartford in 1967 and taught high school in Bristol for 25 years. The Joyells are both retired from teaching and live in Bristol.

His new book, A Lifetime Ago , recalls what Waterbury was like in the post-World War II years and how childhood was different then. At a recent 40 th grammar school reunion, former classmates agreed, “We were such lucky kids to have grown up when we did,” he says.

One of his grammar school classmates went on to become president of the New York Stock Exchange, and another became a Radio City Music Hall Rockette. They went to school in an era when jackets and ties and dresses were the required wear, and “in a blue collar town, parents backed it up,” Joyell says.

Hear his podcast about life in Waterbury, “a little Boston,” and about students and children of the 1950s.