From St. Nicholas magazine, 1916.

From Wizardry Gaiden: The Second Episode: Curse of the Ancient Emperor handbook.

Yes, they got TWO words wrong in this quotation (about 20% in error!).  From Clarion's 1946 yearbook.

All poetry worth reading begins the same way, with a battle between two bears.  From Barnard's 1907 yearbook.

It's a Googlewhack to this day: "To see how color flies through kaleidoscopic eyes, you must start the spinning gyre and consure each day in fire."  From Hollins' 1962 yearbook.

By Helene Coogan.  From Coraddi, 1931.

Here's a precursor to John Blase's logic that God is blue:

If God is Love (as the Bible says)
and Love is Blue (as the song says)
then the law of transitivity leads me to
at least consider the possibility that
God is Blue (as I’ve long hunched).
—"In Praise of Blue," 2020

From The Gateway, Feb. 20, 1969.

Two pronunciations of "row."  From Kansas State's 1907 yearbook.

"To know the Moon as few men may, one must be just a little fey; and for our friendship's sake I'm glad that I am just a trifle mad."  From The Complete Poems of Robert Service, 1945.

From Woroni, 1983.

"Some ships go East and others West, / While the selfsame breezes blow; / It's the set of the sails and not the gales / That bids them where to go. / Like the winds of the seas / Are the ways of the Fates, / As we journey on through life; / It's the set of the soul / That determines the goal, / And not the storms and strife."  From Salem's 1929 yearbook.

In the late 1800s, children were taught early that people look like dogs.  From Pittypat and Tippytoe by Eugene Field, 1896.

"He sees phoniness in nearly everything."  Irving Layton, in The Martlet, 1965.

That is a cat respectable,

Connectable

With selectable

Felines respectable,

Whose names would make you quiver.

That is a cat of piety,

Not satiety,

But sobriety.

Its very purr is of piety

And thanks to its Feline Giver.

—Sinclair Lewis

Photo from Northeastern's 1972 yearbook.

Chris Piuma, rapier sharpened by a battery of Latin examinations, offers today's Tic Tac Toe-generated story.

Our Tic Tac Toe generator builds stories out of the one-letter words X and O.  Here's an example.  To play along, see below for instructions and a link to a template.

"I wish something that rhymes with boat would strike me."  From Otterbein's 1911 yearbook.

"The pleasant books, that silently among our household treasures take familiar places, and are to us as if a living tongue spake from the printed leaves or pictured faces."

From East Carolina's 1930 yearbook.

"My Life Like a Feather Pillow."  From Tenderloin Times, April-May 1981.

We encountered a charming wizard's song in "What If a Witch?" by Elaine McQueen (Ethos, 1964). 

I came from there

and now I'm here

and tomorrow I'll be

I don't know where ...

I'm a flunk at ghosts

I can't make toasts

and instead of boiling

my cauldron roasts ...

My name is ___,

a wizard by whim.

I spin magic marvels

when daytime grows dim ...

But you're all so friendly

I'll try to be good

and put all my magic

away in the wood.