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FORTY FORT — In this Times Leader file photo, printed on Feb. 12, 1991, fourth-grade students at Wyoming Seminary Lower School color battle scenes of the Persian Gulf on a 4-by-7-foot sheet of paper during Eileen Warren’s art class. The project was designed to teach the students about cooperation, courage and survival. The finished product was displayed on a wall in the school.

The photo was taken by Clark Van Orden, who is currently the photo editor for the Times Leader.

In an accompanying article, staff writer Lily Arvizo wrote “Crayon-wielding fourth-graders … shared their interpretations of the war through art Monday. John Jacob, of Laflin, drew a huge U.S. plane lowering a tank into the Saudi desert while another tank burrowed several feet into the dirt toward Iraqi soldiers. ‘It’ll be a cool tank to go underground,’ Jacob said. ‘They don’t really drill. I’m just making it up like that.’”

The article continued: “The exercises on courage and survival began in December when students sent letters to soldiers in the Persian Gulf. The course will end with the students writing essays on their heroes … Each student is writing about a real hero in addition to a fictional one. John F. Kennedy, Mother Teresa, Mahatma Gandhi, Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr., Susan B. Anthony and Albert Einstein are some of the role models they’ve studied. The students are supposed to learn about new role models, said Patti Summerhill, a fourth-grade teacher.

“‘In fourth grade, they’re still young enough to think of a hero as being some very, very brave person,’ she said. ‘There are some other heroes that don’t come to light all the time.’”

Michael Orlando, of Pittston, who was in the class at the time told the reporter who his hero was at the time.

“I chose to read about George Bush because he stood up to Iraq,” Orlando said in the original article. “I would have done the same thing.”

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Editor’s Note: Every Thursday the Times Leader will reprint a photograph from our archives for the Throwback Thursday feature.