SMHS Memories

My number-one favorite memory is – YOU! Having no siblings or first cousins and spending the better part of a decade in San Marino schools, many of you became great friends. You were my playmates, classmates, teammates, dance-mates, date-mates and detention-mates!  We shared some of the best times and years of our lives.

Now a "Stroll" (such fun music then!) through my random and rambling memory:

FACULTY: Mr. Clopper, Coach Cunz, Coach Mahoney, and Miss Fenner. All had very positive influences on me- even Mr. Shickle from whom I earned an "F" in Latin. It's a hoot to recall Mrs. Peime in her high heels, either with "Dancing Don" Meadows or storming after the smokers in the girls’ bathrooms. What were those terrible nicknames for Stevens, Heffner, Lewis, Frost and others?

ATHLETIC PARTICIPATION: B Football winning the  Rio Hondo League Championship. Varsity Football beating Monrovia (26-25) for the first time in seven tries. Varsity Baseball winning RHL and playing in the CIF Championship game – sadly losing 5-3,  However, a season record of 23-1 is damned impressive!

DRAMA PARTICIPATION: Roles in "Stalag 17" and "Li'l Abner" plus the backstage "drama" with Mr. Clopper, Rick Troup, Roger Pfaff, Rich Gerage, Bill Taylor, Maureen Doughty (Daisy Mae!) and others.

ASSEMBLIES: Class competitions during pep rallies, John Goddard, Sam Riddle, the Beach Boys, Richard Nixon, and our own "School Belles."

FOOLISHNESS & FUN"  (On and Off Campus) Trash can fires, food fights, post game "encounters" with SPHS, powder puff football, the blast from the air raid siren (CD drill) once a month (Fridays at 10:00 a.m.), campaign parties for ASB candidates, the Huntington Hotel (Proms), Lacy Park, Twohey's, Bob's, Orange Julius, Colonial Kitchen, Bill Halley's beach house. The field trip to the USC library when Dee Wilson deliberately dumped an ice cream sundae on top of Bill Stevens head. The V Baseball team "field trip" to play Palm Springs H.S. followed by "dune diving" and learning how to ignite the "blue flame" and finally, Officer __________. (Name your favorite SMPD cop.

NEVER FORGET:  A lasting memory from the last day: During dinner at Grad Night (I can envision it so clearly) the well-executed striptease by Rick and Roger as the band played "The Stripper." They took almost all off – down to their white boxer shorts with the red hearts!  We all had such fun – a lifetime of "Moments To Remember,"

Since Grad Night

If one were to ask, "Since you left SMHS . . . . ", I would have to start my answer with the year 2007. No, I wasn't held back for four decades, but I did spend more time on campus than the rest of the Class of 1962.

In the fall of '62, along with Sue Brown, Ann Coughlin, Carol Munnecke, Carol Rice and Bob (now Rob) Stebbins, I matriculated at the University of Redlands. While there I often returned to SMHS to attend football games and plays, thereby staying in touch with many of the coaches and teachers. At the time, none of us knew we would soon become colleagues.

With enormous gratitude for my parents support, I was afforded the opportunity to remain at the UR through grad school, earning my MA and teaching credential, and retaining my "2S" student deferment draft classification!

During this time I also played football for the "Bulldogs" and coached the Frosh team for two seasons following graduation. On four occasions I competed against Don Carver who was playing for Pomona College.

Within ninety days of completing my graduate work, I was reclassified to "1A" and awaited my draft notice. In the meantime, I signed on  for substitute teaching in the S.M. school district and applied for Army Officers Candidate School. The same week I received my orders to report for my "pre-induction physical exam," I also was notified of my acceptance to OCS.  

What happened next was perhaps the most significant turning point in my life. Within a 24 hour period, I went from one foot in an OCS classroom (and likely on Viet Nam soil !), to total rejection of service in the U.S. Army, to signing a full time teaching contract with the SMUSD.  That led to forty more years at SMHS!  As is said,"Timing is everything.”I can relate the details of this unique set of circumstances in about three minutes. If you're interested, just ask me  sometime.

Six months later Coach Bob Cunz and I walked off a football field with the Varsity team having just lost a CIF Championship game, but what a way to start a great career at my alma mater as a teacher and coach of the TITANS ! I remained on his staff for fourteen seasons until his retirement. Over my years coaching football, we made many CIF appearances, but only won the Championship once, in 1988.

It was a different story for Varsity Baseball. After 25 years coaching JV baseball, I became a scout/coach for the Varsity, evaluating the players and team strategy of our opponents. This became extremely important during the CIF Playoffs, as the competition got progressively better. Coach Mickey McNamee, who replaced Coach Mahoney in 1964, lead the Varsity for forty seasons. During that time we made more than twenty appearances in the playoffs and were 5-2 in Championship games. What great fun and an honor to be part of his legacy and Titan baseball.

In the classroom, I taught every required course in the Social Studies Department (except Econ), several English classes, (including Shakespearean plays and instruction in writing research papers). health and driver education – fourteen years, behind-the-wheel driver training. A few funny and scary stories here, ya think!  Yes, I did have a number of your younger siblings on team and in class,  and eventually quite a few of your offspring as well.  But, when your grandkids started crawling toward SMHS through Carver and Valentine . . . !

On a personal plane, I've never married, though engagements and disengagements are rumored to have occurred. Kids?  None that I know about. I've lived in a condo across the street from Cal Tech since 1973 and I currently have a place in San Diego near Balboa Park.

During the summer of 1970 I chaperoned forty high school students on a three-week tour of Europe. That was the start of extensive travel for me. I've since return to England and/or "the Continent" on six occasions, made two trips to Asian countries, two to Latin America nations and, with my Dad, gone on fishing trips to Canada and New Zealand. The Canadian trip was a wonderful time at Paul (Buz) Clopper's cabin at Lake of the Woods. I can also throw in eight cruises, two through the Alaskan inland passage, another through the Panama canal, one around the Baltic Sea, one to the Bahamas, one around Cape Horn, one on the Mississippi River and a most surreal water passage to Cuba. At the time of that one, I had taught U.S. History for several years and suddenly found myself aboard a Soviet cruise ship sailing into Havana Harbor past the berth where the Maine was blown up. I fell right into the pages of my textbook. On board for a week, I never photographed the huge hammer & sickle emblem on the ship's stack.  Hey, I remembered that the John Birch Society was once headquartered in San Marino!

One final travel comment. Anyone interested in railroad travel, please call me or Rob Stebbins. In 1988, we, along with another Redlands classmate, formed a rather dubious entity,"The Rusty Rails." Since then we've been on dozens of railroad journeys around the country, riding in cabooses, boxcars, gondolas, locomotive cabs, Amtrak chair and sleeper cars and several luxurious private rail cars. Come along with us sometime. ALL ABOARD !

YES !  I KNOW. This is loooong. But, it is the one and only "auto-bio" shot I choose to take and you are the only ones I care to "Friend". (So lame!)  I don't belong to "Facebook," "Twitter" or any other such thing. I own a dumb phone and don't own a computer.I do go to the library for e-mail exchanges, talk on my cell (but take pictures with a camera !) and occasionally write letters and "Thank You" notes.  However,"face to face" communicating, especially while slowly eating and drinking, works best for me. Let's make more time to do that.

See you at the next reunion. Boni and I insist!