| 45th REUNION RECAP The HHS Class of 1958 held it's 45th reunion at The Llanerch Country Club on Saturday, June 7, 2003. The thanks of the entire class go to the committee that worked for months to pull together such a terrific event: Richard (Dick) Young, Sara Westlake Caldwell, Dale Burkholder Hastings, Richard (Pat) Caldwell, Joann DelPizzo Miller, Barbara (Babs) Horton Holloway, Dorothea (Dottie) Keene Todd, Blair Klepper, Elinore O'Connell Verna, and Laurence B. Ritter. Tour of the High School Despite a teeming rainstorm, approximately 40 classmates gathered to tour HHS on Saturday morning. Mary Beth Laur, a school district administrator and the mother of three students who attended HHS, led the group through the complex, which is now a four-year institution with more than 1,700 students (425 to 450 per class, compared to our 350). Babs Horton Holloway described the tour as "remarkable" and the school as "vast." Since we attended HHS, the school has been expanded by at least 50 percent. The bays that we remember between the three wings of the school have been filled in, essentially squaring off the building. The gym, which looks much as it did, has been dedicated to Stephen M. Juenger, the coach who led us (how could we forget?) to the state basketball championship in 1958. Today there is an impressive display of banners on the gym's walls, marking state and conference championships in various sports. There are two cafeterias (one for 9th and 10th grades; the other for 11th and 12th grades) with lounging areas that, according to Dick Young, "seem to be in keeping with the lenient collegiate air." Dick also noted that while the library is still filled with books, the mezzanine-level "media center" houses 60 personal computers with both Windows and Apple operating systems and is "where the serious research work is done." The auditorium is scheduled for a major renovation. (After all, folks, it has been almost a half century since we moved into the "brand-new" school in the spring of 1956, with the smell of concrete still drying.) And the curriculum has been greatly revised since we trod those hallowed halls. For example, the "wood shop" now features computer-aided design capabilities. Babs Horton Holloway said of the tour, "We left knowing that any student who attends this great school is certainly fortunate." Reunion at Llanerch Country Club More than 160 people (100+ classmates, plus spouses and significant others) gathered at Llanerch Country Club on Saturday evening for cocktails, dinner, dancing (to fifties sounds from a jukebox!), and nonstop conversation. Our class president, Dick Young, greeted classmates at the door and smoothly orchestrated the flow of the entire event in his laid-back, laconic style. The evening was filled with memorable moments, including a skit by Pete and Bob Elder, which reminded us that, as the French know, "the more things change, the more they stay the same." The decades fell away as Pete and Bob once again amused us with their trademark hijinks. The trick of the evening was to move among classmates, greeting and conversing, without allowing one's glance to fall to the name badges that everyone sported. Peeking was bad form: however, sometimes it was simply unavoidable. One would see two people approach one another and exchange a pleasant word or two. Then one would surreptitiously glance at the other's name badge and let out a yelp of recognition, followed by a hearty embrace. At the end of the evening, each classmate received an HHS '58 tote bag and a booklet containing the replies to the reunion questionnaire. Reluctantly, the last of us departed just before midnight, vowing to begin planning an extraordinary get-together for our 50th -- only five short years from now. For each of us, the reunion was a swirl of current impressions overlaid by fond memories. Please add your thoughts to those below. Even you weren't able to make it to reunion, we'd like to hear from you. Tell us about your life today and what you remember of your years at HHS. Just email your message to our fearless webmaster Blair Klepper at: [fbk352@aol.com]. |
| Memories Are Made Of This! |
| Oh my, what a trip down memory lane! I hadn't been back to the Havertown area in years, so not only did I attend reunion, I also made other pilgrimages: to the house in Pilgrim Gardens where I grew up; to Manoa School, where I remember falling off the monkey bars in third grade; even to the house on the Jersey Shore, where I spent all or part of every summer of my life until I was 40. This immersion in another time and place produced a curious phenomenon: for days, I became "unmoored" from the present, happily drifting back and forth in a sea of memories that span decades. Memories of close friends, some no longer here –– memories of the fifties, such a different world then –– memories of the young woman I was, so eager to venture out into life, so innocent about what lay ahead. Reconnecting with all of that –– and with all of you –– made me realize how very much I am of that time and place, how deeply embedded all of it is my DNA, in what makes me me. You can take the girl out of Philly, but you can't take Philly out of the girl. – Love to all, Virginia Foster – |
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| It seems there's nothing like a reunion to jog the memory of times long past. Most of our known world while we were growing up and in school was Havertown and nearby communities. Although we were aware of what was happening in the rest of the country and the world, we always felt safe and secure there. We have all certainly traveled many varied and interesting paths to get to this time and place. It was indeed a pleasant experience to see so many friends from years ago and to have an all-too-brief chance to swap life's experiences and reminisce about almost forgotten happenings of the past. It would have been even better if we could have had days or weeks instead of hours and minutes to exchange our thoughts with each other and had enough time to talk to everyone in our class. It would have also been a lot easier to identify each other if we hadn't all decided to disguise our physical appearances just to fool each other and THEN had the audacity to wear name-tags to add yet another mental insult to our faded recollections and memory (boy, good old whatsisname sure has changed, hasn't he?). We have certainly traveled many roads in our 45 year journey to get here after leaving HHS and through our lives we have also experienced the astronomical acceleration in the speed of change to our lifestyle, country and the world after spending our early years in such a constant and stable era. In today's fast-paced society, it's all too easy to forget just how fortunate we are to have lived when and where we have. I cannot possibly think of any other time throughout history that I would have rather lived in. We have all been blessed many times over the years and we certainly have also suffered some of life's many speed-bumps as we progressed to get to this point in time and I just hope that we can all continue to be blessed and hang in there until we get to do it all over again for our 50th! See you then! – Best wishes for continued good health and happiness to all, - Blair Klepper – |
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