Time to crank up the band and make some noise about West Covina High School Class of 1963. We are having the 55 year class reunion in Cathedral City: October 26th - 28th. That Saturday night there will be a dinner and dance. Mark your calendars, Classmates.
Details will be revealed as soon as Sue does the deal.
Bud

I haven't blogged here since our 50 year reunion. Now Sue Hunter is planning another for our 55th. That will be in 2018 and probably the same venue as the last in Palm Springs. Wouldn't it be fantastic if we had 100 classmates attending!

Five years ago I jumped in to help organize our 50 year class reunion. Along with Sue Hunter, Bill Kouri, and Warren Schifini we set about establishing phone and email contacts with classmates to build interest in the event. The sad news was that we found many members had died and most of the class was unaware. I decided that we needed to memorialize those and all classmates who have left us. 

Lake Tahoe Concours D'Elegance 2015

Photo from Woody Boater Magazine

Classmate Tim Robinson and son Brian have made quite a name for themselves in what started as a hobby for Tim - classic wooden boat restoration. Robinson Restorations is now restoring a speedboat once owned by Henry Ford. Click on the link to read a great article on Tim and his boat work ... Woody Boater

Team Go Bill

My classmate, Bill Sabatino is battling for his life. He has a rare form of leukemia that requires a stem cell transplant. A compatible donor needs to be found. If you or someone you know are between the ages of 18 and 44 then maybe you or they can help by joining the Be The Match registry.

 Join Now


 You are only asked to donate cells if you come up as a match to a patient.  The process is painless and easy:

There are two types of marrow donation, a peripheral blood stem cell (PBSC) donation and a traditional marrow donation

 - 75% of the time, patients need a stem cell donation, which is similar to donating blood.  This is what Bill needs.

 - 25% of the time patients need marrow cells, which the doctor draws from the donor’s hipbone. You should not experience pain.

 Melanie Wong - WCHS ASB office responded to my query as to how the Mike Okura Memorial Scoreboard fund is doing. As I recall the needed sum is $75K...long way to go

"We are still under $15,000 I believe. I am forwarding your email to our committee contacts."

Classmate updates:

Fellow '63 Spartans:

In October of '13 I was diagnosed with some kind of tumor on/in my brain.  (Yes, frequent appearances to the contrary at WCHS, I do have one!).

The Medics removed what they could in April of '14 and I've been doing the radiation/(oral) chemo routine since.

In true Beowolf (remember our classes on that?) style, after my surgery I decided to maintain a 99.97% positive attitude and fight it all the way to the Finish line.  

First, I would follow medical instructions to the letter.  

Second, I would maintain a positive mental attitude and work very hard to NOT become a burden on my wife or our friends, because everyone my/our age has something going on.

Since the April surgery, the remaining tumor ("lesion") is about half the size it was the day after surgery.  I've lost a bit of weight, but needed to do that anyway.  I feel fine, except for mild fatigue and flirtations with nausea, during my "chemo weeks".

This thought has helped me and I share it because it may help others in a similar situation:

                 I have Cancer.

                 It doesn't have me.

Air Cooled Forever!

Mike Newlon
Palm Desert CA

Hello, Mike and Bill Sabatino (with an update for WCHS Class of 1963)

This is Lee Downs.  My compliments on your approaches to dealing with your cancers - I agree completely.  Keep up the good fight!

And yes, Mike, I remember the "Beowulf" sessions as well as "Julius Caesar" from Sophomore year.  And what was that about the Ides of March?

After graduating from MSAC in 1966, I was in the Navy (submarines) from 1966-1995, commissioned from the ranks, retired as a Lieutenant Commander (LCDR) .  Mostly out of the continental US for much of that time, so I lost contact with the whole class.  I was glad to be "found" here in Virginia Beach by the 50th Reunion organizers (man, did they organize!).

But I missed our 50th reunion and actually only made the 15th while I was stationed in San Diego 1973-79.  And I was at our submarine base in Scotland (closed in 1990) when the 25th reunion happened in 1988; couldn't make that one either.

But I digress.  The real message to you both is that I greatly admire your courage and example to us all.  My prayers are with you both.  

Best Regards,

Lee Downs

Virginia Beach VA

This just in from a WCHS '63 girls gathering down in Jamul, California. Hiking Mt McGuinty are, L to R, Susie, Karen, Linda, Barbara with Marilyn on the camera.

Keep them coming, classmates!
Bud

Edna Davies Owen writes...

"Bud, thanks for keeping all of us in touch! I was in West Covina not too long ago and Cortez Park looks just the same, of course there was a little league game going on......The Church next door has expanded the parking lot and the was is covered over with pavement. I wonder if the kids now days still climb the big trees and pick the mistletoe?!?  I know they do not have the freedom and fun we all had, being gone all day and just showing up in time for dinner. I don’t know if it was any safer then, but we were unaware if it wasn’t. And instead of video games, we played ding dong ditch, kick the can and more! My grandkids don’t know what they are missing. Guess we have gotten older although I don’t think any different.  The reunion was great and am looking forward to the next one."

 

Latest news in from classmates. 

Hi Bud and Tom and all concerned.

Thank you for keeping me in the loop. You must ask Bill if he remembers the summer days at Cortez park where Bill and I and Denny Allen and the guys would play 3 flys up or toss footballs around etc. Those were the days. Are they looking for stem cell donors for Bill? I would be willing to give it a try if does not conflict with my situation.

You can let all on the e-mail chain know this info. I have cancer also. I have had 2 surgerys. The latest was a radical tumor and surrounding tissue removal. They think they got all of it. No chemo or rad yet. MRI is the next step. They will be checking my lymphnodes ETC.

BOY, it's tough getting old

Class of '63 rocks-----It was the best.

Terry Thorsness

This is the latest news on bill Sabatino, feel free to share this with any concerned classmates, keep him in your prayers, Thanks, Tom Hetzel.

---

From: blackieblackford@gmail.com
To: slambright@aol.com
Sent: 9/18/2014 4:40:48 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time
Subj: Direct words from Sabo today

2nd chemo starts tomorrow.6days hospital 3 weeks in condo. This goes on until we match donor. Transplant, hope and pray stem cell does not reject odds 70/30 it takes, if reject ball game over for me Sabo, Steve this is the exactly what he told me, let everybody know thanks Bill Blackford

 

Thank you so much for the wonderful prayers, there is no doubt I will submit to Jesus's will. He has been with me ever step of the way.

Sabo

As expected, the 50th reunion came and went in a heartbeat. All the reports coming my way say that a wonderful time was had by...EVERYONE!  I would like to recognize these classmates for their contributions to the success of our reunion:

The entire weekend's venue was put together by Sue Hunter. Sue did a wonderful job in organizing what we saw as a seamless celebration of our 50th.  

Bill Kouri spent many days and dollars looking for and finding classmates.

Warren & Joanne Shifini selflessly spent time and money providing me a '63 Lycurgean, lists of names to add to the hunt and notes to Classmates.com members about the reunion.

Linda Joseph Duncan provided floral arrangements and party accessories.

Judy Phillips Wallace provided the pizza for the Friday night party.

Carol Holroyd McLendon helped to organize the Friday pizza party and clean-up.

Bill Ashdown , class of '61, provided his DJ services for our Saturday night dinner/dance.

Carol Hunter Stewart, class of '61, (Sue's sister) and her husband manned the registration table Friday and Saturday.

Steve Lambright provided those awesome photos of life on campus back in the day. 


Thank you,
Bud

The 50 year class reunion is fast approaching. 38 days hence we will be basking in the beautiful sunshine and dry air of Cathedral City at The Doral Desert Princess. While we are still looking for 95 classmates, we have found and accounted for 226. You can view all the Lost/Found/InMemory/Attending pages here - http://wchs63reunion.com/

Signed up to attend The Reunion so far, we have 67 classmates with another dozen lurking in the wings keeping us all in suspense. Sue Hunter has made all the arrangements and says there is a little wiggle room for unexpected folks, but try not to be one of those, please.

You may know that we started a Flickr page, Classmates Now, and classmates are encouraged to send in a current selfie that can be posted there. In jest, I posed this as a place to reveal yourself as you are now to ease the shock of the big expose at the reunion. I am truly, in awe of the utter handsomeness, character, and poise of all who dared.

This reunion is something to cherish. Join in the fun and make the most of it.

Bud

The West Covina High School class of 1963 Reunion is only 68 days away. 72% of the class has been accounted for and nearly 70 have already signed up for the dinner/dance during the 3 day gathering at the Doral Desert Princess in Cathedral City, Oct 4th - 6th. Any classmate who wants to attend and hasn't signed up yet can do so by sending a check ($40 per person) to ;

Sue Hunter
28963 Isleta Court
Cathedral City, CA 92234

 The class website can be visited at www.wchs63reunion.com 

(Be sure to click on the buttons atop the website to view all the pages.)

The last classmate found to date, Loajean Brailey Young, gets us up to the 62% in classmates accounted for from WCHS '63. Loajean is 156th of the 319 we identify with our class. Not every one of the 319 classmates we have searched for graduated with the class, but were with us most of those years.

With 4 1/2 months until the reunion we have slowed way down in finding people on the lost list. Word of mouth and curiosity have got to kick in as I think it did with Loajean. We are well into 2013, our 50th year since graduation so lost folks just might start wondering about good old West Covina Hi and what happened to all those bright young faces.

Today, I took a count of those committed to attending the reunion dinner and came up with 47 classmates. Still lots of folks who haven't decided if they're going. That makes it tough on Sue Hunter who has to deal with the country club banquet room manager.

It has been awhile since the last post. Have had some chores that needed doing.

I wanted to share with the class the sad news that Ernie Ewegen lost his battle with cancer last month. His brother, John was clearing out Ernie's phone messages when he heard mine about the class reunuion. John was so kind in letting us know about Ernie's passing so that we could honor him "In Memory" on our class website.

On a happier note, we have found another classmate. Thanks to Laura Wine Paster sending in a phone number she had we were able to do a reverse lookup and get an address for Linda Guerrero, now Linda Grensted. Bill Kouri, ace detective, vacationing in Encinitas where the reverse lookup showed Linda went by and left a note. Linda, arriving home from exotic faraway places, found the note and called Bill.

So the list of classmates to find "dwindles" to 134. We've still got a lot of work to do.

We have surpassed the halfway mark in accounting for classmates. Sadly, it was by posting three more classmates "In Memory":

Valerie Goodell
Terry Kiley
Diana Lile

RIP

Just found Carole Tyner Bergeron. Also Linda Plesetz Hennings sent her email in to be put on the group email list. We have accounted for 156 classmates so 3 more puts us over the halfway point.

Sue Hunter tells me the call for dinner/dance money has checks arriving at a high rate. She asked that it be made clear that the $40 ea., posted on the website, was for each person, so a couple would be $80. 

I am going to assume that we can create a list of those paid and call it "Attending - Confirmed" or some such. Keep an eye out for the list. I will probably post the list in our private group emailing and the private group blog. So if you read this and haven't gotten in your email address to me you might want to now.

A video of West Covina High School's Class of 1963

The reunion crowd is growing, we stand at 118 found of the 315 1963 alums. Folks are excited about getting together to celebrate 50 years of character building after high school. Maybe not so surprising, only 8 of those found have expressed no desire to go to a reunion of such upstanding citizens as ourselves.

The latest info has been posted on the facebook page and the website so everybody can plan accordingly.