OHS Newsletter
(Archived Copy)

A Summary of Events and Topics of Interest to OHS grads and friends

March 10, 2003

IN THIS ISSUE:

Seems at though this is turning into a bi-weekly newsletter. I just haven't had the time to spend on it this past 6 months or so. Been a lot happening.

First, Norma Allison Pernell thanks you for your prayers concerning her son. Keep them coming! We're all praying for a swift and complete recovery.

Thank you, also, for all your prayers regarding the surgery. Due to the flu, it was AGAIN postponed until next Wednesday, March 12, 2003. I have already lost weight due to the new diuretic and the lovely flu bug. I've gone from 360+ down to 326, which is a plus going into surgery. Two women in my apartment building, and 4 women at work have had this done, not all the same way, but still gastric bypass. It's an almost built in support group. I've also been informed there is a "closet" full of Lane Bryant Clothes in sizes 12-3X. You sign out your size as your lose weight, and return the larger ones, this way you save money on buying new outfits while losing weight. The doctor assures me that the operation is 1.5-2 hours, and an hour recovery, 2-3 days in the hospital, barring no complications. My girlfriend Katie has lost 122 lbs since last May and looks incredible. Actually good enough for a magazine cover. Of course I'm not expecting to be on ELLE, after all, she's 30. But when I'm done, maybe I'll get a photo shoot with AARP! Right next to a Winnebago or something!

I hope everyone received the email regarding the Yearbook CD's. I'll try to scan more while I'm recuperating. It's $10 a CD. I will put all of what we have available on each CD. You don't have to send $10 for each year. Please pass this on to others who don't get the letter. Also, if anyone has a '66 book they would scan or lend to Bob Chan or I to scan, please let me know. It would be returned as soon as we completed the scanning.

Speaking of the yearbooks, Bob Chan, '71, tells me that an Oaken Bucket from the 30's just went for over $200 on EBAY! Can you believe that??? We're looking into the mystery to see what made this particular yearbook so valuable.

Any of you watch Survivor? Currently Roger Sexton, '64, Skyline, is one of the contestants. Anybody out there remember Rod? I know we have several Skyliners on the list!

One of our members, Michael Ben Edward, 1957, recently had an article published on Yahoogroups.com. If you'd like to read "Good, bad, It's hard to say," and " Give War a Chance", check into F.A.R.T.S. Digest Number 815 on Yahoo. Keep up the creative work, MBE!

A note from Shirley Fong Foey, '65. Shirley was asked to come out of retirement to substitute teach for a couple of weeks, but chose to leave Oregon for a bit to run down and visit her sister in Reno. Maybe this time Shirley can hook up with Vicki Bearce O'Shaugnessy and Dixie Brewer Dickenson '65 , They both live in Carson City Nevada.

Brian Digardi '65, Dave Tracy, '65, and Rich Tan '65 made the trip from the Bay Area to Hearst's Castle last weekend. Brian said it was amazing there. They returned home up the Big Sur coastline. What a beautiful drive. The trio is considering making their next outing to Yosemite. It's so great that these guys haven't lost touch in 38 years since high school. That's what this letter is all about. Friendships that have survived over the years, and new ones that we've just made!

Another way to make new friends and also reconnect is through our Message Boards. Currently, my brother Tom, Graphicsdoc1, moderates our OHS message board on Arborwood. He has started putting up a question a week to spike some new attention to the board. This week's question concerns the high gas prices. Check it out at http://www.arborwood.com/ . There are lots of other topics out there too, as well as photos of old Oakland and Alameda. Message boards are like emails, but you can jump in any conversation. Arborwood will inform you of any replies to your comments. Go on out and check it out. Tom's put some really funny stories on there, too.

Hugs to all,

Bonnie

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Ginger Hudson writes:
Also, wanted to tell you that Mun Wah was here in Stockton showing his film at San Joaquin Delta College and I went to see him! It was very different than I thought it would be, not just a movie, but he did a workshop that involved the audience totally. It was fascinating. He is a very gentle, sweet, but forceful man. I spoke with him briefly after the film and told him I was from Oakland. Ironically, one of the people in the film is named Tom Burke, so I was wondering if it was your brother, but Mun Wah didn't think so.

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REGULAR REUNION BLURBS:

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Welcome to Patricia Moreira Butler '54, who has just joined our email list! You can write her at Butler651@aol.com .
Also a welcome to Rod Souza, 67, husband of Lisa Oldt Souza '68. You can reach Rod at Rod@lisaknit.com.

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More and more names and wonderful old photos have been added in the past 2 weeks again thanks to the ongoing efforts of Bob Chan '71, who continues to send me a wealth of photos and names that I have added to the Memorial Pages.

  • Class of 1905
      Miriam C. Coffee
      Linda Pearl Cotter
      Gladys Ann English
      Helen Ellen Hill
      Ruth Amanda Hitchcock
      Lorena Mac Intyre
      Herman Rittigstein
      Jack W. Taylor
      Helen W. Waterman
      Edna Whitney
      Charles A. Whitton
  • Class of 1914
      Phoebe Hortense Meyer
      Roland Conrad Milliken
      Marjorie T. Mock
      Grant W. Monroe
      Herbert A. Murray
      Ralph E. Norris
      John W. Oakley
      Seijino Okuno
      Duke Pavilger
      Sarah Phillips
      Mildred Randolph
      Clare Elizabeth Reynolds
  • Class of 1924
      Arlo Allen
      Raymond J. Ambrose
      Leland C. Arbuthnot
      Windfield Scott Baggett
      Lauretta Colette Baldwin
      Dorothy Elizabeth Banta
      Mervyn Charles Barron
      Joseph Boyarsky
      Coby Lorenzen
  • Class of 1925
      Christy T. Allen
      Leona Hazel Barnes
      Nell Deyette Bayard
      Ethel Ericka Bersch
      Frank L. Bohn
      Charles Warren Bramhall
  • Class of 1927
      Robert Cooper
      George V. Currlin
      Mildred Lucille Curtis
      Russell Lloyd Davis
      Frances Elizabeth Dietzler
      Dorothy Dean Drake
      Domingo Estrada Ea
      Marion Arvella Flannery
      Donald C. Forbis
      Maxine Emily Franck
      Nathan Friedkin
      Morris Gladstein
      Helen Marie Glenn
      Jean Anne Goldberg
      Marcella Jeanne Gravier
      Iris W. Hamilton
      Herbert Carl Heinz
      Pearl David Hunter
      James Jan
      Secil Ernest Kyle
      Ernest A. Mennell
      Walter Frank Milestone
  • Class of 1931
      Howard H. Fisher
      Jeanette Fuller
      Mona Jane Goodell
      Elizabeth E. Grandjean
      Leonard Louis Griswold
      Gertrude Josephine Happ
      Virginia Harrington
      Kenneth Rudolph Hilgedick
      Arthur Hobson
      Malcolm Wallace Hodkins
      Dorothy E. Holmes
      Charles Edward Ivy
      Ileen Beatriz Johnson
      Leighton Johnson
      Arlina Mildred Jorgensen
      Robert E. Kalbaugh
      Merritt Edward Keary
      Jeanette Keating
      Julian Bruce Keating
      Milllard R. Kibbe
      Leslie Thomas Ledson
      William J. MacDonald
      William Magliano
      Helen Charlotte Moeller
      Anna Belle Nicholson
      Virginia E. Pugh
      Mary Elizabeth Rennacker
      Theodore Nicholas Rozoles
      Josephine Taber Rubidge
      Ewart Haddon Thresh
  • Class of 1950
      Marjorie Faye Bass
      John Hughes Bennett
      Thomas Edmond Bolger
      Diane Louise Bolmen
      Glen A. Bowlsbey
      Claude Harold Brandon
      Dona Lee Brown
      Norman Allen Burgk
      Dolores Susan Davis
      Nolan MacDonald Davis
      Bernard E. Drost
      Everett Edwin Eby
      Ralph Leonard Edmister
      Douglas W. Gildroy

Send additions, corrections, comments PLEASE to Bev Shulster

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Bob Chan '71 has been busy at work finding old yearbooks at the Oakland Public Library. On one of his forays he looked in the 1922 Aegis and found a goldmine! The class of 1922 noted the fifieth anniversary of OHS by including a section in the yearbook with all the names of all the grads from 1872 till 1922. I have managed to update classes 1872-1890 on the website and will be continuing further as the days go by.

Beautiful artwork accompanied the 25 page alumni list and a brief history by (apparently) the vice principal of the school was included. I will be copying this history onto the history page of the Memorial Site within the next week.

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I have a great job. Seriously. I wouldn't trade it for the world. The first day I came to train for the job, the girl I was replacing said," these are my crayons and these are my color books." I thought she was kidding. After all, I was coming to work for the Criminal Investigation Division of the Marine Corps. The color books must have been a joke. They weren't. Don't get me wrong, we have crime, just not on the scale of a big city. Our department also dabbles in Community Relations, neighborhood policing programs, and once a year we hold a softball tournament, pistol and rifle shoot, golf tournament and K-9 competition. Believe me, I don't know a thing about golf but I can set up a tournament! Part of the job. It also leaves me lots of free time to write a weekly email letter, and a few years ago, I even wrote a book. I did it just to prove I could. I published only one copy. No one but my family will probably ever read it. It took me 3 years to complete. Get ready to laugh. It was a book about haunted houses and other strange things. All from family/friends contributions. That is why no one will get to read it.

The point I'm making is I kind of fell into this job. I was very lucky.

I read a story today about a guy with the ideal job. He is a taste tester for Dreyers Ice Cream. Now how would you get a job like that? Would you need a resume? What would you put on it? Taste tested Fosters Freeze for 2 years, and attended Ice Cream College (Yeah Ice Cream Boy, you know who you are!)? What kind of qualifications would get you a job like that? Did he find this job on Monsterjob.com?

How do you get the really great jobs like mattress tester? What about the person who checks to see there are M&M's on every piece of candy? My daughter's friend works in a light bulb factory, testing light bulbs all day. There is a job on the Food Network I'd love to have. The show is "$40 a day". This woman gets to travel to all the exciting cities of the world and eat. The catch is she can only spend $40 a day. HOW did she get that job? Believe me, I can eat with the best of them. I'm sure I'm more than qualified to host this show. I wonder what kind of job interview she had?

The guy from Dreyers will be visiting stores in the Ice Cream isle to teach the art of swirling, smacking and spitting ice cream. He has special skills. No wonder he got the job. I'm sure his qualifications looked lovely on his resume.

Of course, not all jobs are dream jobs. Who tests the wings on Always? Or tests Depends? Or suppositories? Now there is a great job, suppository checker! Love to see the resume for THAT one! Better, yet, the Job Announcement. Needed: Suppository Checker. Must be able to work well with hands. Nimble. Irregularity not a problem..........Be your own boss....

Who sees how many licks you can get on a tootsie Pop before you get to the chocolate? Who decided that a size 5 men's shoe is different than a size 5 woman's?

Back in Oakland High, counselor's talked to us about what plans we had for the future. Most of us went to school. Some of us got jobs. No one told me I could have been an ice cream taster. I might have been good at that. I'm sure I can swirl and smack with the best of them. Instead, I quit junior college and I took Classified Ads on the Telephone for the Oakland Tribune. Although not near as fun, I sure enjoyed paydays each week. I think I got paid every Tuesday, and $78 after taxes seemed pretty big to me. I bought a 56 Chevy, and my own clothes (but that is another story). Yep, I didn't need no stinkin edumacation! I had me a job.

The counselors never mentioned a few other jobs. How would you get to be Number 5 quality assurance checker at the Fruit of the Loom Factory? Is this checker a man or a woman? How would a woman even KNOW how the man's underwear fit or if they were right? Did she get a naked man to try each pair on? If so, why would anyone want to buy them after that? Not a comforting visual......Who is the mysterious checker Number 5?

And who was the wise person who got the job of inventing the "Do Not Remove Under Penalty of Law" tag on mattresses and pillows? Who ever actually SAW this law? I never saw it become a law on School House Rock. (I'm just a bill, sitting here on capitol hill........) Seriously, who wrote and submitted this law to congress? And, if there is such a law, is there really Mattress Police? Who decides what is going to be a law? Did we vote some of this stuff in or was it tacked onto something else, and went unnoticed?

I will admit, taking Classified ads was never dull. There was always an idiot to talk to in-between the normal people selling or buying things. And every guy that called seemed to think he was Romeo and you were his dream girl, right down to heavy breathing on the phone. (his, not mine!)Some guys used the classified ad phones just to flirt. Thank Goodness they have 900 numbers for that now. Of course I do miss hearing occasional heavy breathing now and then! Still, it was nothing compared to what you can buy on EBAY these days. Give it a category and a price and you can sell ANYTHING on EBAY! Someone tried to sell a kidney once. And, Moon rocks. Who knows, you could probably buy Elvis's toe nail clippings (yuck) or Tammy Faye Baker's fake eyelashes! Used, of course. In fact, I was told Luis Gonzales, the baseball player, spit out his gum, and it was grabbed by a fan and sold on EBAY for $20,000 ( heard this from my son, so not sure of the authenticity).

The point is, some people just have a knack for falling into the right jobs, the right timing for selling things, or meeting the right person. What little kid says, "Mom, I'm going to grow up to taste ice cream?" and does it? What school counselor tells a student, "Don't go to college! You can make a fortune testing mattresses!" You either have it or you don't.

Yep, I love my job. I can't get pens or envelopes and paper, but I've got a brand new computer with a CD/DVD burner on it, a scanner, a refrigerator and microwave next to the desk, a surround-sound CD/DVD player and a stack of CD's, a box of crayons and color books. I drink bottled water, and have lunch delivered. I work for the government, so if someone sneezes, it's a holiday. Our big criminal case is a serial sprinkler stealer, whose stolen 15 sprinkler heads from 15 different houses with a total value of $5. OH yeah, he's a truly evil criminal. We're going on stake-out. All I'm missing is a big screen TV and a wet-bar! I guess I don't need to be an ice cream taster. Heck, after the Marines have run 3 miles in the morning, I even get heavy breathing on the phone! I'm a working woman, and Yep, I love my job! Life is good.

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  1. What character on a TV show had T-Negative blood type?
  2. What was the original name of the group Chicago?
  3. What product made kids cry "Look Ma, No cavities!"
  4. What article of clothing could you buy for $1 from Scott Paper in 1966?
  5. How much were tickets to Woodstock?
  6. What make of car was a Stratochief?
  7. Who came from Frostbite Falls, Minnesota?
  8. What was the name of Joey Clark's black stallion?
  9. What was the name of the Alka Seltzer boy?
  10. What town had a station called BDRX?
    Bonus Question: Hey, guys, do you remember how much 3 "Trojans" cost in 1965? (this is a question from Trivial Pursuit!)
Jack Delowe, '58, got the June Cleaver question. Her name was Bronson. Way to go, Jack!

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Pictures this week include:

Sandy Emerson Reyes Skyline '66 as a child, with an as-yet unknown OHS grad from '64 or '65 taken on Rosemount Ave. Anyone recognize this cutie?

Sandy and ...?
Sandy and ...?

Also, does anyone recall POP BEADS? My grandmother must have had a million of them!

Pop Beads
Pop Beads

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If you have trouble with the graphics in the email version, go to www.oocities.org/ohsnewsletter

Mail your news, comments and suggestions to Bonnie at HULSEBE@barstow.usmc.mil.

Copyright © 2002-2003 by Bonnie Burke Hulse '65 and Bev Shulster '65. All rights reserved.