Hickory High School Class of 1965 Online Archives: September 2015

Saturday, September 19, 2015

Class of '65 "Regional Gatherings"

By Linda Mamone Thompson

Our 50th reunion was so great that some of us didn't want to wait for the next one. Thus began the planning for a mini "Regional Gathering" of classmates. I knew that there were four of us living in the Lehigh Valley in Eastern Pennsylvania. Grace and Rick Sutherland and I briefly connected at the Avalon reunion, but really didn't have a chance to talk much, and Gary Webster wasn't able to attend the reunion at all. We four shared a few emails and decided that the first HHS Class of '65 Regional Gathering would be held at my house on Thursday, September 17. Gary and I checked the address database to be sure that we weren't missing anyone and found no other classmates within sixty miles.

Gary and I had recently discovered we had never known that we have been living only one mile from each other for the past twenty years! He lives just down the road from the high school my younger daughter attended. Grace and Rick and I had run into each other at a children's concert at Symphony Hall in Allentown in the mid 80s, so we knew we lived about ten miles from each other. But I guess "life got in the way," and in all that time none of us attempted to get together. This time we were going to make time to get together and get reacquainted.

Grace Watson Sutherland, Linda Mamone
Thompson, Rick Sutherland.
Seated, Gary Webster.

It was a lovely, warm late September evening. We had dinner outside, enjoyed a couple bottles of wine and talked and laughed, sharing stories about growing up in Hickory Township. Gary told a wildly funny story from his memories of sixth grade, but it's unprintable! Rick talked about playing baseball on my dad"s team from Little League in elementary school all the way through American Legion in high school. He remembered me sitting on the bleachers, in the 8th grade, keeping score for my dad, and most of all remembered my dad offering him some chewing tobacco. Having my dad as my classmates' coach was always challenging for me. Yes, I got to see all of the cute boys at the games, but I also had to risk feeling mortified by my dad!

Our mini gathering was an enjoyable success, so I encourage all of you to set up your own HHS '65 Regional Gathering. Check the class database for zip codes and contact classmates in your area. It can be as simple as meeting for breakfast or a walk in a park. Send pictures and information about your gathering to LMT at this blog so that we can all be a part of it. Ours was lots of fun, and Grace baked a killer chocolate cake!

Friday, September 18, 2015

Tar Heel Home

We have noted before that quite a few of our classmates now live in North Carolina, indeed ten of us. Intrigued, we asked Brian Hasenflu to comment on his adopted state. Learning about his log home was a plus.

Brian: I also find it interesting where our classmates ended up and how they got there. My wife Marsha and I and our two kids had vacationed at North Carolina's Outer Banks for 28 years and decided that when we retired we would move close to the ocean. The Outer Banks are too touristy so we chose 3.5 acres to build a log home in Richlands, NC, forty-five minutes northwest of Topsail Island, where Bill and Bob Bartlett each have homes.

After high school I attended YSU to escape the draft, but had had enough after two and a half years and joined the Air Force, for four years with one year in Viet Nam. I was discharged from the Air Force on a Friday, drove straight home from upstate New York and applied for a job at GM Lordstown on Monday. Apparently that impressed the HR department because I was hired on the spot. I felt pretty damn lucky. The GM jobs were hard to come by. I retired in March, 2003.

Our fellow classmate Tom Warrender's parents had a log home, and after seeing it I knew we had to have one for our retirement home. We had lived in two sub-divisions when the kids were growing up. Marsha and I started planning our new home five years before I retired and did a lot of research into log homes. "Log Home Living" magazine was a great help.

I was surprised to find out there are so many of our classmates living in North Carolina. We love it here. The weather can't be beat. Two to three months of mild winter weather and some years maybe a little wet snow. Looking in the class directory I saw the Barlett boys live nearby on the coast. We chose to live back from the ocean a little ways for a buffer between us and hurricanes. No regrets leaving PA. The best move we ever made.