Monthly Archives: February 2015

50th SAHS Reunion, Whassup?!

Jennifer McClanahan Dicks writes:

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Wow!  What a bunch.  Howdy Saints!
I will attempt to fill you in on the last 50 years, but I doubt that too many are interested because not too many of you knew me personally.  I was not involved in many school activities and certainly not in the “in crowd” but I hope to reaquaint with many of you at the reunion.  I did make the Honor Roll.  My brother, Tom McClanahan (1966 grad) was more involved and some of you probably remember him.  My Dad was a Marine officer/pilot stationed at El Toro where we (all 8 of us) transfered to in my Sophomore year when I joined the Santa Ana Saints. Late comer.

MOST MEMORABLE EVENT AT  SAHA: Had to be the announcement of the assasination of President Kennedy a few months after we started school at SAHS in 1963.  It was the day my brother was to get his driver’s license, Nov 20, his 16th birthday. We had just moved from Springfield, VA where DC was our backyard playground.  Everything was free.  I visisted Jackie Kennedy’s whitehouse  and all the monuments and museums  on a regular basis. What a shock and loss it was for our nation that day when the announcement came over the loud speaker.

About me:  After graduation I attended SA College and then married a Valley High grad, Ron King, in 1967 – 1985.  We raised 3 boys and attended many soccer and baseball games in the Tustin area.  Today the boys are very successful, still in Southern California, and have given us 9 grandchildren.  Family was always and is still my prioity but education ranked second. When the boys were  old enough I returned to school and completed a BA in Liberal Studies and an MA in American Studies at Cal State Fullerton.

As is the case with many in our age group, we divorced.  I later married  Dennis Dicks, a native LA guy who added a son and daughter to our family.  They have since given us 5 more grandsons.  Dennis and I relocated to the Sacramento area for several years where I did some teaching.  Coming from a family of educators I felt compelled to fall in line but did not enjoy the gig.  I returned to school and became a hairdresser (FYI – 1600 hrs + licensing) and then opened a small salon in El Dorado.  Sideline:  It was next to an infamous bar in the gold country on the 49er trail called Poor Red’s where they invented a drink called The Gold Cadilac which made them the largest consumer of Galliano in the world.  Some of you may be familiar with it.  Now closed but fun while it lasted.

As I stated, family is my strongest pull.  Besides a wonderful 3 week tour of  Europe in 1969 when the Iron Curtin still stood tall,  I have travel Route 66 (now I-40) over and over to visit parents in Indiana and 3 sisters and a brother in Charlotte, NC, where my folks recently moved and celebrated their 70th Wedding Anniversay.  We are blessed. I still have places to go and people to meet.

When the grandkids started arriving, we relocated closer to OC and stared a moving business in the Fresno area.  I hit the road south about once a month to hold those babies, watch more baseball games, soccer games and dance competitions (finally – some girls)! I have put the pedal to the medal since the first grandchild arrived -15 years ago.  Hot-rod  Grammy.  Ha!

Today Dennis and I are settled in Oakhurst (16mi from Yosemite) and have been married 26 years with 5 kids between us and 14 grandchildren (10 boys and 4 girls – including one set of twins).  Can anyone beat that record? Maybe. Please contact us if you head this way to beautiful Yosemite.  We’ve got space.
Jenny

ADVICE:  It is always more helpful to see the glass half full!
And how about some more baseball!

 

50th SAHS Reunion, Whassup?!

Ginny Null Morgan writes:

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Running a organization:  Maui Harp Music (http://www.mauiharpmusic.com/) she provides romantic music for Maui weddings.  The website says: A graduate of the Chapman School of Music in Orange Coutny, CA, she has played in over a dozen orchestras worldwide . Ginny is the artistic director of Early Music Maui and the Producer of the  celebrated Maui Festival of Harps. Harp, Cello, and Viola da Gamba are favorites among the many  instruments Ginny plays.  In “Pluck: The Tales of a Wedding Harpist in Maui, Hawaii,” she dishes on the good, the bad and the truly embarrassing culled from nearly twenty-years of resort-side ceremonies. From Butterfly releases gone horribly wrong to vow-forgetting husbands to libidinous ministers, Morgan observes it all in amid endless repeats of Pachelbel’s “Canon” as she rises from an under-appreciated wedding vendor to a successful and in-demand businesswoman.

50th SAHS Reunion, Whassup?!

Joyce Lister Brown writes:

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I am pretty  sure no one would remember me , Joyce Lister Brown.  My Husband & I own 20 acres outside of Bozeman going towards Big Sky Ski resort. We don’t ski.
We have Horses. Cutting Horses.  We are down to 3 horses now which making it easier to enjoy our place.
Bozeman is growing fast. Lots of California people here.
If you are ever in the area call & come by.
Joyce Lister Brown
50th SAHS Reunion, Whassup?!

Linda Filson Woodbury writes:

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From successfully dealing with total blindness in a sighted world to adapting to life after an accident in 2002, that left her nearly speechless and immobile for a year, and now, 18 months following a diagnosis of a fast-moving Parkinson’s, Linda Woodbury continues to spend her lifetime adapting to change and offering that incredible challenge to others.

 After receiving her Masters Degree in Speech Communication at California State University Fullerton, Ms Woodbury worked as a Speech Consultant to the President of Yamaha and as a University Instructor with California and Texas higher education facilities.  Later, as a consultant to Fortune 500 companies, Linda Woodbury improved the morale and productivity of their personnel.  She also helped recently disabled people and those who had experienced the stress of a corporate merger or downsizing re-enter the workforce with renewed purpose and vigor. While working for three other businesses, she set sales records and surpassed all expectations.  Later she opened “dining in the Dark” Restaurant in Scottsdale.

Linda became a nationally recognized keynote speaker throughout the U. S. for companies such as Coca Cola, IBM, 3M, Abbott Labs, Unum Provident Insurance, the American Bar Association and the Industry Labor Counsel.

With compelling commentary, humorous stories, and fast paced video clips, Linda shares with audiences how she renewed every part of her being by swimming with dolphins and winning sailing regattas as a totally blind sailor.  She often shows her sky diving or Air Combat USA videos to drive home the point that “anyone can stand on their own two feet no matter what the game”.

She says her most prized activity has been as a mother and now grandmother to her family in TX.  She resides In San Diego and spends time writing her book “Just Because I’m Blind, Why’d They Take Away My Drivers’ License?” as well as catching up on a lifetime of spiritual quest with God as her partner in fully living each day.

Open your eyes to all your senses, options for meeting challenges and to the contributions of others.  The result is an enhanced ability to listen, focus, trust, plan, innovate, and ‘See Farther’ than ever before”!  And, never trade a happy day for an unhappy one.

Keynotes, General or Concurrent Sessions National or International:  Contact Linda Woodbury at 858-229-1921 or email lwoodbury@san.rr.com

 

50th SAHS Reunion, Whassup?!

David Ruch writes:

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Retired world history and band/orchestra teacher.  Still playing violin in church every other Sunday, guitar in BIBLE Study.  Took up woodworking when I retired and especially like Intarsia and fretwork.  Remarried after my first wife of 36 years passed away to Barbara, whose husband passed away a couple of months after my wife.  We met at church a couple of years later.  I have a 36 year old son Joshua.

David