76 years after Snohomish graduation, they’re back in school

Published 1:30 am Tuesday, September 4, 2018

Back to school came a day early at Snohomish High School, but the friends sharing a lunch table Tuesday weren’t current students. They graduated in 1942.

The classmates, most of them now 94, have gathered for reunions in recent years at Hill Park, overlooking Blackmans Lake. This time was different. Instead of bringing sack lunches to a picnic shelter, eight alumni — some with spouses who attended other schools — returned to their alma mater.

With Snohomish High Principal Eric Cahan as their guide, they toured a campus much changed since their school days. The only halls they once walked are in the A Building, a brick edifice built in 1939. Everything else on campus is new, but some mementos remain.

Outside the gym, Cahan pointed out the center circle, marked with an S, that once decorated the old gymnasium. Pictures of Snohomish High Hall of Fame honorees line one wall. The classmates, some walking with canes, took their time crossing the new gym’s shiny wood floor.

Their high school memories span the years just before and after the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor. At least eight of their classmates died while serving in World War II.

“I got drafted into the military the same day as Earl Torgeson,” said Keith Krause, a Class of ’42 member who served on a Navy minesweeper during the war. Torgeson, a 1941 Snohomish High graduate who died in 1990, went on to become a first baseman with several major league teams. Krause remembers Torgeson building a baseball bat in woodshop.

Sitting beside his wife, Milly, Krause shared his most lasting high school memory: “Making a date with her in the doorway of typing class.”

June Gregory, a 1942 classmate and retired teacher, has organized the get-togethers for more than a decade. “We’re so excited, we can’t eat very much. We don’t see each other that often,” said Gregory, a Snohomish-area widow accompanied Tuesday by her daughter, Sue Temairik.

In a conference room near the school office, old friends crowded around a table to enjoy sandwiches, veggies and cookies. They were greeted by Snohomish School District Superintendent Kent Kultgen and Scott Peacock, the deputy superintendent.

Cahan set a few yearbooks on the table. “This is 1940, this is 1941, and we found your class — 1942,” he said. Panthers who graduated 76 years ago passed their annual around, looking at names and young faces.

In a moment tinged with sadness, Gregory noted their dwindling numbers. “In 2007, we had 23. We’ve lost someone almost every year,” she said. There were 123 in their graduating class. The principal told the group that the Class of 2019 will be a bit shy of 400.

Gregory remembered her good friend, Alice Nelson Coon, who died four years ago. “It’s good to talk about our friends,” Gregory said. Kelly Coon, Alice’s husband, drove from Olympia to join the group Tuesday, although he’s a 1945 graduate of Garfield High School in Seattle.

Bob Bisnett was part of Snohomish High’s Class of ’42, yet didn’t graduate. “But I have a master’s degree,” said Bisnett, who became a teacher in Shoreline. In high school, he said, “we all wanted to make enough money to buy a car.” He was with his wife, Elinore, an Everett High graduate who later studied nursing.

Conversation came easily among the classmates.

Elizabeth Reed said her son, Rick Reed, played football at Washington State University after graduating from Snohomish High.

Dr. Hugh Minor recalled that he dislocated his hip while skiing in ninth grade. A retired Everett ophthalmologist, he attended the U.S. Naval Academy and served in the Navy before going on to the University of Washington School of Medicine.

“I set the school on fire once,” said Crystal Johanson, who told a tale of using rags to wipe down a woodworking project the boys had built. She recalled storing those turpentine-soaked cloths too close to a furnace. “I’d made a perfect place for spontaneous combustion,” Johanson said.

“No matter who you talk to, they still have their memories of high school,” said Kultgen, the superintendent.

As the group finished lunch, the principal extended an invitation for next year — but on the first day of school. That way, students will get a chance to meet those born in the 1920s. “They will go crazy,” Cahan said. “They were all born after 2000. They literally don’t know a life without cellphones.”

“We probably know some things the kids have yet to learn,” Coon quipped.

Julie Muhlstein: 425-339-3460; jmuhlstein@herald net.com.