Saturday, October 15, 2011

Know Your Teachers: Joseph G. Lassegues

How many of you took auto shop from Mr. Lassegues? Jack Baldwin did. He credits him with inspiring his interest in French cars. Jack also said Mr. Lassegues' favorite expression was, "Damn kids!"

Angela Bellante recently sent me the Memorial Progam for Mr. Lassegues, who died in 1996. His life was definitely more diversified than just about cars. This is what he wrote about his life in 1977:

"Looking back on my own vocations and avocations, I must conclude that my life probably has been more diversified than those of my predecessors. I have been engaged at some time or other as a janitor, salesman, preacher, auto mechanic (and shop operator), airline pilot, teletype operator, high school teacher, and church organist. I must add one more to the list, that of 'scholar,' since I have been attending classes of some kind over a span covering most of my life to date. It is interesting to note that in recent times, our total knowledge in some fields (for example, aeronautics, electronics, nuclear physics, space exploration) has doubled in as little as 15 years, and a person might well conclude that one lifetime is too short to learn all he would like. Unfortunately, man's moral and spiritual developments have not kept pace with those of the scientific fields, resulting in some precarious world conditions."

This poem he wrote was on the back of the program.


Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Sharp Park School, 1951


When I was putting together our 50th Anniversary Classbook, Lonnie loaned me this photo of her 8th grade class at Sharp Park School. Quite a few went on to graduate with us from JUHS. And quite a few can still be recognized. Who do you recognize? Some in the class helped me attempt to identify everyone, since the names were not in our Classbook. We didn't meet with 100% success. Let me know if you can fill in any missing names.

This is what we got. (I hope the picture comes out large enough -- I am new at this.)

Top Row: Rich Fredr. Smith / Sidney Snud / Judith Butler / Dave Coates / Harry Sampson / Pat Gardner / Ted Edney / Carol Whitney / Merl Alonso.
Row Two: Georgette Cahill / Lonnie Perrier / John Leipelt / Shirley Ellis / Bob Tollner / Lonnie De Vries / Jimmy LaFrance / Virginia Scott / ?.
Row Three: ? / ? / Jolene or Jolaine Hufferd? / Ron Dominguez / George Niemela / Beverly Boe / Walter Novak / Vivian Delay / Ronald Anderson.
Row Four: Cheerie Jones / Ramona Giardano or Giardanno? / ? / Connie Hester / Mike Feverly / Janice Prudden / Starr Campbell / Marge Freeman / Darrell Wilcox
Row Five: Bob Kapelowitz / teacher: Mrs. Countryman.