Lorain High alumni recall ‘good ol’ days’

Jul 03, 2010

By: The Morning Journal

By MEGAN ROZSA

Lorain High School class officers for 1960.

rozsa.megan@gmail.com

LORAIN – This is a year of milestones for Lorain High School, old and new.

It’s the 50th anniversary of the last class to graduate from the old Lorain High School while it was still the city’s lone public high school, before the opening of Admiral King High School in 1960.

Lorain High School – free slideshow maker with music

This year also marks the beginning of the new Lorain High School, as Admiral King closes and the building becomes the new LHS, home of the Titans.

The Lorain High Steelmen class of 1960-B will return to Lorain on July 24 for its 50th reunion. Several other graduating classes returned to Lorain to celebrate during the recent International Festival.

Ever since the original Lorain High building was demolished last year, LHS alumni can’t say enough good things about their alma mater. Here, they share their memories:

“My homeroom teacher my first few years was Mrs. Stemple. She had been my older brother’s French teacher and was always very personable and sweet and very beautiful. I thought she was very sophisticated because her French students called her Madame Stemple. She had a big impact on me because if I showed up early, which I usually did because I took the bus and it arrived a half hour before school started, she would always be very engaging with me. Even though I only had her for homeroom, she took interest in what I was doing in other classrooms and projects and would offer up advice and tips which inevitably always helped.”

Keith Saunders, LHS class of 1981

“In talking with some of my other classmates, the biggest thing I can tell you about the time in high school was we made great lifelong friends. The people were the reason you had so much fun. My senior year, I was the president of Student Council. I got to interact with staff more on a personal level because I was a liaison between the student body and some of the staff members. I learned first and foremost the ability to listen to people and the ability to work with people even if you did have differences. It’s sad that the building is gone. I still talk with people, and we still share what happened in this class with this person. Sure, I would love it to be there because you can drive by and think of the memories you had, but I’m in contact with people that transcend all the grades I was in.”

To the new LHS classes, he says, “Make sure you cherish every day. You don’t know what you’re missing until it’s gone. It’s the cliche everybody uses, but it’s true.”

Jeffrey Czatt, LHS class of 1983

“The cafeteria, when they ripped it down, it was sad to me. I was called Boss Hoerrle. I remember lunch and the Steelmen Burger. It was about the size of a quarter-pounder. I remember Mr. Kennedy and his science class. He was a real strict teacher, but a real good teacher. He used to have a block of wood about the size of a New Testament that you get at hospitals. If you were sleeping in class, he would slam it on your desk. And if you didn’t wake up, he would do it again. It’s hard for me to drive by there and see an empty lot when there used to be a three-story building there.”

Tom Hoerrle, LHS class of 1976

“My senior year, my parents bought me the car I was driving to school. At the time, there were no student parking areas, so you parked on the street. Well the police would come by every once in a while and put a little chalk mark because you were only supposed to park somewhere for a short number of hours. And I was getting tickets. I thought, ‘No, this isn’t working.’ It was only a few days left of school, so I got a hall pass, and I went out and I moved it a couple inches, just past the chalk line. I went back in and there stood the principal, the assistant principal. ‘Cathy, bad girl.’ So while everybody was getting measured for their caps and gowns for graduation, I sat in detention hall. The ONLY detention I ever got.” (VIDEO)

Cathy (Campbell) Ratcliff, LHS class of 1960-B (VIDEO)

“We had the clubs back in those days. They weren’t school-affiliated. They were called the Bachelors, the Dukes and the Barons and the girls had the Y Jackets and Y Sweaters. We used to put on big dances like we had at the roller arena on the west side. We used to rent that out and we used to bring in big names like Fats Domino, Dion and the Belmonts and all these guys that you see on the doo-wops now. We were bringing them in and we would make money by selling tickets. We would use the money to go rent cabins up at Geneva-on-the-Lake for our club members. There was a little bit of partying going on. It was sort of like ‘Happy Days.’”

Tom Ratcliff, LHS class of 1959 (VIDEO)

“Like a dummy, I was walking down the halls one day, it was in the industrial arts area, I was taking my book and running it across the tops of the locker making a click, click noise. All of the sudden, boom, no book. I reached and the top of the locker was gone. So I ended up having to go into the machine shop. I told the teacher I lost my book, can I get a ladder to go get it? He gave me a funny look and I told him I set it up there to tie my shoes, I didn’t tell him I was running it. But I went, got the ladder, looked and there was no shelf at the top, it fell way down in there. So I looked at the number of the locker and I thought after school I’m gonna come there. So I did. Here’s this nice-looking girl, I don’t even know who she was. I said, ‘Can I get my book out of your locker?’ She looked bewildered. I picked it up and showed her my name in the book. I closed it, and off I went. She’s probably still like, ‘Who is this?’”

Ted Litkovitz (VIDEO)

If anyone is interested in purchasing a brick from the old Lorain High School, contact Tom Hoerrle at (440) 396-0950. They are $15 each.

INFO BOX FOR THE 1960 CLASS REUNION
Saturday – July 24th, 2010, Rosewood Place
TIME: 6 p.m. Cocktails – Meet & Greet
7 p.m. Dining and Program Rosewood Place
9 p.m. to 11 p.m. Dance to the ’50s

Friday – July 23rd, 2010, Jackalope Lakeside, third floor
Time: 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. Hors d’oeuvres
Both nights are reservation only, call Cathy Ratcliff at (740) 327-1483, or e-mail therats1@verizon.net.

VIDEO

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