MY BOOK ……..LILAGCS B - 16

Sunday June 24, 2012

Going To High School

12^th Grade – Senior Year

What can I say about my last year in High School? Kelley Hoskins was my locker mate for the fifth year (That is something neither of us has ever forgotten and we are now 70 years old!)

We also won the “Red Jug” for the best homecoming skit for the fourth year in a row. Dave McCauley and I wrote most of it with a lot of help from others in the class.

I may have forgotten to mention it, but during my early high school years I wanted to learn to dance. I wanted to be “popular” ha! ha!

I remember I asked my mother how I could be popular and she told me that boys that could play the piano or dance were always popular when she was in high school. I couldn’t play the piano and it would take too long to learn so I decided dancing was the best choice.

I was at a “Sock-Hop” after one of our football games and I asked Paul Laughin to teach as he seemed to be a good dancer. He agreed and that is how I started dancing. Well, that was at the beginning of the “Rock and Roll” era and all the tunes were Rock and Roll type music. During 10^th and 11^th grade I developed quite a reputation as a good Rock and Roll dancer.

My partners were many of my female classmates and  all together we won over 80 dance contests. I would Toss the girl over my head and all sorts of gyrations.

One time during my senior year we had the opportunity to travel to the Roof Garden, a very popular dance ballroom located in Arnold’s Park at Lake Okoboji. They were going to have a State Dance Contest for fast (Rock & Roll) and slow (Waltz) music.

The dance started and slowly couples were eliminated. My partner and I together with another couple were selected to “dance-off” to see who would be selected as the winner. The selection was made by the audience clapping. We had 3 times the selection and tied all three times. The other male was very good and he looked to be Asian (Hawaiian) maybe. After the fourth dance off they won. My partner and I got second place.

Note of interest: 4 months later I was watching the Lawrence Welk Show on television and Lawrence introduced a couple who had won a nation “Rock & Roll Dance competition. It was the same fella I had danced against at the Roof Garden. I felt good that I had gotten second place up against the National Champion! (Special note, Bobby Burgess, the famous dancer on the Lawrence Welk Show was a fraternity brother of Paul Laughin, the one who taught me to dance.)

Well so much for my senior year of High School. In May of 1959 we graduated and all went our separate ways, some went  to college, or to a job and Paul Laughin and Kelley Hoskins decided to go to California. I read more and refer you to Kelley’s comment in the Memory Book we got at our 50^th class reunion.