Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Nailing Jello to a Tree

After having completed a class search for Evansville's F.J. Reitz Class of 1967 and now deep into the search for our classmates with the help of my personal Sherlock, Linda, I can't help but reflect on the way the search evolves gradually from one distinct stage to another.

I can't think of anything to compare it to other than a criminal investigation. You begin with the physical evidence, in our case, Embers and a couple old attendance directories from previous reunions and once you compile a universe of suspects, and last known whereabouts, you start pounding the streets looking to verify what you know and confirming what is bogus. And with the multitude of Internet people search engines and Google, the odds of confirming what is bogus is getting easier and easier.

Sometimes, the days just pass without any progress, just canvassing, inquiring, talking your head off to answering machines, sending emails into the electronic nothing out there without any prospects of response or reply. Other days are like today. Had a great talk with Mary Ann Dugan Tomassone, another retired nurse, who has connections to two other people we were looking for, Diane Gluck Benedict and Linda Johnson Reed, who is on Mary Ann's Xmas list. In addition, we located Kathy Ormsby Wentworth out in Washington state. Information comes in little clusters, and each clue sends you down the road to another possible positive location of another classmate. Finding Mary Ann was a goldmine of information.

Usually a good day is when you take a single clue and are able to develop an address and possible phone number from it. Do this with a dozen or so "missing" classmates. Some will dead end with a phone call. "Yes my name is XXXXXXX, but I graduated from a different school in 1967." Some will just add another clue. "You must be looking for the XXXX that lives in Brigantine, I think they went to Wayne Valley". On to the next trail of clues, wearing electric holes in electronic shoes pounding on the "information highway".

And on the way, there awaits in your blog comment box another anonymous bit of venom, dripping with animosity and maybe more than a little jealousy. If there was any substance to it, I'd share it, but it's just juvenile vitriolic whining. Please, we're not back in high school.

Tony Gravagne (WVHS '66) but one of my Wayne Valley concert band music buddies, suggested to me that I ought to start a Class directory Facebook group. I sort of dismissed the idea at first, but much like I decided to go my own way and start the class directory, I think I will, especially in the face of the continuing craven adolescent hostility I've been receiving, now I'm thinking once again, why not. Why not start a group around the class directory that acts as a focal point for clues about our missing classmates and reconnecting with each other.And it's not just for '67 graduates either. It's for family of grads, and underclassmen too. Anyone who might have information about where our classmates are. Why not indeed. I remember the last time I wrote these words; now we have a class directory. So Facebook classmates, if you get an invite to join a new Facebook group, don't be surprised. It's only me.


Sunday, November 27, 2011

Tempest in a Teapot Revisited

Not intending to create a ripple in the time continuum, I quietly withdrew from the Facebook group known as the Wayne Valley Class of 1967 and posted it on my wall so that anyone used to looking for me there wouldn't think I had passed away unexpectedly and that my Facebook page was one of those ghosts that the dead leave behind. Seriously, I didn't expect anyone would notice since there is no activity there for me since the administrator blocked me from posting or viewing posts. This has been the case shortly after I started linking this blog to that group. Must have been something I said? The doc said the medication was supposed to take care of my terminal sarcasm.

Anyway, my quiet posting on Facebook has unleashed a completely unsolicited wave of thanks and congratulations which has been a little overwhelming. But thinking about it, I remember when we finished the same work for Linda's class of 364. There was a sense of accomplishment - especially after what it generated in class buzz, and resulted in unprecedented attendance for a non reunion year class get together.

Well, our work for my Wayne Valley class is far from done and getting to the point where we need your help. Take a close look at the "Return to Senda" page and think of playing with these classmates as kids in your backyards. Did they have brothers or sisters  or kids you've run into on Facebook? Are their parents still in Wayne? These are all the kind of clues that have led us to yet another classmate who didn't know that they were being sought.

Speaking of ripples, the kind that I want to generate are those that encourage you to go to the reunion. Linda and I will be sending out reminders in late winter to call the reunion committee members to sign up for the 45th reunion. Every indication I have is that people that either never went, and many who have missed recent reunions have finally awoken to the new conditions: my friends, we have become the old people we impatiently waited on in no passing zones. We are now the ones counting out change in the check out lines. Our parts are wearing out. We're dropping like flies in September. It is in fact, with few exceptions (including myself) the September of our lives.  (I except myself because 3 of my grandparents lived past their centennials and I have every intention of living into my 100's. I also intend to be the crankiest SOB on the planet. Just stay out of cane range. I'm warning you now.)


So for those of you who thank us for the hard work, we acknowledge your thanks. You may be called to testify that your congratulations were completely unsolicited. We will use your thanks to motivate us to continue to make those thankless phone calls every afternoon and evening.

Saturday, November 19, 2011

Filling in the Details

Linda and I have been working on filling in some details for our classmates who died young, trying to contact family for current photos and obituaries. Why are we being so intent on this aspect of the directory? First, we want people to be properly memorialized, that they were part of our class, part of our lives, so at least we should know when they passed, and who and what they left behind. We owe it to their memories. Families have been most cooperative and interested and pleased that we remember their family member.Just listing "deceased" isn't personal. It's just a statistic. These people weren't statistics. They were our classmates.

Death is a touchy subject. No one wants to report that someone has died and have it not be true, but the longer someone goes "missing" without a trace, or leaves behind a Facebook page without any activity since their reported death date, it does warrant a closer look as a possible outcome. Sometimes the mystery is just a matter of circumstances that make it difficult, no, nearly impossible to find someone. I can't emphasize the importance of listing maiden names as well as married names on Facebook. We also understand that many of us have a love/hate relationship with Facebook and some whose children and grandchildren set up pages for them.

We were just delighted that the rumors of Madelyn Sisco Alexander's demise are highly exaggerated. To the contrary, she's beating the road between North Jersey and Princeton to dote on a half dozen grandkids split between locations. We were very lucky that Linda happened to see another Engle from Wayne on Facebook. Turns out that he's a relation to Barbara Engle Fincham, who's out in Moab, Utah, one of our favorite places on the planet. Unfortunately, Barbara is care giving and in the midst of a difficult time. We hope to hear from her in greater detail when she is able and wished her the best of luck with her situation.

Again, friends and classmates, take a look at your Facebook pages then take a look at the Return to Senda page. You may be friends on Facebook with classmates who have not yet been located. Let us know with our thanks. That's the way the detective game is played!

Thursday, November 10, 2011

Six Degrees of Separation

Remember that parlor game 6 Degrees of Separation where you try to figure out how you or someone else is related to Kevin Bacon using only 6 related connections? That is what finding lost classmates is like, except you don't know who the connections are.

The fact of the matter is that in many cases, our other classmates are the connecting links. They know brothers, parents, children, cousins, other relatives of classmates alive and gone. They speak with them on a regular basis precisely because of their friendships with these classmates.

So the next time you are on the class directory website, take a look at the "Return to Senda" page. Is there someone related to one of these people with whom you have communicated recently? If so, you may hold the key to locating a classmate.

If nothing more than the principle that we want to be absolutely inclusive in the directory and include everyone, even those not pictured, or who only attended Wayne Valley for a short time,   you can help us complete the blanks in the directory. We each of us, who visit the directory are like time travelers emerging from a time capsule looking upon a world of which we were not previously aware. We look at each other's picture pairs with new eyes, looking for recognition through the veil of time. We each hold the key to locating someone who is not aware that they are lost or unlocking the past of someone who passed away far too soon.

If you contribute just one of those 6 connections for one of our classmates, you have done your part with our thanks in helping to complete this project for our class.

Monday, November 7, 2011

It's personal

As most of you who follow this blog know, this little project of ours, the Wayne Valley Class of 1967 Alumni Directory, is something that we're doing for the class, because after all these years, its a shame that the only way we can get in touch with someone we've lost touch with is to perchance meet them at a reunion if you and that person both happen to attend. Or wait another 5 or 10 years. Well, we all know that we may or may not have that time. It's not up to us necessarily, at this point, and that's just a sad truth.

This is a resource that has been needed for years. It could easily have been done long ago, but that's neither here nor there. It is here now and now we can memorialize our fallen, honor our veterans, and celebrate with once long-lost friends that life does go on, mostly happily. Once rediscovered and reconnected, we can now stay in touch with social media and via current technologies. Some people have asked me why I waited so long to do this. I just told them it's not a perfect world; otherwise we'd have all our hair and teeth and fit into our high school jeans. It's here now. So be part of it.

I have lived many lives in many places and all this moving about the country has made it difficult for my friends to keep up with me and for me to stay in touch with them. Some I always knew roughly where they were, others were lost in the fog of time and the more time that passed, the "loster" and "loster" they got. One in particular, had been lost to me for 44 years despite every attempt I made to locate him. His childhood home had been sold, his parents passed away. His brother moved and I thought him deceased and the trail just went cold except for a single memory and a couple of vanity LP's he cut in his late teens. It was this project, this directory that went indirectly through clue after clue from multiple classmates that reconnected us today. Now I know he is alive and well and that after talking on the phone, we still understood each other, and like I keep telling everyone, the reasons we were friends in the first place still exist. I told one of our other friends that today, I am really happy.

It's more than just a class resource for me. It's personal, too.

Friday, November 4, 2011

A Good Day

It was a good day today. We located and posted a terrific obituary for John Iraola, and confirmed locations for Phyllis Seliger Holland, Jim Gullone, Kathy Grap Hodgen, Pete Manus, and Sherry Kill Lawson.

Got a better photo of Paula Rafferty Severance from her BFF, Nancy Sliker Gillingham.

In our searching, we have discovered that it is not uncommon for people to have started Facebook pages that remain long after their deaths, inactive , stolid and silent tombstones on the information highway, like Erwin Goovaerts. The same sort of thing is true of Classmates.com which holds inactive accounts as bait for additional revenue. Once you pay your fees, you discover that all the info you were hoping to find are just cardboard storefronts devoid of content or contact information.

So far, as we hoped, there seems to be a certain momentum building with the class directory that we hope will allow its completion with the help of classmates who know where other classmates are. Thank you again, to those of you who have provided clues.

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

Oopsies

Once again, Milton proves he is fallible. Noticed some file naming inconsistencies that led to classmates being out of alphabetical order which of course, I cannot tolerate simply because it bothers me. Working on correcting that.

Still getting calls to add military records and a lovely email from Cliff Recanzone's wife who was delighted to hear that there would be a memorial page. She is preparing materials from Cliff's services to forward to us

Heard from Anne Hoffmann who in turn knows where Paul Wagner is. It just keeps getting better and better. I've been looking for Paul, as well as others who have been looking for over 44 years.

I encourage everyone to update their photos as they can. And if you spot a mistake, misspelling of a name, missed married name, anything at all, let me know and we'll get it fixed. If everyone allows me one mistake, that's over 600 to which I am entitled.

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Fondest wishes

So far, my fondest wishes from the Wayne Valley Class Directory have started coming true. I'm getting emails and calls with additional information, military services dates and calls from people I haven't talked to in for-ever. Mollie Kroll Abend has a classmate cousin, Sally Rosenzweig Moskowitz who has been in periodic touch with Anne Hoffman, who we have had no luck finding without outside help. And so it goes round and round and suddenly we have another found classmate.

Then one of our many postcards generates a phone call from Dennis Sandfort, in Newton, who has been helping people chainsaw their way out to the street from the recent snowfall. Dennis is landscaping up there.

Rick Sasse remembers that Don Gerola is an artist in RI from a news magazine article, and reminds us of his own long service in the US Coast Guard and that Gary Luccio was also in the USCG. Sue Cowin counted off her years in the army which somehow triggered my memory that Rich Burgess was also Army.

Let the games begin! In the meanwhile, we're still working the phones for the rest of our folks.