50th Bessemer High School Reunion

It is now Thursday morning after a whirlwind weekend that this writer is having great difficulty telling you about. Why the difficulty? If you were there, you understand ! How did it happen? How did we pull this off "perfectly!". Did anything go wrong? I think not!

Everyone, everyone seemed to have a great time at all the events we put together. Some came to only part whereas others came to all. Did you not have a great time?

Two years ago the planning committee started having lunch together the first Wednesday of each month. Do you know the part that played the biggest role to me? It was us, now getting to know each other after, for most, being apart for 50 years! Culture Shock? Shock and Awe? Whatever you may call it, it was there starring us in the face.

But soon, we were friends again, knowing something of each other's lives and totally enjoying our time together. Oh, we did not start planning for maybe months, but we talked about it, discussed a lot of options but mostly talked and got to know each other.

If I start naming names, and telling who did what, I will surely fail to mention someone! Please pardon this writers 'senior moments' as total recall is not my strength.

Jeanette, Patsy, Jerry, Janet, Gladys, Nancy, Tommie, Jackie Davis, Tommy and lastly me. Please pardon me if I left someone out but, we had people behind the scenes helping us in so many ways. It is to you, the unnamed, we all say a big "thank you" for helping us do this and making it such a big success.

The 50th Anniversary Book, the music disk, the picnic last Friday, The Club on Saturday, Church together at the 1st Presbyterian in Bessemer Sunday morning, and finally lunch together at the Bright Star.

The part that amazed me or was the biggest surprise was going to Sunday School and seeing Clyce and reminding him of our Class coming that morning. "How many do you think will be here?", he asked! I told him "15 to 20, possibly two rows on the left side". Boy was I wrong! I came into the sanctuary about 10:50, and there were already 4 rows filled to overflowing. We filled almost 5 rows, 65 to 70 kids all coming to 1st Presbyterian which is Clyce, Ruth, Karen's and mine, all our home Church. Personally, we want to thank you for your presents in God's house and hope you took away something of great value.

The next was Harvey calling the Bright Star and Jimmy coming and telling us Harvey wishing he could be there. Quote "I miss being there with all of you but I miss the Bright Star more!" Thanks Harvey, we missed you too!

You know that anyone who writes this letter of any event, his or her focus is narrowed by his or her special attachment to some of you. Eddie Falkner, James Phillips, Kay Cowan, Phyllis Cowan, Karen Keith, Jane White, Betty Burnett, Clyce Hurst, and Jerry Morrow, to name a few as we were childhood friends growing up together as little kids and most beginning with Ms Shine in the first grade at Arlington School. We played together, rode bikes together, ate together, and went to SS and Church together, making those first real bonds with friends we loved. If you wrote this paragraph, the names and places would be different and feel free to share that with us.

A car full of gas filled purple and white balloons, what a hoot! Putting up the signs for the picnic were a task! I had to make the signs and park on the entrance ramps on the North and South bound side of Exit 1 on I459 to put the BHS55 signs with the arrows. Oh, and attach the purple and white balloons I had floating around in my car. The traffic on I459 blew the balloons all over the place and it was only 92 and close to 100 with the heat off the asphalt. I was sweating big time. Then driving to Brackner Park and putting up the BHS55 Picnic sign with the balloons marking the entrance. Really this was a breeze, but I wanted them up before Jeanette and Tommie and others got there and to make it an easy sign for all you guys and gals to see.

The picnic was nice with the pavilion being in the shade after 2:00pm. We all had a nice visit together and lots of new friendships renewed and new ones made. Karen and I left about 7:30 p.m. and some were just pulling chairs together to get into some big time memory sharing. THAT was the purpose and what this reunion was all about.

The Club did a great job on caring for us and our time there was wonderful. It was great to have one of Tommie Walker's children there to take pictures and to share these with us on disk. "Jerry Batson did a great job as MC!" Thanks Jerry!

I think I have talked about each of the events and if you came to all, you had a very busy weekend. I want to tell each of you how much fun it was putting together and working with all the members of the planning committee to make it happen. We are still going to meet the 1st Wednesday of each month at the Golden Corral on Lorna Road in Hoover so feel free to join us. We start about 11:00am or 11:30am and go until we get tired. Do we have some memories to share! Thanks everyone for coming!
Jeff Nutter, Jr