Jack Keefe

Thanks to Mel for his recent post. He seems to have jump-started an outpouring of notes from people we haven heard from lately. It was great to read all of them. Here's the latest from our house:

Janet and I celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary yesterday. We're planning a trip later this year but not until the weather is warmer.

We are expecting our first great-grandchild next month in Texas. So, whether it's for an anniverary trip or not, a journey to the Dallas-Fort Worth Metro is in our future to greet the new arrival.

And my book, Echoes of Purple and Gold, continues to draw readers. We had a book signing yesterday in Normal, our third one since publication. The book is available on line from Page Publishing, Amazon, and Barnes and Noble. 

Spring must be on its way. Tempratures here in Bloomington are forecast to be above average again in the coming week. Everyone stay well and enjoy!

Joan Pease (Clark)

I'm a semi-graduate of the BHS class of 1964. Our family moved to California at the start of our junior year, so I completed high school in Palm Springs. (A very different demographic than the one where I grew up!) I want to return one of these days, but 'these days' are flying by. I'm including a picture here that I shared some time ago; maybe some classmates will see themselves or a friend here. Jack Habich has a copy of this and said Steve Wilson took it. We were Franklin School students on a field trip to Springfield. I'm in the front row, holding my greasy lunch bag. The boy next to me is Denny Van Steenberg, whose family was killed in a tragic auto accident. I also recognize Anne Bailen (Barbie Reed's head behind her?), Fred Livings in the cowboy shirt, Vcki Rizzuto and Virginia Spry behind me. (It strikes me as funny that Steve had to leave the picture to take it, but we've got the bus driver included!) 

Enjoy a stroll down memory lane.

Ray Bledsoe

This is to keep Mel Happy.  Hopefully some of you are into Genealogy which I have been working on since 1956 and started with the Genealogy Merit Badge in the Boy Scouts.  The first photo is the fort built by my great-great-great-great-grandfather Anthony Bledsoe b.1733.  it is located on the Cumberland Wagon trail which he helped carve out of the wilderness.  The third photo is part of the interior of the fort now maintained by the Park Service and is Northeast of Nashville, Tennessee near Gallatin.  The fourth photo is of Anthony Bledsoe.  The fifth photo (out of order-sorry) is the log cabin where my father was born in 1907.  The sixth photo is of Bledsoe State Park in Bledsoe County, Tennessee which was established in 1973 after the Park Service took it over.  Bledsoe County was named after Anthony who was a favored son of the South.  The last photo (also out of order) is Anthony's gravemarker located in the family cemetery at the Fort.  I appologize if this is too lengthy but hopefully you history buffs will enjoy.

Dianne Shaffer (Troxel)

it's fun to keep in touch with you. I married David Uban when I was 22.  Had 2 children Cari and Bradley. Divorced after 20 years of marriage but stayed friends until he died 1 1/2 years ago. Married Roger Troxel 25 years ago at age 52 - he is 7 years younger than me. He is Terry Troxel's cousin. I worked at State Farm 22 years.  Retired. Roger retired from Fire Department (28 years) but plays bagpipes for fire Honor Guard, Celtic across Pipes & Drums and for American Legion. He played at David's funeral. He has 3 daughters (2 in Texas and 1 here) and 7 grandchildren and one great granddaughter born on my birthday 1 year ago. One grandson (20) is in Army in South Korea now.  We share my granddaughter Revin 17 who is at BHS and my son (50)  and his wife (38) have a 4 month old baby girl in Wilmington NC. Life is amazing. I lost my beautiful sister Jeanne Olofson last March.  I got our year books out and must say those are memories that I love.  By the way Joan, I am the little girl straight in back of Ann sitting alone on that ledge.  Denny was my boyfriend in 3rd grade. First death I ever had to deal with.  🥲 God Bless you all.

Regina (Sue) Petersen (Koppenhoefer)

I'll jump in too -  Steve and I live in a small town 70 miles north of Bloomington, and have 6 children and five grandchildren.  Jack, I really enjoyed your book and hope to have you sign it for me at our 60th.  Joan, I think that is Don Cravens to the right of Ann.  We went to the same church growing up.  Fred Livings started school with me at Bent, and I wondered where he went from there.  Ray, I enjoyed reading about your family history.  I am familiar with the Gallatin area.  Our daughter, Lisa, lives in Nashville, and maybe on one of our visits there we'll check out the park and cemetery.  I still spend a lot of my time quilting and have a few projects in the works right now.  This year we had family pictures taken.  I'll share a few --

Melvin (Mel) Theobald

OMG, you guys are so beautiful. Please send more. And thank you to all who have responded here. There are dozens more of you and we would all love to hear your stories. Still incouragible, but not to be taken lightly, your classmates still remember you. This is just the beginning. Anyone else? We're waiting!!!

Sandra Jeakins (Singletary Sizemore)

Mel, you really woke us up.  Thanks!  I don't have an interesting story to tell.  Most people would find my life boring.  But I enjoy staying home.  I play my piano, at least two times a week and read lots of books, mostly murder mysteries.  I play on the computer, Solitaire, mostly.  I do word search puzzles.  When it gets warmer, I will take some car rides in the country.  I watch TV and since I retired in 2016, I've really gotten into Football.  Neither one of my late husbands liked Football and my kids didn't either, so I just never learned to like it.   But I like College and NFL.  I also watch some Basketball.  I attend church and go to BIble Study  once a week.  There is a group of church members that meet for lunch once a month,  But if I don't have someone to eat with, I'll go by myself.  Ron Singletary, my first Husband, passed away 38 years ago this year just after our 21st wedding anniversary.  He was 38 when he died.  My second huband passed away almost 10 years ago.  We were married 23 years. So I've been doing the alone thing for awhile and since I'm an only child, it wasn't much of an adjustment.  Ron passed away a few days after we found out we were going to be Grandparents.  So he never got to see our six grandchildren from our two Sons, and five great-grandchildren. I'm close to my youngest Son, who lives almost behind me.  He is a big help to me and enjoys doing things for me.   My oldest Son lives in Eureka.  Once a month the three of us go out to eat together.

Sue: nice family pictures.

David Brock

Spring is coming and we have the seed catalogues out.  Sandy and I have been maried since '72.  We have 2 children Janice and Charles. 

Janice married later in life and inherited 3 mostly grown boys (1 in high school and 2 in college) at that time.   She just lives down the road about 10 minutes from us. The oldest is a pilot--flew for Glendale Air out of Phoenix for a while.  He is now back in flight school learning to fly 767s for freight--both US and international flights. The middle one works with Amazon in one the St. Louis distribution ceners.  The youngest is scheduled to graduate from St. Louis Univesity in May.  

Charles lives in Atlantic, Ia, about halfway between Des Moines and Omaha.  He is married and has 3 children.  The oldest, Parker, is 16.  He is an Eagle Scout, member of the Honor Society and very musically talented.  The middle one, Bella, is 14.  She is big into gymnastics, dance and music.  The youngest,  Hudson, is 12.  He is very mechanically inclined (what he can't build, he thinks up).  He also plays piano and oboe.  All the kids have shown rabbits and sheep as well as static displays at the County and State fairs.

Sandy and I are muddling through our daily routine, working in rehab and preparing for the life ahead.  We are looking forward to outside work when the weather breaks.  In the meantime  I am maintining the bee hives and equipment. and the seed starting boxes.  Jonquils are starting to pop up, and will be blooming before we know it.  Fishing trip to Bennett Spring planned in May.  Just taking life one day at a time.

Allida Frisch (Altemus)

. I love reading all the posts. Even though a lot of us think we don’t lead interesting lives they are our lives to lead. I think most of us would agree that family is the most important.

Jim and I just celebrated our 56th wedding anniversary and have been together 59 years. We have 2 daughters Sarah and Emily. Sarah lives 4 miles from us in O’Fallon, MO. We live in St. Peter’s. Sarah and her husband have three kids. Emily lives in Mahomet,IL and is the mother of triplets, one girl and two boys. Makayla graduated from U of I in Champaign last May and is doing a Masters program in Medical Bio Science and will be applying to Medical School. She graduated from U of I with a double major. Her brothers Alex and Connor will graduate from ISU in May. Connor in Environmental Sciences and is contemplating a career as a forest or park ranger. Alex majored in art and is a phenomenal artist. His makeup skills are extraordinary. He needs to move either to California or New York. Brendan is the son of Sarah and he is in the 5 year architecture program at University of Arkansas and is finishing up his 4th year. He will be studying in Rome for the fall semester. Lindsey is married and her job is in social work. Unfortunately our beautiful and bright granddaughter Kendall was taken from us much too soon by a distracted driver May of 2018 on her way back to her apartment at SIUE on Mother’s Day. She had just finished her junior year and was 20 years old. As any of you might know losing a child or grandchild is not the natural order of things. Life is never the same. She would have been a phenomenal teacher. She was a kid magnet. SIUE did award her her degree posthumously in May 2019. Her brother Brendan accepted it on her behalf.

I finally retired from being a nurse two years ago. It was hard at first but the right decision. I still get together with my colleagues. Life certainly has its ups and downs but Jim and I have had a good life. We do enjoy traveling. We have taken our kids and grandkids on a lot of great trips. Many memories made. As I said at the beginning family is everything. I hope we can all continue to enjoy life and stay well.

Karen Sue (Suzi) Denton (Merritt)

HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY CUZ!! 
 

HOPE YOU HAD A GREAT DAY!!

🎂🎁🥂🍾

LOVE YA

SUZ

Karen Sue (Suzi) Denton (Merritt)

I married Ron Ratcliffe right out of high school.  He was in the Marine Corp...station at Camp Pendleton in California.  We lived there a year and moved back to Bloomington.  Our son Jeff and daughter Kelly were born here.  We were married 17 years.  
I've been very lucky to be married to a wonderful man for almost 27 years.
I worked for 35 years at State Farm.  I love retirement.  Dave and I have six kids and fifteen grandkids between us and a little doggie 🐶 Sunday who is our baby. 

Melvin (Mel) Theobald

Whoa! It has been 15 days since anyone posted something on Raiders 64. Tomorrow is Suzi's birthday and she was the last to write anything here. HAPPY BIRTHDAY SUZI. Not even Jack has posted to let us know that we should set our clocks ahead tonight, something that has become somewhat of a tradition. The past couple of weeks have been traumatic for me. My dauhter was the victim of a hit-and-run accident that left her with multiple broken bones, but she is doing OK and is so much more forgiving than I could ever be. Tomorrow, I will be taking her a bouquet of roses and my special concoction of chicken spinach meatballs (if you want the recipe send me an email: theobaldart@gmail.com)

Everyday I think about all our HS classmates and wonder what I can do to stimulate our conversations. I've turned from painting and photography to writing a memoir. So much of the early pages are devoted to BHS, it is hard to imagine my life without all of you being part of it. Among those teachers I talk about are Elizabeth Stein (Art), Loraine Kraft (English) and Robert Wilson (Thespians). I'm sure you all have stories about those who mentored us. Please, tell us who among them influenced you and how. In a sense, we are all products of the impact they had on us.

And many thanks to those of you who shared your stories a couple of weeks ago. It would be a gift to hear from all of you.

Linda Bristow (Elias)

Mel:

I really can't say that I was inspired by any high school instructor.  My toughest teacher was in 7th grade at Brigham School.  Mrs. Vogel was a strict teacher who instilled vocabulary and the study of syllables and the derivitives of those syllables.  I will always acknowledge her for giving us the most instruction of any teacher I ever experienced.

For kicks, she allowed us to learn a bit of taxidermy her way.  I caught a rabbit and stuffed it in her class.

I remember Biology class and disecting frogs.  Also Mr. M. had hearing aids.  Kids in class moved their mouth and he couldn't hear.  After he turned up his hearing aids, they yelled and he had to turn them down.

I kept extra busy working after school Monday through Friday, then all day on Saturday.  That I will never forget!

Linda

Sandra Jeakins (Singletary Sizemore)

Mel:  Prayers being said for your Daughter.  Hope they catch the hit and run driver!

Linda, I had Stanley Holzhauer for Biology and I liked him, too.  But I didn't like disecting the frog.  Yikes!

My fifth grade teacher was Miss Leota Gathman, at Bent School.   Everybody had me scared to death of her because they thought she was so mean.   She ended up being one of my favorite teachers and even helped me, at her home, with sixth grade math problems.

I liked Miss Spiegel for music class at Bent School and Junion High.  She always said my voice was more comfortable singing in a lower range and she made me sing alto instead of soprano, what I wanted to sing.  But after my first Son was born, my voice did drop and I could no longer sing the high notes that I had been siinging before he was born. My voice teacher and I tried to get my high notes back, but never could.  I never got the chance to tell her she was right. 

In  high school, Miss Selk let me direct the choir in my junior year and I loved it. After seeing me direct, she told my Mom she really wanted me to go to college.   But my life took a different  turn.  I liked Charles McGuire, who taught me how to write checks and balance my checkbook.  I don't remember if he was my teacher in Junior High or High School. 

I didn't have Charles Ridenour, but for those of you who remember him, he will be 96 on March 21.  He goes to my church and although he walks with a cane, he drives himself to church and never uses the handicapped spots.  He always has a sport coat and tie on-every Sunday.. 

David Brock

I can't say any teacher at BHS was a standout..  All that I had were good, so there was nothing bad to say.  I only spent my Jr. and Sr.years. at BHS.  Most of the previous10 years were spent in another district.  I did have 1 teacher Jesse Oldaker in 6th grade, who today would have been classified as a stereotypical school marm from  the 50's and 60's.  I also had for a couple of classes with her in 8th grade (there was no Jr. Hi.).  She was tough and demanding,  but very patient with some of the mentally challenged kids.  Then there were 2 or 3 years when I was in a split classroom (half  1 grade level and half another).  Those were interesting, challenging years.

Linda Bristow (Elias)

Mel:

I was hoping that you might elaborate on your daughter's 'multiple broken bones'.    Since you haven't, I will mind my own business and just say prayers for her too!

Linda

Richard Gray

Mel - I'm one of the guilty ones of never writing to our class, My only interest in high school was hot rods and motorcycles, I still do both. Lost the interest of going fast but still enjoy riding motorcycles and driving old cars. There are 3 teachers that I recall for various reasons. In 5th grade at Jefferson grade school Ms or Mrs Oneal made me stay after school for several afternoons until I mastered the use of fractions. I thank her for that still today. Mrs Wilcox was my 7th grade English teacher. She gave me several one legged A's if you know what I mean. In hgh school I had her for General Business where she gave me B's. She asked why the big change. I said I think it had something to do with my mothers leather belt. Then there was our American History teacher, Mr Fairchild. I will never forget walking into his class on November 22 1963. he had written on the blackboard "SIT DOWN AND SHUT UP, THE PRESIDENT HAS BEEN SHOT'. I will remember tha as lon as I live. Rich

Linda Bristow (Elias)

Richard:

I was going to early lunch in El Paso High School here in Texas when I first heard the president was shot.  People started screaming and crying.  I just kept looking for the Principal's tv for more information.  Sure enough, he opened his office door and turned the tv so people could see it.

Linda

David Long

The person in high school that most influenced the manner in which I have lived the rest of my life was Coach Swearingen.  He always told me that no matter how tired I was and how much I hurt, I could always find a little bit more.  I know that he used to use me as an example to later track teams as someone that would never give up.  I know he told the story of me vomiting blood after my mile runs - saying that I gave everything I had to the race.  What neither of us knew at the time was that I was competing while suffering appendicitis.  Yeah, I did cough up blood after every race my senior year, and I did give it everything I had which was often not enough to win, but the kicker was the pain that went with trying to go the extra little bit - give it just a little more.  That attitude / ability came in very handy in the Corps, in Nam, and most recently when I had to learn to walk again with a prosthetic.  Thanks, Coach, you've been with me in thoughts many times when I had to work though issues that were almost, but not totally, impossible to deal with.

David Brock

David--You mentioned Coach Swearingen--I did not know him so well, but I knew his parents.  I deliverered the Pantagraph to them for a few years.

Melvin (Mel) Theobald

OMG. To the two Daves, Sandy, LInda and others, I love hearing your stories. Then there is Richard. I loved what he had to say. I don't mean to be patronizing, but every one of your voices touches a nerve and makes it clear that we are all one and the same. Anyone else? I'm sure that I am not the only one who is thriving on your memories of BHS and Bloomington.

As for my daughter, she had 10 screws, a rod and two plates surgically placed on her right ankle and lower right leg. Although immobiized for the next 6 to 8 weeks, she is going to heal and is in great spirits. It could have been much worse.

Allida Frisch (Altemus)

Mel- I am so sorry to hear about your daughter’s accident. It will be a long recovery but as long as she heals that is what is important. Prayers for her and your granddaughter and you.

Richard Gray

Mel - Very sorry to hear about your daughter I wish her a speedy and painless recovery, I had a bad accident in 2016 that broke my femer, took a chunk out of my knee cap and broke one of the two large bones in my lower right leg. I was on my new BMW motorcycle riding through Leroy on highway 150. I could see the city backhoe with the 6 foot wide bucket setting at a stop sign 2 blocks down the road. When I got right in front of him his backhoe lurched forward. That day while I was lying on the road he said he didn't see me coming. A few months later he told me he thinks his foot slipped off the brake. My right foot was behind my left ear. The lady on the ambulance asked me if I could hold it there until we got to Bloomington. From Bloomington they flew me by helicptor to Peoria, After surgery and a couple days in St. Francis they took me to the nursing home in Leroy. Five weeks later I went home after a lot of physical therapy. A month after getting out of the nursing home I met a lady in the local market. She said she was working in the emergency room in Bloomington when I was brought in. After they took me to Peoria she asked the surgeons how they would have taken care of me. They were going to amputate my leg. Sure glad they took me to Peoria. My heart doctor in Bloomington told me months later the surgeon in Peoria must have been a genius. I walk just about as normal as anyone and I owe it all to that surgeon. I still have the steel strip in my upper leg and I don't know how many screws in my upper and lower leg.. The nurse in Peoria said she had never removed that many stitches from anyone.. My brother Bob came to see me in the nursing home, he said your not going to buy another motorcycle are you? My answer was "if you broke your wrist golfing, would you give it up"?  I have avoided countless accidents in my 55 years of riding motorcycles on and off road. I guess I will keep riding until I can't throw a leg over one.

Wendy Stephens (Cullen)

I have three teachers who really influenced me.  Mr. Hostetler, the Advisor for the Aepix and Aegis, Miss Lange, History, and Mrs.Calhoun, English.  They all broadened the way I thought about books, history, and  personal responsibility.

Terri Baxter (Whirrett)

aFirst of all, Happy Birthday, cuz Suzi! And thank you for your birthday wishes as well! I often read the website as well but don't respond! Guilty! Dave and I are about to celebrate our 54 Anniversary and he is about to turn 80! Yikes! We are both blessed with good health despite a few mishaps in the last couple of years. We live in South Carolina and enjoy the beauty in our state. Our son And family live in Charleston. We would like to see them more than we do, but will being down there soon to see the grand girls, 17 and 14.We had the pleasure of visiting Marv and Judy in Key West last year, and they stopped by this year on their was down there.We hope to be in Bloomington his summer around reunion time. Hope to see many of you then! Fondly, Boo (Terri)