The class of 1970

Okay so maybe you are wondering about the title today and rightly so. This Saturday is the RHS/LRHS alumni banquet. The last banquet was held in 2019 but because of Covid restrictions we couldn’t have a formal get together without the fear of another ‘Superspreader’ event near Ritzville.

So what is the big deal about the class of 1970? It just so happens that this was the class in which I graduated. Because of a few absentees I have been afforded the duties of introducing our class at the banquet. One caveat, keep it short since there will be three 50 year classes, three 25 year classes and three graduating classes so keep the introductions short. That doesn’t seem fair since we had a really good class and the largest one since 1970.

So I will start with having a large class. From first through fourth grade we had three classrooms. The other classes only had two which means there were a few one year teaching contracts signed.

When we were in fifth grade a lot of things in the world were changing and most of that was happening 90 miles away in Cuba. We learned a lot about duck and cover, fallout shelters and our location as a community in respect to Fairchild Air Force Base, Grand Coulee Dam, Hanford and a now defunct Larson Air Force Base that was located in Moses Lake. No one told us about the missile silos in our area and now I’m glad they didn’t. We survived the craziness of October 1962 when the nuclear armament went back to Russia.

In sixth grade none of us will ever forget November 22, 1963 when John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas. I can walk into the classroom today and point to where I was sitting. That was the first time that I was aware of the word assassination but it certainly wouldn’t be the last.

As we moved on to Jr. High the Cuba situation was in the rear view mirror but Vietnam became a significant part of our vocabulary and the evening news.

In our 8th grade year we finally had the opportunity to play basketball against opponents from other communities. That was fun. We played 6 games against 3 opponents and won them all. We felt pretty good about ourselves. Prior to those games the only competition we had with Bi-County opponents was during track season. We also started making friends from other communities.

As we moved on to high school we were able to go to several classrooms during the day. So we weren’t always with the same group of kids like the smart kids that affected my grade when the teacher graded on the curve. Some of those curves were treacherous.

During the fall of 1966 our football team was undefeated and won the Bi-County championship. As freshmen I remember getting hit pretty hard and sometimes that happened when I held the blocking bag. I learned to tackle and I also know firsthand what it’s like to get the wind knocked out of you and it wasn’t a pleasant experience. Two of our running backs were in the top five in the state in scoring. When you tackled them in practice you had a good day.

Sometime during our sophomore year the state of Washington mandated that anyone turning 16 needed to take Driver Training. Before then it was optional. I figured if I could pass my dad’s course on the farm I could manage Mr. Agee’s class and I did.

In April of 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in Memphis and in June Robert Kennedy was assassinated in Los Angeles. These deaths were senseless and we wondered what was going on in the world.

At the start of our junior year we had a new Principal and Superintendent for the first time in over a decade. The new Superintendent was a great guy and the principal…well let’s just say we weren’t sad that he only lasted one year.

Our drama and music departments collaborated on the musical Bye, Bye Birdie and it was certainly a hit. There were several members of our class that were leads in the musical and they did a great job acting and singing.

Our senior year started with another Bi-County football championship. We were voted Number 2 in the state that season because there were no playoffs yet. Basketball season had its ups and downs until we had a late season rally to get into the playoffs and we would play in the state tournament and secure a seventh place trophy.

The baseball team won the Bi-County and District championships for the first time in 13 years. Track and wrestling did well and they both sent members of the team to state.

During our four years of high school we had one football coach, four assistants, four head basketball coaches, two wrestling coaches, three tennis coaches, two track coaches and three baseball coaches. We have some great members of the 1970 class and I’m looking forward to our reunion.