Volume 3 | Number 4
Welcome to Rise
Welcome to the July 2018 edition of Rise Grand Island the alumni newsletter for Grand Island Senior High published every other month by the Grand Island Public Schools Foundation. Rise is where we connect with thousands of Islanders across the globe, keeping you and them informed on what’s happening in Purple and Gold land, and reminiscing a little bit as well.
This is Volume 3, Number 4, the fourth offering of Rise this calendar year, our third year as the official publication for alums of Islander Nation. Thanks for reading us and for your comments and support.
We really enjoy hearing from those of you who find Rise in your in-box every other month. Give us a shout, especially if you or a GISH alum you know has done something new, newsy, or newsworthy. You can reach us at alumni@gips.org.
We are introducing a new feature into Rise, this issue: Grand Legacy Update. It will be written each issue by Leigh Lillibridge, the campaign coordinator for the spectacular new project to renovate Memorial Stadium — Our Grand Legacy Memorial Stadium. Leigh will be keeping us apprised of the project’s progress and give you ways you can be involved. In her first offering she introduces herself and her connections to Memorial Stadium. Welcome to the Rise family, Leigh.
Our At the Top feature is about the role of a GISH alumnus (or any school alum I suppose) whether he or she graduated in 1938 or 2018. We’ve thrown in a little on shared history, too, that part of our past that informs and influences our present.
Also in the issue Foundation Executive Director Traci Skalberg walks us back into Memorial Stadium history.
Our Class Reunion Update lets you know who is going to party and when in case your class is on deck or maybe you just want to crash another class’s soiree and see a few old friends.
Meet Marti Terry-Purdy, Class of 1968. Marti traveled to Antarctica to complete a bucket list entry. She shares her story and photos in our Milestones section.
Our Distant Mirror correspondent, Mike Monk, Class of 1967, writes eloquently about the value of great books in his life. He also persuaded four of his classmates to share the books they considered the “best” in their reading lives. Mike also shares his and asks you to share yours.
My I’ve Been Thinking column touches on the closing of College Street, the thoroughfare that for many years bisected the Senior High campus. The reconfiguration of the campus got me wondering about school size and the important of “place” in our lives.
As we do every issue, we honor those Islanders who passed the last couple months in our In Memoriam section.
Per our custom, we’ll see what songs were popular on the radio, what novels people were reading, what movies were wooing us to the big screen, and what television shows kept us from our homework each decade during July going back to the 1930s.
We hope you enjoy this Rise as we bask in the summer sun. Oh, yeah, and remember … keep pushing on.
George Ayoub, Class of 1968
Editor, Rise Grand Island
Grand Legacy Update
Meet the Memorial Stadium Project Campaign Coordinator
Hello! It is my privilege to help coordinate the collective efforts to bring Grand Island’s Memorial Stadium a much needed renovation! Oodles of work goes on behind the scenes to gear up for a fundraising effort of this magnitude, and I can tell you, I have enjoyed every moment. One of the many highlights has been researching and learning about the original campaign from 1945-47 during post World War II days. I was so proud to find family names of my husband’s among the names of the original donors to Memorial Stadium.
I came to work for the Foundation a little over a year ago, with 20+ years of previous work in non-profit administration, fundraising, and finance. One of my most meaningful prior fundraising projects was the improvement of facilities at Howard County Medical Center in St. Paul, Nebraska. Their patients have the benefit of improved care with a new laboratory, emergency room, infusion room, and many other updated pieces of medical equipment because of fundraising efforts.
My family and I have lived in Grand Island since 1995 and consider it home. Our only child, Jonah, is a Third Grader in the GIPS district. My husband Jack works in the laboratory at the VA Medical Center. If you are a veteran, you may already know him.
I would like to thank the many volunteers, our co-chairs, honorary co-chairs, and the campaign cabinet for their tremendous gift of time to our project so far and for the many hours they will spend to see this monumental project come to life. We thank you all for your future support and we look forward to seeing you at Memorial Stadium.
Leigh Lillibridge, MS Ed
Campaign Coordinator
At the Top
New Alums Now Sharing History
I heard a graduation speaker once tell the assembled soon-to-be alumni seated in a vast auditorium to remember than even when the worst of times visits them, even when their lives are tossed upon rocky shores, even when they don’t believe they can be further down or farther out, rest assured: Their alumni association will call them and ask for something.
Sure, he was going for a laugh with his joke, but we here at Rise, the alumni newsletter for Grand Island Senior High, aren’t asking for anything whether you graduated 80 years ago or 8 weeks ago. We simply want you to know what’s happening at GISH, enjoy some reminisces we have to offer, and give you a rundown on ways you can stay connected and involved in your alma mater.
The origin of the word alma mater comes from the Latin meaning, “nourishing mother.” And while some speak in reverent tones when they recall a school so much a part of their lives, we at Rise hear from a variety of correspondents from a variety of graduating classes offering a variety of sentiments about GISH and more.
As the alumni newsletter and the single unifying feature for Senior High grads … other than being a Senior High grad … at Rise we hear from alums from nearly every decade. Some want to praise us for sending them Rise every other month (you’re most welcome); some want to ask questions, often about the past but occasionally about the present or future (glad we could help); and a few have written to complain or take us to task about this or that (we’re doing the best we can).
We appreciate any correspondence or newsmaker “tips” from readers like you. Being an alumnus allows for a spectacularly long continuum on which one could develop and keep a preferred relationship: from no interest in anything to do with Senior High to active participation in alumni activities from reunions to hundreds of ongoing, informal connections with classmates from the past. The Grand Island Public Schools Foundation maintains links on its web page that may be of particular interest to alumni, from reunions to this newsletter to opportunities to establish or endow scholarships. Check it out here: GIPS Foundation.
Too, whether we like it or not GISH’s success is our communal success in that GISH is a part of all of us, our shared history. Writer James Baldwin said that history “is not merely something to be read. And it does not refer merely, or even principally, to the past. On the contrary, the great force of history comes from the fact that we carry it within us, are unconsciously controlled by it in many ways, and history is literally present in all that we do. It could scarcely be otherwise, since it is to history that we owe our frames of reference, our identities, and our aspirations.”
To the 520 newly-minted members of the Class of 2018, welcome to our shared history. Here you’ll find a piece and part of your past, however brief that may be at the moment. As the years distance themselves from your past and it takes on new meaning per Baldwin’s observation, remember how much you want to participate in it is completely up to you.
No joke.
I've Been Thinking
Of Time and Place ... and Size
If you’re a member of one of the 62 classes that called North Lafayette Street home for high school, put on your hard hat and dust off your engineering skills.
Things have changed.
For years College Street separated Senior High and Memorial Stadium, essentially dividing the campus.
Those days are over. The Grand Island City Council voted a year ago to close College Street, the busy byway that bisected Senior High’s now sprawling campus. Last month, the barricades went up and Senior High no longer had a street running through one of its “hallways,” part of the safety argument proponents of the closure made in the run-up to the council’s vote. Hundreds of students headed across College Street each school day for PE class or band practice or soccer team drills. That vote incidentally was a tie. Mayor Jeremy Jensen, a GISH grad, cast the deciding “yea” in favor of snipping College Street at Lafayette on the east and Custer on the west. Part of College Street (the eastern section) that has been closed will now become a green space with walkways to the stadium. Local access from the west to parking lots will remain open.
Opponents from the neighborhood were loud and legion, arguing that closing College Street would overload traffic on side streets, creating dangerous intersections not to mention adding time for travelers heading east and west. The math was impressive, too. The city estimated that each day 3,000 vehicles heading west used College Street between the school and the stadium. Another 1,000 did so heading east.
Nevertheless, Senior High now has an undivided campus that stretches from Custer on the west to Lafayette on the east and from State on the south to Forrest on the north. That’s not including two softball field north of Forrest and the Career Pathways Institute on South Adams Street. The main campus — now a single, unbroken physical entity — covers 24 square blocks.
And I used to worry about such mundane matters as which “finger” on GISH’s “hand” housed my biology class with Mr. Bean, and whether I would be trampled in the cross corridor getting there. That was before Grand Island Senior High added two wings, built another gymnasium, threw in an entire freshman class, closed a street, and grew to well over 2,000 current Islanders. If today’s version of GISH were a city, it would be larger than about 80 percent of the state’s municipalities.
The Grand Island Public Schools used the school’s size in a recent marketing campaign whose tag line was “Yeah, we’re big!” — accenting the advantages a large school has over its smaller neighbors: AP courses, a wide variety of fine arts, and about any sport or activity you can think of.
Any high school of any size should strive, however, to create a community, looking for common bonds that unify rather than separate. With over 2,000 students, the current leaders at GISH will have to work at it daily.
In the 60s we always had the Islander (fortunately they still do), which was delivered into the hands of every student, usually on Friday afternoons. Students also showed up at football games and school plays in far greater numbers then as fewer of them worked on a weekend night and school events carried a certain social cachet.
I was always proud to be from one of the biggest schools in the state, one that played a Class A schedule and looked beyond the old Big Ten Conference to Lincoln and the Metros for peers among high schools.
We were 1,500 or so but I never remember thinking GISH was too big or overwhelming or unnavigable … despite my daily adventures in the cross corridor or the horrors of being last for lunch when the main courses had been severely picked over.
None of which diminishes the communitarian advantage of small schools. It simply was not my experience … nor the experience of thousands of you reading this. Size … in school form … matters because when you’re talking about high schools, you’re talking about an experience that shaped us when we were … well … quite shapeable. When we went to Senior High — time — obviously molded us. But never discount the critical experience and importance of place and the size of that place.
And now with College Street no longer part of the mix, Senior High’s place has changed.
Alumni Reunions
Planning a class reunion?
We can help get you started!
Contact us for your class list and send us information about your reunion. We will post it to our website.
Kari Price, Alumni Coordinator
kprice@gips.org
308.385.5900 ext. 1148
NOTE: Reunion information in this newsletter is current as of the publication date. To see Reunion updates and additions go to our Alumni Reunions page.
Class of 1951
The Class of 1951 will hold their bi-annual reunion at the Liederkranz on Friday, October 5th, 2018, Harvest of Harmony weekend. Please contact Jim Marsh for details at
(702) 946-1000.
Class of 1953
The Class of 1953 will be holding their 65th Reunion on August 28 - 30, 2018. Festivities include a movie viewing at the Grand Theatre on August 28th. The Righteous Brothers concert at the Nebraska State Fair and a banquet dinner on August 29th and a farewell breakfast on August 30th.
For more information call Buzz Douthit, (308) 390-2242 or Neta Hepp Dibbern, (308) 583-0159.
Class of 1956
The Class of 1956 wishes to extend an invitation to fellow classmates to join them at their monthly gathering. They meet on the 2nd Tuesday of each month at the Midtown Holiday Inn at 6:00 pm.
Class of 1966
The Class of 1966 wishes to extend an invitation to fellow classmates to join them at their monthly lunch gathering. They meet the 3rd Wednesday of each month at the Platt Duetsche at 1:00 pm.
Class of 1973
The Class of 1973 will be holding their 45th Class Reunion the first weekend in August, 2018.
August 2: Thursday is a Downtown Night on the Town that begins at the Bartenbach Gallery and will continue to a few 'sites' in the downtown area. August 3: Friday night will be a gathering at the Liederkranz. August 4: Saturday will begin with
George Bartenbach hosting a golf outing, please contact him directly, ASAP if you are interested. (bgallery7@gmail.com) Saturday night will be dinner and dancing at the Saddle Club.
For more information; email Linda Syverson Guild, syverson.guild@outlook.com or call her at 301-320-6055
Class of 1978
“COME SAIL AWAY” 40th Class Reunion.
When: Saturday, July 21, 2018
Where: Riverside Golf Club, 2820 Riverside Dr. Grand Island NE 68801
Time: 6:00pm to midnight
Casual Patio Dress
Please join us for heavy appetizers and a cash bar! *Dance begins at 8:00pm* Cost: $40 per person, $75 per couple. To update your contact information email: gishclassof1978@gmail.com and we will email you an invitation. Make Checks or Money Order Payable to: GISH Class of 1978 and send to: Linda Campbell Schlapfer, 15808 Larimore Plaza #44, Omaha, NE 68116. No Refunds. FYI- Friday night, July 20th is a Downtown Night on the Town that begins at Studio K around 7:30
Pushing On
Milestones
Islander Crosses Antarctica Off Her List
When Marti Terry-Purdy, Class of 1968, retired six years ago, the intrepid traveler had one more continent to check off her bucket list of visiting the seven continents: Antarctica. She had no luck finding anyone interested in the trip. She said she believed people thought she was a little unbalanced for wanting to travel to the coldest, windiest and driest place on earth. Finding passage was not easy either, in a group or solo. “There were lots of cruises that did “drive-bys,” she said. “But no one guaranteed me being on land because the weather is so iffy.”
She finally found a company, Quark Expeditions, that took her to land on the continent via a zodiac twice a day for five days. She said she never traveled completely alone before in her life but she “just went for it.”
Her experience was like no other.
“They call it the “Zone of Peace and Science” because it’s the only continent that hasn’t been completely ruined by humans. It was like being on another planet. There were no roads, no billboards, no hotels, just seals, incredible mammoth icebergs, and thousands of penguins that if you sat on the snow would come up and look you in the eyes. It was truly a trip of a lifetime, and I recommend it to anyone with a screw loose who loves adventure.”
Shaking the World
Tradition, Honor, Glory and Memories
When the GIPS Foundation decided to take on a fundraising effort to renovate Grand Island’s Memorial Stadium, the first thing we knew we had to do was research the past. We wanted to know how this community pulled together to build the stately Memorial Stadium and who was involved. We found some great help at the Grand Island Public Library and started to piece the information together.
Shortly after we started the project we got a call from Jean Ashworth Fisher class of 1950. She explained that she had a copy of the program for the first game played at the stadium (Friday, September 19, 1947). Mrs. Fisher graciously donated this program to us. It was a wonderful addition to our growing repertoire and understanding of the initial project.
When we went looking for some video footage of the Class of 1949 football great Bobby Reynolds, another Grand Island High School grad came to the rescue. Tom Hill, class of 1964 lent us his copy of a football game where you can see just how talented Grand Island’s Mr. Touchdown was. He weaved in and out, hurdled other players and made quite an impression.
Still, we were piecing together memories and official documentation of the project. We were missing THE FILE. The school district didn’t own the stadium until its dedication. The school district didn’t fundraise for the project…so we were pretty sure that the district didn’t have THE FILE.
We were hoping that THE FILE documenting the campaign effort existed. This summer our friend Bill Scott brought us a file from his father’s things. The tag on the file read: “MEMORIAL STADIUM, Bayard H. Paine, Jr. Chairman, Final Drive.” This file was the American Legion file. Bayard H. Paine, Jr. class of 1924, had headed up the final drive for the project as the initial drive fell just a bit short. Bill’s father was A.C. Scott, class of 1942. A.C. served as both Legion Commander and Commander of the elite 40 & 8. A.C. Scott also served as the Veteran’s Service Officer from 1971 to 1988.
While other files might exist, we were giddy with what we found in this file: Newspaper clippings for all of the mentions of the campaign, fundraising letters and campaign materials, personal notes, and the original donor list. This file helped us fill in some major missing pieces. We will be adding these things to our history page of our website and featuring them from time to time.
We are so grateful to the Scott family for preserving this history and to Bayard H. Paine, Jr for meticulously keeping information for the file. And we are grateful to all of our alumni and friends that have helped us so far. If you have memories or information that you want to share with us, or you would like to get involved with the campaign,
click here: GI Memorial Stadium. We need all hands on deck.
Here is one little nugget we pulled from the file:
Original excerpt from the Grand Island Daily Independent, September 16, 1947:
The Daily Independent has a sense of personal pride in the Memorial stadium, which is to be dedicated tonight. This newspaper has never supported more enthusiastically any community project.
It was well over two years ago that the proposal for a stadium in memory of the services performed by Hall county men and women in the armed services during World War II was first made. The goal set, $100,000, looked almost unapproachable in a city the size of Grand Island. But the committee in charge of the campaign went out after the money. And the money came in.
There were hundreds of contributors – the number may have reached the thousands. Some came back a second and third time. The gifts ranged from $5,000 down to a few cents, and the same thought was behind each.
At the end of the two and a half years, more than $100,000 has been made available-at least $1,000 more than that unapproachable sum of 1945. The stadium has been all but completed, and will be ready for use by the time of 1947’s first football game next Friday night. It is a classically beautiful athletic plant, and one that will take care of the community’s needs for years to come. It isn’t as large as was first planned, because prices have gone up. But the additions can be made as funds are made possible.
The stadium will serve a useful purpose not only for football games, but throughout the year. It can be used for 4-H fairs, for the Harvest of Harmony, for many exhibitions, for concerts. It is a great community asset, of which Grand Island has every reason to be proud.
Your Legacy. Their Opportunity.
#WHYIGIVE. The GIPS Staff Do It Again!
Where on earth can you send your kids to school that is so mission driven, with staff that are so deeply concerned about the students in their care, that they give from their own pocketbooks to invest back into these students? Grand Island Public Schools is that place.
This year 90.5% of the more than 1,400 staff gave back to students through the GIPS Foundation’s Add it Up to Opportunity campaign. The staff raised over $93,000. The campaign was themed #whyigive because giving is so personal, and we all give for reasons that tug at our hearts in a particular way. I am not going to tell you why they give…I am going to let them tell you themselves via the video below.
The campaign was helped with a challenge gift from the Ron & Lori Depue family and also included fun contests and a social media blitz.
On behalf of the board and staff of the GIPS Foundation, we are so grateful to the staff of Grand Island Public Schools. It is an honor to work in support of and in partnership with them.
A Distant Mirror
The Joy of Reading and Top 10 Favorite Books of All Time
Our past reflections from the Distant Mirror (to keep the metaphor going) have touched upon my love for books and literature. I shared my memories of going to the Carnegie Library on Second Street with my buddy Steve Schroeder in Third Grade or so, and checking out the maximum of six books each. My childhood was blessed by reading not only every sports book in sight, but also the great “Tom Sawyer” and “Huckleberry Finn,” the charming Chip Hilton sports books of Clair Bee, and the heart warming stories of Beverly Cleary, including “Henry Huggins” and “Beezus and Ramona.”
Katherine Martin (Katherine Langdon), my beloved Second Grade teacher at Howard School, brought the Beverly Cleary books into my life. In an earlier Distant Mirror column about the teachers I most treasured, I mentioned Ms. Martin, who so greatly inspired me not only to read, but to love reading. One of the most rewarding parts of writing this column is that it has allowed me to reconnect with old friends. The most emotional for me was reconnecting with Katherine “Kass” Martin in this past year. After she read my newsletter, her friend Jane Richardson gave me her contact information, and I wrote her with my thanks and fond memories. Later we spoke on the phone and shared many memories from her 1957 Second Grade class. Kass was as charming and positive as ever, and speaking with her these 62 years later was a thrill.
The value of reading is universally acknowledged. One of the most common habits of very successful people is continuing to read voraciously through their lifetime. Many very successful people from Warren Buffett to Bill Gates to Mark Zuckerberg, read prodigious numbers of books on a regular basis. To read the best that has been written delights and surprises. It shocks and amazes. It warms and mellows. And it is invaluable when watching Jeopardy. Some of my most euphoric moments in life have been while reading in my easy chair or at the pool or with a glass of ice tea on the patio. The well-read person not only learns the lessons taught by great literature, but has a pleasing hobby to soothe the tired soul for the rest of one’s life. The most poignant parts of my top 15 list below have brought me to tears.
The great educator Jacques Barzun in his book “Teacher in America,” emphasized that everything we read has value, ending with a favorite line of mine, even “Trash is Excellent.” I agree. But over the years I have come to ask, “Why not read the classics primarily, the best that has been thought and written?” There is a wonderful book by Harold Bloom called “How to Read and Why.” The title is a bit misleading, but it is essentially a list of wonderful books, some well known classics and some not, that will reward the reader greatly. I once discussed this book with a law partner, who asked if such lists are not “elitist.” Well the answer is no, since anyone can read them and all will benefit.
In this spirit of selecting wonderful books to read, after my 50th Senior High reunion last year, a few of my close friends from the class of 1967 and I set out to record and share our “Favorite Books of All Time” in Top 10 lists, reminiscent of David Letterman. I found these fascinating, and hereby share them with you. Please note that we agreed not to include Shakespeare, since his works would dominate any list. He is the King, the Bard, the most eloquent writer in the English language.
We all had trouble keeping the list to 10 books. My long time pal Jeff Greenberger was particularly obstreperous and refused to reduce his list to even 20. But, with a little editing, here are our lists of 10, or 15.
Jeff Greenberger
1. “Ulysses” by James Joyce
2. “One Hundred Years of Solitude" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
3. “All the Pretty Horses” by Cormac McCarthy
4. “Crossing to Safety” by Wallace Stegner
5. “War and Peace” by Leo Tolstoy
6. “David Copperfield" by Charles Dickens
7. “Lolita” by Vladimir Nabokov
8. “Middlemarch" by George Eliot
9. “Augie March” by Saul Bellow
10. “Winnie the Pooh” by A.A. Milne
11. “Swann’s Way” by Marcel Proust
12. “Satanic Verses” by Salman Rushdie
13. “Love Medicine” by Louise Erdrich
14. “Death in Venice” by Thomas Mann
15. “Cloud Atlas” by David Mitchell
Dennis Hickstein
1. “War and Peace”by Leo Tolstoy
2. “Ulysses”by James Joyce
3. “Brother’s Karamozov” by Fyodor Dostoevsky
4. “David Copperfield” by Charles Dickens
5. “The Great Gatsby” by F.Scott Fitzgerald
6. “For Whom The Bell Tolls” by Ernest Hemingway
7. “The Sound and The Fury”by William Faulkner
8. “To The Lighthouse” by Virginia Woolf
9. “A Death In The Family”by James Agee
10. “Raise High The Roofbeam Carpenters”by J.D. Salinger
11. “Look Homeward Angel” by Thomas Wolfe
12. ‘Crossing To Safety” by Wallace Stegner
13. “The Alexandria Quartet” by Laurence Durrell
14. “All The King’s Men” by Robert Penn Warren
15. “Heart of Darkness” by Joseph Conrad
Thomas Meedel
1. “Walden” by Henry David Thoreau
2. “Cancer Ward” by Alexander Solzhenitsyn:
3. “Crime and Punishment” by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
4. “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee:
5. “Jude the Obscure “by Thomas Hardy:
6. “Don Quixote” by Miguel de Cervantes:
7. “Cannery Row" by John Steinbeck:
8. “Hiroshima” by John Hersey:
9. “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” by Mark Twain
10. “The Origin of Species” by Charles Darwin
James Vohland
1. “Charlotte’s Webb” by E.B. White
2. “The James Bond” books by Ian Fleming
3. “Slaughterhouse Five” by Kurt Vonnegut
4. “Lucifer’s Hammer” by Jerry Pournelle and Larry Niven
5. “Charlie Chan Series” by Earl Derr Biggers
6. “Portnoy’s Complaint” by Phillip Roth
7. “Red Sky at Morning” by Richard Bradford
8. “I Shall Not Be Moved” by Maya Angelou
9. “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
10. “The Bell Jar” by Sylvia Plath
11. “Andersonville” by MacKinlay Kantor
12. “Devil in the White City” by Erik Larson
13. “Lord of the Flies” by William Golding
14. “All books” by Janet Evanovich
15. “Jack Reacher” by Lee Child
Michael Monk
1. “War and Peace” by Leo Tolstoy
2. “The Pickwick Papers” by Charles Dickens
3. “Middlemarch” by George Eliot (AKA Mary Anne Evans)
4. “Tom Jones” by Henry Fielding
5. “Huckleberry Finn” by Mark Twain (AKA Samuel Clemens)
6. “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
7. “Canterbury Tales” by Geoffrey Chaucer (original Middle English version)
8. “East of Eden” by John Steinbeck
9. “The Magic Mountain” by Thomas Mann
10. “Pride and Prejudice” by Jane Austen
11. “Tale of Two Cities” by Charles Dickens
12. “Robinson Crusoe” by Danial Defoe
13. “The Stand” by Stephen King
14. “Tortilla Flat” by John Steinbeck
15. “The Big Sleep” by Raymond Chandler
If anyone has a need for a summer reading suggestion, you could do worse than trying any book on these lists. I would love to have alumni email me their top 10 “Favorite Books of All Time.”
Indeed if I get some lists, I will include one in each future newsletter. After all, isn’t the purpose of a school system the advancement, enjoyment and pursuit of knowledge? I can be reached at m.monk@mpglaw.com.
In Memoriam
May and June memorial list of GISH Alumni
DONNA (DUNN) CHAPMAN, Class of 1961, died April 26, 2018, in Fountain Hills, Ariz. she was 74.
LOYAL RUHL, JR, Class of 1942, died May 1, 2018, in Central City. He was 95.
DORIS (LEAMONS) EPPENBACH, Class of 1969, died May 3, 2018, in O’Neill. Doris lived in Ewing. She was 66.
JOAN (REIMERS) GRAYBILL, Class of 1967, died May 4, 2018, in Hastings. She was 69.
LORI (HELM) ROACH, Class of 1978, died May 6, 2018, in Colton, Calif. Lori lived in Redlands, Calif. She was 58.
JERRY ‘PAT’ LEE, Class of 1951, died May 7, 2018, in Scottsbluff. He was 85.
NORM DEHARDE, Class of 1952, died May 8, 2018, in Grand Island. He was 83.
SHARON (SENKBEIL) MELSEN, Class of 1959, died May 8, 2018, in Grand Island. She was 76.
BYRON MOORE, former GI Senior High teacher and Assistant Principal, died May 13, 2018 in Grand Island. He was 72.
KANDI HICKEY, Class of 1990, died May 14, 2018, in Grand Island. She was 49.
PEPPY (WOLBACH) BAHR, Class of 1960, died May 16, 2018, in Rancho Santa Fe, Calif. She was 76.
DONNA (RUFF) STONER, Class of 1962, died May 19, 2018, in Sioux Falls, S. D. Donna lived in Jackson, Minn. She was 74.
JAMES (JIM) BECK, Class of 1963, died May 20, 2018, in Rochester, Minn. he was 73.
RONALD GRIMES, Class of 1966, died May 20, 2018, in Central City. He was 70.
DAVID JANSEN, Class of 1984, died in Central City. He was 51.
JAMES (JIM) JACOBSEN, Class of 1968, died May, 22, 2018, in Kearney. He was 67.
DANNY RICKERT, Class of 1961, died May 27, 2018, in Springfield, Mo. He was 75.
ED FELSKE, Class of 1956, died June 2, 2018, in Grand Island. He was 81.
ERMA (STITES) LEE, Class of 1941, died June 16, 2018, in Burwell. She was 95.
VICKI (JAKUBOWSKI) TREJO, Class of 1982, died June 11, 2018, in Virginia Beach, Va. She was 53.
MATT ADAMS, Class of 1999, died June 16, 2018, in Grand Island. He was 37.
CAROLINE (SKINNER) LEEP, Class of 1958, died June 24, 2018, in Grand Island. She was 77.
CASSANDRA (SHAFER) HEDGLIN, Class of 1988, died June 24, 2018, in North Platte. She was 48.
WAYNE JANSSEN, Class of 1955, died June 26, 2018, in St. Libory. He was 80.
