This past Saturday, May 18, about two dozen members of the St. Peter's Cathedral Grade School graduating class of 1963 celebrated our 50th graduation anniversary with a mini-reunion. The original class size was approximately 80 students. 

We met at 3pm at the grade school and Principal Lynda Higgins allowed access to the school to visit our old classrooms.  We originally attended first grade classes in the OLD St. Peter's grade school building (southeast corner of the church parking lot...LONG since demolished) until Thanksgiving of 1955, because the new school was not quite ready for our occupancy. We moved into the new school after Thanksgiving break in 1955 to complete our first grade in the newly constructed school.  We were actually the first group of children to attend classes throughout all eight grades. The school recently absorbed several other grade schools in the parish and the blended result is now called Resurrection School.

Cindy Kamphaus, Sister Dorothy Henscheid (formerly Sister Mary Lois) & Roberta Mueller outside the "supplies" closet. Cin & 'Berta were the "supplies" gals in eighth grade, going from room to room with compasses, protractors, rulers, notebook paper, erasers...OLD-school stuff!  

While most attendees still reside in the KC area, some of our classmates attended from as far away as California, North Carolina, Colorado, Ohio, Texas and the St. Louis area.  

After the tour, we attended 4pm Mass at St. Peter's Cathedral, celebrated by Fr. Harry Schneider.  Sister Dorothy Henscheid, our second grade instructor (back then, her name was Sister Mary Lois) also attended the tour and the Mass.  Sister also joined the group for continued conversation at the Panera Bread in Mission, Kansas.

David Briscoe, Sister Dorothy (AKA Sr. Mary Lois) and Roberta Mueller
in our actual 2nd grade classroom
with our actual 2nd grade teacher!  Kozmik!

We ran an ad on the back advertisement page of the church bulletin for two weeks that read: "In gratitude for our excellent Catholic education. St. Peters Class of 1963"

The arrangements for this get-together were made through a special Facebook page for our class and through postcards mailed with the information to those for whom we had contact information, but who were NOT Facebook members.  I'm duplicating the FB postings here for classmates who are not FB members.

Here's a group photo taken at the church after Mass. Click on the photo for a larger view.

First row: Roberta (Clegg) Mueller, Cindy Kamphaus, Linda Conley, Sister Dorothy Henscheid (formerly Sr. Mary Lois, our 2nd grade teacher!), Lu (Dover) Davis, Marlin Pace  

Second row: Marilyn (Buford) Carroll (behind Sr. Dorothy), Pam (Smythe) Widener

Third row: Mike Kilderry, Charlie Huddleston, Diane (Lohr) Bahr, Marlene (Wise) Braunsdorf, Mary Pat (Horan) Corder, David Briscoe

Back row: Patty (Stack) Ames, Mary (Stewart) Simpson, Mary Ann (Lynch) Duffield, Jane (Hartung) Ketchell, Steve Klemencic

Many people brought along old artifacts and mementos from grade school days to share: Laudate hymnals; Missals with the Latin on one side of the page and the English on the facing page; First Holy Communion purses, rosaries, prayer books, scapulars; Science Fair certificates; St. Dominic Savio Club and Bishop's Relief Fund certificates. Amazing what we hang onto, isn't it?  :)

We all had a wonderful time catching up with one another!  


NOTE: Check the 2013 Blog Archive over there on the right hand column for an earlier posting about this event that includes lots of photos of mementos. I'll also scan and post additional things over the coming weeks.