East Seattle School Class of 1946 revels in its Mercer Island memories
Published 6:42 pm Monday, November 24, 2008
By Cody Ellerd’ email=’Cody.Ellerd@cmg-northwest2.go-vip.net/mi-reporter
Digging up information about the history of Mercer Island in its adolescent days can be a bit difficult. But aboard the Schooner Mallory Todd last Wednesday, the East Seattle School Class of 1946 provided a veritable gold mine.
Eighteen of the original 28 members of the eighth-grade graduating class of the old school on Mercer Island revisited the Island’s youth and their own. The members kicked off two days of festivities to celebrate their 60-year reunion — one year early.
“Everybody that can be here is here,” said Ed Lightfoot, 73, who got the reunion plans off the ground more than a year ago. “We’re at the point in time where heck, we won’t see a bunch of these people again in our lives. This is a one-shot deal.” In attendance were Lois Vinzant, whose father, the Island’s first postman, used to deliver mail by horse cart; and Mimi Macdonald, who reigned as “Queen” of the Interstate-90 floating bridge during the 1949 ceremonies to scrap the structure’s toll nine years after its opening. In opalline earrings that sparkled with blue and gold to match her eyes, Macdonald was looking as regal as ever.
Lightfoot and his old buddy Al Coury, who helped organize the event, admitted that it’s rather unusual for a grade school class to have a reunion. But having spent at least eight years together in a four-room schoolhouse on a rural island that until 1940 was accessed only by ferry, this class itself is rather unusual. “We grew up together,” said Susan Anderson, whose father built Mercer Island’s first shopping center. “There were dairy farms. We rode horses, we’d sneak down to the store to get Twinkies. Our parents never worried about us. It was a wonderful place to grow up,” she said. It’s also a bit peculiar that the Class of ’46 is celebrating its 60-year reunion after only 59 years, but the group’s alma mater is facing possible demolition if the Boys & Girls Club, which now occupies the old schoolhouse, is successful with its proposal to build a new facility. That provided an incentive to hold the event, which included a tour of the old school, earlier rather than later.
Lightfoot, however, offered a different explanation: “We blame it on Miss Lemkil, our third-grade teacher. She didn’t teach arithmetic too well.” The group set sail for a champagne toast cruise on the Mallory Todd, a custom-built yacht. The boat’s owner charters it out to private parties and provides free tours to disabled children and ancer patients. As Captain George Todd navigated the group’s native waters of Lake Washington, the boat’s deck became awash in memories. Bob Kuebler recalled the kindness of John Hanklin, the Island’s first school bus driver, who died rescuing a child who had fallen from a boat. Barclay Stewart recounted his boyhood days living with 45 other kids in the abused children’s home his grandmother, “pioneer woman” Mary Douglas, ran in the 1930s and ’40s.
“Granny was a strict disciplinarian, but never a tyrant. We all learned our social graces,” Stewart said. He traveled from Sedona, Ariz., for the reunion with a memoir he had prepared for the Mercer Island Historical Society describing life on the 80-acre estate. His mileage was beat by Sarah Nobles who made the trip from Mazatlan, Mexico, where she has lived for the last 10 years. She hadn’t seen most of her former classmates since 1948. Not everyone recognized one another by their faces, but many knew their old friends by the sounds of their voices. “I’m still always opening my mouth when I shouldn’t,” Lora Lee Hester said with a smile.
Not all the memories were rosy, however. Mimi Macdonald was still weary whenever Frank Beers was around: “She claims I dunked her pigtails in an inkwell,” Beers explained. And with the reminiscing, some of the old adolescent mischief wasn’t far behind. “He’s always been that way!” Vinzant shrieked after Coury poured ice water down her back. Coury believes that after 60 years, it’s okay to act a little silly. While 10- or 20-year reunions are full of boasting and machismo, by this time, “everyone has come down to earth.” Indeed, Frank Beers wasn’t bragging about his work as a chemical engineer at the Nevada Test Site. Nor was Bob Lewis touting his volunteer work as a dentist in Latin America and Vietnam. Lightfoot didn’t need to tell his old comrades about the 25 summers he spent in Alaska mining for gold — with such an impressive turnout and the wealth of history, memories and friendship around him, he had already struck it rich.
