Class of 1971 ready for reunion
It's the golden anniversary, not the start of their golden years.
At least, that's what the organizers of the Butler High School Class of 1971 hope.
The traditional golden anniversary reunion of the class is set for Sept. 24 and 25.
Kathy Rogerson, a member of the reunion committee as well as a retired family and consumer science teacher, said plans call for cocktails and appetizers Sept. 24 at The Stables in Connoquenessing and a dinner and dance at The Atrium in Prospect Sept. 25.
Rogerson, Mary Johns McFarland and the rest of the reunion committee: Pete Rogerson, Sharon Logan Clark, Chet Clark, John Gibson, Larry Hibbs, John Ray, Pati Rubino and Gloria Sabatelli, spent a lot of effort trying to track down the 1,000 graduates of Butler High School that had spread across the country in the previous five decades.
McFarland said the committee was kept to 10 members for a reason.“We don't like to make the committee too big because you can never make decisions,” said McFarland.And it helps if the committee members are in Butler, she said.The committee they do have has been invaluable, said Rogerson.“Larry Hibbs is a pharmacist and has given us COVID advice,” she said. “Don Morrow has stepped in for John Gibson who had back surgery Aug. 31. Pati Rubino has been a big help.”Rogerson said it's been an effort to try to track down their classmates.
“There were 1,000 people in the class of 1971. This was back in the day when there were a lot of people in the class,” said McFarland.“We were one of the last big classes that went through Butler,” said Rogerson. “Now there are 500 in a graduating class, and it continues to go down.”Tracking their classmates down through the years and the moves caused the group to adopt the social media savvy of classes that followed after them.Rogerson said, “We did have a mission to contact anyone in our class.”To do so, the Class of 1971 set up a website, bhs71.com, and a Facebook page for the BHS Class of 1971.The reunion committee had 345 classmates, a third of the class, signed up on the website and 229 members on the Facebook page.Some classmates are signed up to both, but it was still a good start, Rogerson said.The committee also generated 435 leads from using the website searchpeoplefree.com.It sent out postcards and got back 25 to 30 replies.“In this day and age, not to have a computer or a cell phone as a way to connect is unusual, but we didn't want to miss anybody,” said Rogerson.Of course, some classmates were unable to be contacted by any means.Rogerson said 116 of the graduating class of 1971 have died, almost a tenth of the class.Some of the people of the 200 that are attending the reunion include class president Barry Garber and student council president Christopher Romney, who have both agree to make brief remarks.Carl Hoffman, who became an ordained minister, will give the blessing.Retired Vice Admiral Jonathan W. Grenert, a BHS 1971 graduate, will not be attending.He graduated from the United States Naval Academy in 1975 with a bachelor's degree in ocean engineering and completed studies in nuclear power for service as a submarine officer.His land assignments included being named the 30th Chief of Naval Operations in September 2011.Another classmate is published author Evan Slaughenhoupt, a retiree who lives in Venice, Fla.He wrote “Camp Cadet,” about the program that provided young people with positive experiences with law enforcement for improved community relations.
“He wrote three other books,” said Rogerson. “We had some pretty outstanding people who graduated with us.”Maybe that's why the committee has managed to put on a reunion every five years since the 15th reunion.“It's a lot of fun getting together because you lose classmates every year,” said McFarland.“I enjoyed high school,” said Rogerson. “I hear people say, 'I'm never going back.' But they probably didn't like high school to begin with.”McFarland said the reunions are always a lot of “kisses and giggles.“We are doing a skit on Saturday night. It will be silly. It will be real silly,” she said.“We just want to have people relax; there's no more cliques and that type of thing,” said McFarland. “I go up and talk to someone. It's a lot of fun.”“We have a lot of repeat attendees, always fun to get some new people coming in that haven't been to our other reunions,” she said.And there could always be another instance of magic like the one that happened at the 45th reunion.He was a band member and she was a Sequinette in high school. During an away football game, he snuck onto the Sequinette bus disguised in a hooded Sequinette sweatshirt.
They were friends in high school, nothing more.After graduation, they married other people. He moved away. She stayed in ButlerLater, they both divorced.The story goes, Rogerson said, that before the 45th reunion he contacted her and said he wanted to come back for the reunion and said it would be nice to see her there.Rogerson said the pair began dating while he maintained he would not get married again.Then in 2019 he surprised her with a proposal, and Sharon Logan Clark and Chet Clark have been married for two years now.McFarland hopes a COVID surge won't derail the committee's plans.“If Gov. Wolf shuts down the state, we will refund the money. We are adhering as much as possible to the efforts of the state to prevent the spread of COVID,” she said.There's still time to make a reservation for the two-day event before the Sept. 17 deadline. Go to the bhsclassof71.com website or call Chet Clark at 724-679-3710.
