News from and for classmates!

This started as a way to share  classmates' accounts of their involvement with Hurricane Katrina. Louisiana and Mississippi aren't all that far from Texas! We added tales from Hurricane Rita. Gratefully, these are less harrowing stories. Now, it's Ike.

Now, other news is gathered. You'll find classmates' stories told here. Why not add yours! Just send it along to Richard or Louise.

Messages are arranged with the most recent "on top."

September 2011: One of our number – namely, classmate Ann Lipscomb Witt – is running for the Texas House of Representatives in the 2012 elections. Her appeal to her Lamar '58 follows. (Note that this is not included here as an endorsement of Ann in this race, but as news about a classmate's willingness to get involved in the public arena.)

“I am Ann Lipscomb Witt, the quintessential late-bloomer – hoping to get started at age 70 - running for State Rep, Dist 136,Beverly Woolley’s just-vacated seat. It isTanglewood/Memorial and points west. I didn’t know a lot of you because I was a mid-termer and skipped ahead to join you in graduating in ’58.

·Married, 6 children, 8 grandchildren

·After college, taught math and children with learning disabilities

·Spent last 10 years developing a 260-acre pecan orchard into 2-acre home sites

·Active in republican politics

·Republican Nominee for state representative in Sharpstown in 2004 –

the demographics changed, Bush went down and I went with him.

I’m running my campaign out of my home, 5136 Huckleberry Circle(Tanglewood)

Come help elect a conservative, have fun and maybe see old classmates.

Ann Lipscomb Witt

Judy Gayle Greenwood reported on 8/2/114 that  “Richard, you have no idea what a blessing your [forwarding of my] email to our classmates has been to me. No one has tried caring bridge, but I have received 15 emails from classmates some of whom I have not seen in 50 years. I have loved every message....I think as we get older and "sicker" that everyone should let you know when they need a lift. It's hard to hear when we've lost an old friend, but if we know when friends are ill, we can cheer them. I hope this will become a practice (of course, this may make your life harder with all the extra work). Thanks again. I am so grateful for old friends. Judy”

posted June 2011

Woodrow Wilson Elementary School is in the end stage of raising money to completely renew their playground with a goal of approximatelyl $400,000.  They have raised about  $250,000.

From Ronnie Grant on September 18:

hi.  we lost one of our beach houses, completely washed away by surge. the other had all downstairs washed away, and storage building. its terrible. i am on dial up, but have power in Clute. we went to Bellville. Galveston is so torn up that it will be months.  this because of our previous plans to go joyvisitride there. not gonna be possible i don't think. and, we have a family who lost their house in surfside, totally gone, they live there full time , staying with us and they may be here through October so i thought i should let you know.  its difficult for all of us.  you should see the destroyed houses in surfside, and jans sister lived permanently on Bolivar, she lost her house. they cant find it. we had minor damage here but surrounding area looks like a war zone so many trees down. i guess we will recover but right now the reunion is not much on my mind.

Later, he added: most of our friends still do not have electricity in lake jackson, but we rejoiced when the HEB opened.  yesterday was Jans 60th birthday, she was sick, but we celebrated it by my driving  to Angleton, a 45 minute round trip, to the red top hamburger place, for two burgers and two malts, plus tater tots. what a wonderful meal. nothing was open here like that and we have a curfew of 7 pm and they mean  it.

In another note:We completely lost one house at Surfside, had terrible damage to the other.  Our home in Clute did a little better. I have been dealing with insurance adjusters, etc,and we opened our home to some who have no home anymore, so it has been hectic.

In 1971, she founded and became the first principal of Houston's High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, only the third such fine arts magnet school in the nation when it opened. Skeptics doubted the school would give students a solid education, and the school wasn't even accredited its first year. In recognition of her contribution to its success, the Houston performing arts high school named its theatre the Denney Theatre.

In 1976, Denney became a professor of drama education at the University of Texas. She taught at UT until 1988. At retirement she was named professor emeritus and many of her former students and colleagues helped establish a scholarship in her honor. The Ruth Denney Endowed Presidential Scholarship in Theatre helps benefit theater arts students.

After her retirement, Denney was key in lobbying Austin Independent School District officials to establish the McCallum Fine Arts Academy at McCallum High School.

Denney's contribution to the arts has been honored many times by organizations including the American Association of Theatre Education, Theatre Under the Stars and the Texas Education Theatre Association. In 1987, she was selected to receive the Houston Mayor's Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Arts for her role in creating a strong arts community in Houston. In 2002 she was inducted into the Austin Arts Hall of Fame.

Ronnie Grant passes along his adventures on September 25

and best wishes back from austin.  jan and i got out of clute before rita hit like they told us to.  we boarded up the beach house at surfside and took some stuff, then basically said goodbye to it.  then we did the same at our house in clute, and again, said what we figured was goodbye. we didnt bother with the house we have lived in so long and not yet sold in houston, let it fend for itself as we figured a major storm hitting it would do about 10000 worth of improvements. 

so, we treked here to austin, and hunkered down.  or, had hurricane parties and eating contests..  it only took us 6 hours to get here but when our daughter and family left the next morning from about a mile from us, it took them 19 hours to travel the same distance. same for our other friends.  some 25 hours from houston area to san antonio etc.  there were no hotel rooms but we had been invited to stay with friends in roundrock, he works for dell. not to be tacky but the water in his swimming pool was a little warm, and i prefer a different brand of scotch but we  made do. lol.  thats bad, considering the fate so many had on the road to hell and back.

they have told us not to come back too soon so we will probably wait until sometime in October, have to be home for the neil diamond concert on the 11th.  we may somehow wear out our welcome before that.

the news was good. our neighbor in clute stood in our yard on the phone with me today and told me that the 17 pecan trees were erect and not on our house. the creek was only rippling. at our beach house, no wind damage and no water inside, according to another friend who was there to check his rental houses, even more wonderful news. as for the improvements to the house in houston that will have to wait til we return to acertain. not a problem.  we may be the last back but that is ok.

just wanted you to know what actually went on during an evacuation from the coast. oh, the stories we could actually tell.  God was on our side this time, for sure.

On September 19, Katherine Hankamer Norris writes:

We are in San Antonio on our way back home, having left Tuesday a week ago for west Texas.  We spent 2 days in Kerrville, one in Fort Stockton, and 4 days in Marfa.  I had spent  the summer of 1946 in Marfa at the Hotel Paisano with my family...getting away from the polio in Houston, seeing the sights, and accompanying my dad on business.  We decided it would be a good time to check out all the art, etc. going on there now, avoiding the storm at the same time.  The hotel has been renovated; but it still has the same friendly, comfortable feel...and the streets are now paved!  According to our neighbors; everything is okay with our house...only lost power for minutes at a time...and now we only have to haul the patio furniture and heavy potted plants back outside when we get home. Bonjour, Katherine

Sara Ince Hamilton writes this good news September 9:

Tom and I left our home in Fair Oaks Ranch (Texas Hill Country) on 1 September in his truck loaded with food, water, the emergency generator from my orchid house, a chain saw with extra blades, 17 gallons of gas, and a Coleman stove and headed for Hattiesburg. We had heard from her son-in-law that Linnie (Mower) and Jack Garner outside Hattiesburg on the Jackson highway, had a tree down on their home, no electricity or water, and that food was running low. Having to take the northern route, we reached them on the afternoon of the 2nd. We stayed the week, and by the time we left they were in pretty good shape, with one drive to the house cleared, ample food supplies, and ahead on boiled water. They were luckier than most, so we are all grateful, and Tom and I are glad to be back home.

a p.s. from later in the day:
I just talked with Linnie, and the electricity came back on this afternoon (crews from Michigan!) and the tree was coming off the house as we spoke. They will contact their water company tomorrow about the potability of their water. Hattiesburg water is OK, but they're not on that system. Linnie sounded positively ecstatic just now, so all is well. Sara

On September 6, Gerald Gray writes:

I just read your message and was surprised to see my name, but you are correct. The southern half of Slidell no longer exists, however our house near I-12 has only tree and landscaping damage. We evacuated on Saturday when it became obvious Katrina was growing into a monster. Presently there is no electricity in Slidell.
 
Joan and I believe the lifestyle we enjoyed in that area for 30 years may never return and have already bought a house here in The Woodlands near our daughter. We have finally returned to our beloved Houston once again.

My daughter, Jennifer, and her family (husband, John, and two daughters - one an infant , one a toddler) from New Orleans are staying with us in Beaumont. Their home is in the Garden District, a block off St. Charles Avenue. From what info we can gather, it appears that their house had no rising water. We don't know about glass breakage from wind or damage from fallen trees. Their home is a beautiful old nineteenth-century structure which they totally remodeled and expanded in size two years ago.

We sheltered two families of their friends at our beach house on the Bolivar Peninsula last week. One is Jennifer's OB-GYN who delivered our grandchildren and who is expecting her second child in a month. She and her family live in Old Metaire and believe their house is dry, as well. They are all worried about the looting of their properties, fires and their safety in returning to their homes. They all want to get back and start rebuilding New Orleans!

John's classmate, Harry Connick, Jr. (New Orleans' Jesuit High School, Class of '85) has already been on the scene at the Superdome and Convention Center, trying to spread encouragement. We believe he will be an important catalyst in the efforts to bring New Orleans back!

We are all pulling for the victims of Katrina. I've offered my plane for transport needs for disaster workers and forwarded donations to the Salvation Army, Red Cross, and Rice University, which has offered all Tulane students full fall classes and housing until Tulane can resume. I'm proud of all these groups, if not of our government's response.

Dear Friends: 
From deep in the heart of blackness (well, ok, on the edge of the hurricane stuff), let me make a suggestion to those of you who are "animal people," which describes most of the people I know (or care to know). If you are considering making a donation, keep in mind that your pennies are nothing but a spit in the big well of the Red Cross and Salvation Army. The affected people have all of those resources plus the federal government, etc., etc. Millions of animals have perished, and some have been rescued and evacuated-mostly cats and dogs, some horses. Having been involved with an animal welfare organization for the past 2 years, I know that these organizations, even in the best of times, operate on the edge of financial disaster. Now, . . . .  Amounts of money that are insignificant to the big charities are windfalls to the small animal organizations. Believe me, even $20 is something to ooh and ah over. So, please consider diverting some of your compassionate dollars to these creatures who didn't have the opportunity to get out--most of the people could have and in fact, were ordered to. The animals had no such option. Also, if you agree with this, please send it out to other animal people you know. If you want recommendations as to recipients, I will be happy to look into the options.