Update 6-21-11

Hi,

First, I'm going to be traveling for the next several weeks, and I'm not taking a lot of electronics.  That's why this update is early. and the next one may be on July 12th.

Second, a reminder that Booker Gibson Night at the Irish Coffee Pub in East Islip is on Wednesday, July 13th, starting at 6:30.  If you're interested in attending, please contact Claire Brush Reinhardt at:  reino @ optonline . net

Third, from Liz King Giordano at South, the speeches that introduced the two recent scholarship recipients:
    The recipient of the Booker Gibson Music Award is a student who has displayed excellence in every aspect of his musical career here at South High School.  He has been concertmaster of the Junior and Senior High Orchestra and Chamber Orchestra for his entire high school career.  He has attended the NYSSMA Solo Festival grades 8 through 12, has been accepted into the District Festival Orchestra grades 10 through 12, accepted into the All-County and Long Island String Festival Orchestras, grades 9 through 12, has been a member of the Pit Orchestra, and is president of the Tri-M Honor Society.  This talented student can capture an audience with a single bow stroke of his violin.  He has also been featured as a soloist at several of our concerts here at South.  He has, and will, continue to inspire his peers and the faculty here at South with his ability to speak through his instrument.  This student will continue to do great things with his music when he is attending Jacksonville University next year.  I am pleased to present The Booker Gibson Music Award to Joseph Schmidt.
    The recipient of the Vince Tampio Theater Award is a student also very much involved in the Music Department at South High School.  She has been a member of the Mixed Chorus since the seventh grade, has been a member of our Vocal Jazz Ensemble, has been selected to Nassau Music Educator's All County Festival, and has been selected to the Valley Stream District Festival Chorus for the past four years.  She has prepared NYSSMA solos for the past six years.   In addition, she is a member of Metropolitan Youth Orchestra Chorus, and she has attended the USDAN Center of the Performing Arts, and the New York State Summer School for the Arts.  This past summer she toured Europe with the Metropolitan Youth Orchestra.  She is among our finest students in Senior High mixed chorus and is always prompt, reliable, ready to get to work, always helpful, and always ready to make our groups succeed.  Her theatrical experience on the South stage includes The King and I, School House Rock, Cinderella as the Fairy Godmother, Once Upon a Mattress as Lady Rowena, Are You Afraid of the Dark?, You’re A Good Man Charlie Brown as Lucy, and her culminating role this past spring in The Sound of Music as Maria.  She will continue her musical studies at the Crane School of Music at SUNY Potsdam.  We are pleased to present the Vincent Tampio Theater Award to Zoe Carpentieri.

Fourth, Mary Sipp Green's catalogue of her latest paintings at the Wally Findlay Gallery just arrived.  As usual, the painting are beautiful, as you can see for yourself by going to www. wallyfindlay . com.  Or you can go to the gallery at: 124 East 57th street in New York.  And I believe you can also buy prints of some of Mary's paintings by contacting Paulinda Schimmel at:  Paulindadi @ aol . com

Fifth, Judy, Hartstone, Paul Zegler, and I had lunch together last Wednesday at that seafood restaurant in Ventura where Judy and I had met before.  Paul brought his bar mitzvah photo album.  Judy brought a copy of William Saroyan's one-act play, Hello Out There!  We guessed at the names of some of the people in Paul's album, and Judy wrote this about the play:

From Judy:  When you write about our get-together in the weekly update, please don't forget to mention the remarkable coincidence of Hello Out There! falling into my hands just a few days before we got together.  If you remember, it was our class's one-act play in 1964, just before I moved to San Francisco, and the last line in the script was, "San Francisco, hello out there!" expertly -- and winningly -- delivered by Martha Morenstein.
    Also, I just read the introduction by Saroyan, and the play was first performed in September 1941 at the Lobero Theatre in Santa Barbara -- the city where I now live.  How's that for another coincidence?  The play served as the "curtain-raiser" to George Bernard Shaw's The Devil's Advocate.

Finally, Eric Hilton sent in another of those innocent questions which, last time, led Joanne Shapiro Polner on her quest to reconstruct downtown Valley Stream in the early 1960s.  Here's Eric's question and the immediate follow-up.

From Eric:  Can anyone tell me when and why the South colors were changed from red and gray to red and white?

From me:  I'll write Liz King Giordano and Emily Kleinman Schreiber to ask.  But it might have been to avoid the Civil War colors.  Or it might have been because they wanted to paint the gym and hallways in school colors, and red and white looked cheerier.  Or it might have been because red and white is a standard high school and college combination, and it was easier to buy things like uniforms in that combination of colors, rather than custom order in red and gray.  Or it could be something else entirely -- something really obvious that I'm overlooking.

From Emily:  I bet Booker Gibson, Bernie O'Brien, or one of the other long-time teachers will know... I'll send this on to them.  And I think all your guesses are good ones.  They also changed Southern Belle to Southern Bell.

From Bernie: As I recall, it was in the mid-60s, and the Parents' Club was the driving force.  They felt red and gray was too drab, or something like that.

From Booker:  It might be similar to what happened at Mepham and, perhaps, Mineola.  In my time, those schools' colors were maroon -- garnet -- and gray.  Maybe it became harder to get those particular colors.  Red is probably easier to find and much easier to distinguish.   Also, we, at Mepham, didn't like it when we played Freeport because their bright red band-and-team uniforms looked much "sharper" than ours. 

From Robbie Brill Birnel:  I vaguely remember hearing something about the cost of printing two colors being more expensive than only printing red on white paper.

From Nancy Russo-Rumore:  I do remember a discussion on this.  I'm not absolutely sure, but I heard that it was hard to find things like uniforms in the red and gray.

The South '65 e-mail addresses:  reunionclass65 . blogspot . com

The South '65 photo site:  picasaweb . google . com/SouthHS65 

Please delete any spaces in links or e-mail addresses before using them.  And remember the latest update is now also posted on Facebook, at Valley Stream South High School Class of 1965 -- Discussions.


Rich