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Post WWII, HHS class of 1950 enjoyed peace, prosperity, pranks

Members of the HHS class of 1950 got a kick out of Blondie Whitmire’s fish stories during their 65th Class Reunion on Saturday at the Hendersonville Country Club.

Driving from Florida to his hometown of Hendersonville, Barry Kalin was trying to pinpoint why he was looking forward to seeing his high school classmates from 65 years ago.


“I wondered if part of it had to do with our timing,” he said. “September of 1946 to May of 1950 was a time when the world was a little bit more at ease. We grew up in World War II.”
Their junior high years hadn’t been easy. Almost no one avoided losing a family member, neighbor or friend.
“By the time ’46 came along times were a lot more favorable for having fun and I remember years of real joy,” Kalin added. “I have only the fondest memories of all of you guys from those days.”
Kalin was gazing out at 14 other classmates from Hendersonville High School’s class of 1950 during their 65th reunion luncheon at the Hendersonville Country Club on Saturday. Some left town when they graduated; others stayed in their hometown and made lasting careers; some traveled and came home. All said Hendersonville was a special place to grow up in the late 1940s and that HHS was a place that had created happy memories.
Boyce Whitmire Jr. was one of those who stayed. The longtime principal and coach known as Blondie read statistics comparing the class of 1950 with the class of 2015 and the rules then compared to the rules now.
“You cannot sit in your car now,” he said. “I remember we used to sit there and smoke and sometimes worse things than that.”
Seniors can leave campus for lunch on Fridays. In 1950, campus was open.
“I can remember my dad picking us up — all five of us — and carrying us home for lunch,” he said.

The class members, now in their early to mid 80s, shared memories of HHS, what they had done since graduation and how many children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren they had.
After he was discharged from the Air Force in 1956, Kalin, a graduate of UNC at Chapel Hill, planned to go to law school. A brother called and asked him to help out at his furniture store in Sarasota, Fla. He figured he’d stay for the summer and then return to North Carolina.
“In the meantime I went to the beach one day and I saw this real pretty girl and I started trying to get her attention,” he said. Six months later, he and the girl, Lois, married. They moved to Ormond Beach, where he ran his own furniture store for 51 years.
Kalin apologized to Drayton Justus for beating him in an election for student body vice president.
“The truth of the matter is he was the better candidate,” Kalin said. “I even thought about voting for him myself.”
Frances Myers Reese said she did not travel or go to college. She stayed home and married Ted Reese.
“I sold the trombone I played in band to one of the Justus boys so I’d have enough money to buy him a shotgun for Christmas,” she said.

Ronald Stepp remembered exactly what he was doing on Oct. 10, 1950.
“I went into the service 64 years ago today,” he said. “I joined the Navy.”
When he came home, he was one of the first hires at a brand new G.E. plant in East Flat Rock. “My badge was No. 8,” he said. He didn’t stay. He became a volunteer firefighter and worked his way to the top, serving for many years as Hendersonville’s fire chief.
Drayton Justus’s most vivid memory of growing up during World War II was delivering an EXTRA! edition of the Times-News when the Japanese surrendered. He went back twice to pick up more papers to hawk on Main Street.
“I sold 113,” he said. “I’ll never forget the look on people’s faces. They were laughing and singing and hugging each other. They’d give me a dime or a quarter or sometimes a half-dollar and say ‘Keep the change, kid.’”
Justus’s vocation was in personnel management for universities, earning a masters and doctorate along the way. An avocation brought him a brush with fame.
“I got involved in the Barbershop Quartet Association and organized the quartet that won the international Barbershop Quartet championship,” he said. “I went to Vietnam to perform with the USO. We sang for the U.N.”
Sara Lee Allen Nickell married Paul Nickells, a baseball player in the Detroit Tigers organization. She taught school for 36 years but never ran across a prank quite as clever as the one the HHS boys cooked up.
“Joe Carpenter won’t admit to it but he and David Johnson and Joe Baird went around collecting money for the ‘blind fund,’” she said. “Then one day in the spring we discovered the ‘blind fund’ was for blinds for Coach Bricklemyer’s room.”
Patricia Heilig Poret told her classmates she had spent a lot of her life traveling. Then someone reminded everyone of her brother, John Heilig, a football star at HHS who went on to play quarterback at Clemson.

Dr. Joe Carpenter stood to tell his classmates how much he enjoyed seeing them. His eldest son, Walter, recalled that his dad had roomed with Boyd Massagee at Davidson College before both went to UNC — Massagee for law school, Carpenter for dental school.
Prizes went to Kalin, for traveling the farthest to attend; Susan “Tootie” Prince Roper, for being the youngest looking; and Barbara Leatherwood Blackwell, for having the most great-grandchildren — 17. Everyone thanked Frances Reese for organizing the reunion, though she did tell Kalin the job was fun.
Then it was time to go.
Kalin called on Justus to deliver a B-flat for the “Red and White” and the Class of 1950 sang “Hail to our alma mater …”