Present from the class of 1966 are shown. Seated, from left, are Debbie (Leer) Kirkdorfer, Kristie (Niles) Essig, Carolyn (Mock) Krum and Vicki (Kline) Berkey. Standing are Jon Roberts, Carolyn (Smith) Baker, Marcia (Richey) Russell, Sally (Searfoss) Hanson and Leonard Kline. (Photos by Ray Balogh)

SYRACUSE — Fond memories and laughter were the order of the evening at the 107th annual Syracuse High School alumni banquet, held Saturday, June 18, at the Syracuse Community Center.

More than 100 attendees chatted and enjoyed a baked chicken and barbecued roast beef buffet to the nostalgic strains of Elvis Presley, Frank Sinatra, The Andrews Sisters, The Platters, Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons and other period performers.

The classes of 1946, 1956 and 1966 were feted in speeches and a slide presentation that capped off the night of reminiscences.

Grace (Stetler) Eyer was the sole representative from the Syracuse High School class of 1946.

According to the participants and the gathering’s theme, they were indeed “The Good Old Days.”

Joe Hibschman emceed the festivities and read a written statement by Grace (Stetler) Eyer (’46). She reminisced about school days during World War II, how area eighth graders were sent to four different high schools and how she and her two friends from eighth grade maintained their close friendship throughout their high school years.

John Searfoss spoke for the class of 1956. He introduced the other eight classmates who attended the event. Though he admitted, “I haven’t kept track of them over the years,” he spoke of the intimacy of small town community life way back when.

“All the small classes knew every mother in town and what everyone was doing,” he recalled. “They were the good old days and we really enjoyed it.”

The class of 1966 will have its official reunion July 30, but nine members attended the banquet.

Carolyn (Smith) Baker spoke on behalf of her class.

“You know you are old when you read in The Mail-Journal what happened 50 years ago” and remember it firsthand.
She cited the 16 members of the class who had passed away. “We think of them a lot and miss them a lot,” she said. “It’s hard to believe that many of us are gone.”

Dewitt Thomas, 100, graduated from Syracuse High School in 1933 and was the oldest alumnus at the school’s 107th annual reunion banquet.

Baker spoke of band trips and school plays; going to the root beer stand, roller rink and Tippy Dance Hall; walking uptown to lunch (“they let us out to do that”); hanging out at the youth center with “our fearless leader Bud Smith”; and going to the movie theater.

“We girls went to the theater so we could watch the boys who went to the pool hall across the street,” she said.

“We all remember where we were at when we heard JFK was shot,” she said. “I was going down the ramp to English class.”

She talked about the revelry, complete with a bonfire, after the boys’ basketball team beat Cromwell to break its 29-game losing streak.

Baker summed up the class members’ undimmed camaraderie after half a century. “We get together and it seems like we can take off talking like when we were 18.”

Baker presented two props from back in the day. The first was a posed photo of the cheer block. The second was a bell plucked from the school before its demolition. Hibschman plugged it in and the dining hall echoed with the familiar sound signaling a change of classes.

Hibschman presented a trivia question: “When did they start calling the yearbook ‘The Echo’”?

“1948,” several alumni shouted in unison. Before that, the yearbook was known as “The Potawatomi.”

The evening ended with hugs, handshakes and hearts full of pleasant memories of “the good old days.”

Shown are member of the Class of 1956. Seated, from left, are Lucille (Bushong) Groves, Barb (Montel) Rarick, Mary (Miner) Manwaring, Darlene (Lung) Fetters and Fay (Gard) Iden. Standing are Larry Mock, James Connolly, John Searfoss and Walter Brazel.