CHS1959-1983

= = = = =some fantastic info **[|Michael X]**Welcome to the 1959-1983 webpage!= Please add any stories of your memories from times at Cullman High School! All you need to do is click 'Edit This Page' in the upper left hand corner of the page. Editing will be very similar to editing a Microsoft Word document. Please feel free to add pictures, if you would like! Be sure to save your changes!

What a wonderful town to grow up in, what a wonderful school to attend, what a great education to be obtained! We were the luckiest kids alive! We had great teachers and mentors- Coach Gunter, Bob Guthery, Virginia Guthery, Miss Bailey (the White Tornado). Don Williamson taught most of us music courses since the 1st grade. Karen Clemmons was a wonderful art teacher. There were many great students with outrageous personalities - Johnny Johnson, Marilyn King, Tony Richter, Goat, Mugsy, Lion et al. I recall the tormenting of Miss Lula Mae Taylor. It was that wonderful time of the sixties when nothing was evil or scary - best music ever. Class of '67, first class not to have a sponsored Senior Trip. Half the class went to Panama City, unchaperoned - what a hoot. Many of my fondest memories are from CHS. Wilks Turney

Cullman High School Rocks! I have so many fond memories of my attendance there. We had some of the greatest teachers whom I will never forget: Mabel Bailey, Elberta Bailey, William Bowling, Coach Woodard, Mrs. Stewart and now I'm having a senior moment, Joe Guthrey??? (Advanced Biology). They were the greatest teachers in the US in my opinion. We had to study, we had to pass our exams, and they were strict!! The Pep Club was very supportive of all the sports and we had such fun going to out of town games on the Pep Club Bus! Our campus was beautiful! I truly enjoyed being on the Southerner Staff and the newspaper. Life was so easy compared to how it is now in the real world. It's too bad that we didn't realize that these were some of the best times of our lives. Well, maybe we did. Life is good no matter where we are in our lives today. If you're still alive, life is definitely good! Mona Townson Jasnow, Class of 1965, We're the best, the greatest alive, we're the class of '65

I transfered to CHS from Winston County High (Double Springs) in Jan. 1963. What a change from a small school where you only had one section per subject to the multiplicity of CHS. The faculty, staff, and my classmates made the transition easy, though. I remember Mr. Tillman asking all the students and teachers to stand by their desks on that sad fall day as he announced to us that our nation's president, John F Kennedy, had been assasinated in Dallas, TX. As Mona said, we had some wonderful teachers. I owe much to the 3 semesters I attended CHS. We learned a lot in and out of class. Bob Prater, Class of 1964. ___ There are so many good memories from CHS. I attended from 1962 to 1966 when we graduated. I was in the band and Bonnie K. James was a great teacher. I learned a lot about discipline from him. Mr. Bowling taught biology and he was great. Mrs. Herrera taught spanish and I can't remember who it was that taught Latin but I think it was Ms. Mc Donald. Someone correct me if I am wrong. It was great going to school at CHS and we had the spirit. Great football team, great band and a safe little town that we did not lock our doors. I live in North Port, Fl. now but I have been back a couple of times to see family. Sandi Lange Wright Class of "66"

Pastel colored wool skirts, and sweaters the same color to match our skirts, and penny loafers and white bobbie socks and pouf hairdos that looked like.......well, the '60's. Those were the good old days of the Class of 1963. Sitting on the steps outside the auditorium and just laughing and having good clean fun seems like only yesterday and yet I know it was longer than that. It was only the second year for students at the newly built CHS. The pep rallies created so much school spirit that even if you were a quiet person, you just had to yell and scream. I wondered though how the football players could even play in the football game since in the P.E. class Coach Gunter had walked on their stomachs while the players lay on their backs on the hard gym floor - conditioning, of course, but what did I know then. Mr. Williamson was such a great Glee Club teacher I felt sure our class was Hollywood bound to "America's Got Talent" or should I have said "The Ed Sullivan Show". We did do awesome in our competitions and we all loved to sing and perform. It's amazing how young one still feels in his mind, especially when we reminisce about school days. It's also amazing how everyone else that was in my class has changed in looks so much more than I thought I had changed. I wonder what my classmates are thinking. O.K. - time's up! My hair is gray and my bones are stiff, but thank goodness, my mind still convinces me I am young at heart. Continuing in best wishes for my classmates, I am Becky Parker Still - Class of 1963.

"We're from Cullman, Bama's pride-we're the class of '75"! I also remember those pep rallys before football games-each class trying to "win" the spirit stick...those black and gold ribbons you could buy each week with the game of the week printed on them that you stuck on with that huge gold football! I remember on Friday's in chorus, Mr. Williamson would teach us "football" songs...and those homecoming mums! What girl didn't want one of those?? My favorite classes involved music and Mr. Williamson, and one of the funniest memories was at a spring concert-I was accompaning the choir on piano-the piano was placed at a slant so I could see the director, but not really the choir...in the midst of the concert, the audience suddenly starts laughing-what in the world was going on? I kept playing, Mr. Williamson kept directing-we weren't going to stop no matter the panic! Then our fearless leader begins to laugh and when I turned around, the back stage curtain had fallen on the top row of the choir (which was all guys) and it was a great moment! He had a great sense of humor and I loved his music and Sr. English classes. I won't mention names, but I had a geometry teacher who not only would spar with Betty Joe Tiffin (Alabama History) across the hall, but give extra points if you came to basketball games! (You can probably figure that one out!) The 70's were crazy times-please don't judge us by our clothes or hair! Lisa Goodlett Latta

I think I was the only one upset in the whole school when Kennedy was shot (was I the only Democrat??) in 1963. I cried all the way through history class, and I cried all the way through math. Then I cried all weekend.......then we had Monday off for the funeral. But on Tuesday, the first day back, what did the school organise for such a sombre occasion? A pep rally! I refused to go, and sat by myself in the classroom. Eventually a teacher passed by my site of silent protest and sent me to the office.....my only time ever to be sent there! Joyce Sanders (66)

In Civics class, our textbook on communism was written by J. Edgar Hoover. Did no one else think this might have been just a little bit weird? My friends outside the U.S. don't believe me when I tell them this. We had to give a magazine report each week, from any article from a magazine of our choice. Surprisingly, none of the guys gave reports from Playboy (which no doubt they would do today!), but after a church trip to the U.N., we toured the Russian Embassy and I brought back copies of "Soviet Life" for my reports. In my yearbook that year, one guy wrote, "Hope you make it to Moscow." (I didn't, by the way). Joyce Sanders (66)

Sandi Lange mentioned the names of our teachers....but why does no one mention some of the awful things we did to them! Poor Mrs. Herrera was a Cuban refugee who taught us Spanish, or at least tried to, until the boys put matches in her chalkboard erasers every day. Use your imagination as to what that does when you try to dust the board. It was Miss McDonald who taught us Latin and French, and she was probably one of the best teachers in the school (she was actually trained to teach the subjects she taught! Unlike the coach who taught us Alabama History and Mr. "Highpockets" who let the better students teach our trigonometry class!). I went on to follow in Miss McDonald's footsteps and became a French teacher.....and have a true love for all things Latin/Roman....from our wonderful Latin text with the photos from Pompeii. Joyce Sanders (66).