Coach Jimmie Amen left a wonderful legacy at Division Avenue High School

1956-57 freshman basketball team. Coach Amen is between Nos. 8 and 13, while Dewain Lanfear is No. 7.

Click on photo to enlarge

By DEWAIN LANFEAR

Class of 1960 and DAHS teacher

My first real experience with Mr. Amen was freshman basketball in 1956. That team, 9-1, was the highlight of DAHS basketball for several years. He was a terrific coach and teacher. Whenever I watch a game on TV I see it through his eyes and how he taught the game. He taught us to understand the game. His overly enthusiastic "pats on the back" were well known.

I had the pleasure of teaching at Division while Jimmie was still there, and learning to address him that way and calling Mr. Jewell "Jerry" were tough steps to take. Anyway, Jimmie was an entertaining person to be around in the faculty room. He and the other coaches ate together at the "jock table" and pretty much dominated conversation. Lots of jokes and personal jabs - not a place for the thin skinned. These were definitely the days before PC was the rule.

They would collect ice cream slips from teachers who didn't want them and wind up with three or four desserts apiece. New teachers were always welcome at their table, especially if they were female and under 60. In the days before enlightenment, any birth in the faculty was required to be celebrated with cigars, and these guys would turn the air in that lunchroom blue with smoke.

Jimmie was well known for his general impatience. Famous quote was "I got things to do". We played in the teachers' golf league together; par for Jimmie was measured in minutes and hours the round took, not strokes. He rarely sat still and contemplation was not a familiar state for him.

During the teachers' strike in the late 1970s, I was walking the line with him one day and we took a break and were sitting on the curb in back of the shops. He was kind of down that day and said "Here I am after all these years coaching and teaching and I wind up here, sitting on the curb, eating peanuts." I recall feeling so bad then because the strike was so nasty and he was such a good dedicated man. He retired soon after that. His son followed him to DAHS years later and showed many of the same strengths and idiosyncrasies as his Dad.

Jimmie Amen left a wonderful legacy at Division Avenue and we are better for having known him

TWO CLASS OF 1960 DUDES, TOM PATURZO BAKER AND DEWAIN LANFEAR

By TOM PATURZO BAKER

Class of 1960

The photograph was taken when I was 33 years old for my promotion to Captain. Prior to that I was a Criminal Investigation Command warrant officer and special agent.

I was in the regular Army for three years and in the Army Reserve Program for 22 years. I retired in 1993 at the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. I also served as a military police officer.

____

By DEWAIN LANFEAR

Class of 1960

I was back to Levittown a few years ago after being away for over 10 years. Even when I was teaching there I didn't drive through the streets, just to school and home. I was pretty clueless regarding the extensive remodeling that had taken place. I think most of the houses that were changed look great even if it is difficult to see the original peeking through. You may remember that some people in surrounding towns opposed Levittown on the grounds that it would be a slum in a few years. Wrong!

An anecdote for you. On this visit to Levittown, I went for a run and traveled down Daisy Lane, my former street. When I got to my house, a man was mowing the lawn, and I asked him if he was the owner (Levittowners now have lawn service! In our day WE were the lawn service) He said he was and I told him I had lived there 50 (OMG) years ago.

He asked if I wasn't Mr. Lanfear who taught English at DAHS and when I admitted it, he said he had been in my class. At that point I recognized him too: his name is Greg Ward. He said my initials were still in the backyard patio and they still had some "artifacts" from those days, such as the cement block that was the counter balance for the attic trap door. If that isn't a typical Levittown story, I don't know what is.

Levittown and its water tower still have a magnetic pull on those who lived there in the beginning - Part 1

Many of us old Levittowners still have a special attachment to the home of our youth. What follows are comments about the water tower and the Zippy cartoon that appeared in the blog on March 21. We have a personal attachment to a town, a time and place from so long ago.

Lillian Smith Handleman (1962)

I copied the water tower photo and the Zippy cartoon and will frame them together, I think. This cartoon about the tower is a little spooky, however, in that it does express the whole "going back in time" Levittown phenomenon. The cartoon expresses the secret longings of those who grew up there and can't seem to escape its magnetic draw. Levittown memories carry us back, time and time again. Something about Levittown...I don't know what it is.

Russ Mulroy (Levittown Memorial 1961)

The cartoon raises an interesting question: do we really mentally age or are we stuck at 16 - 17 internally and why such love for things that happened 50 years ago? Maybe missing our youth is the answer.

Dewain Lanfear (1960)

Regarding the water tower, I have nothing to contribute since my only experience with it was to walk past it on my way to Rich Humbert or Joan Lucas's house. However on the topic of never growing beyond our high school days ("Zippy" and Russ Mulroy) I have some thoughts.

For good or for bad, few of us would deny that our days in high school were important formative ones. Most of us learned through experience what worked for us and what didn't. Teens typically try different personas, as most parents can attest. Some work and some don't.

Come to the reunions and see how easy it is to recognize and reconnect with long time friends. (note I avoided the use of "old"). That's because we've simply become "high school us" 2.0. Research has shown that our taste in clothes, food, and music all are formed between ages 17-24. We really are very much who we were in high school.

Being interested in that time doesn't show a lack of moving on, but rather an attempt to put some puzzling aspects of our lives in perspective. Events that occurred 50 years ago look different today than they did on the day they happened. Who cares? Well, I think the unexamined life is not worth living (not an original thought by a long shot), so trying to make sense out of our teen angst might help us understand where we are today.

Toni Crescenzo Gelfer (1968)

The Levittown water tower is a suburban icon which evokes strong images whenever I see it. It seems that this is not an isolated occurrence, but quite common to those who were fortunate enough to live in its broad shadow.

My experience is always the same. I see it and a flood of thoughts starts, beginning with the baby pool and family, moving forward to being 10 and with a tag on my ankle being so proud of getting in to a Levittown swimming pool unattended. Then the teen years, of relationship sorrows, anticipations and triumphs. The whole thing can be likened to your life passing before you in a near death experience and yet I am alive and so are my vivid, beautiful memories.

______

Part 2 will be posted later this week.

The dads of Levittown's Daisy Lane were teamwork personified in the old days

By DEWAIN LANFEAR '60

Levittown was built primarily to provide affordable single family homes for the men returning from World War II. My dad and many of the men on our block, Daisy Lane, fit this description. They had “served for the duration” and were ready for the home ownership that Levittown offered. The habits they formed during their service carried over to the way they worked with each other on the block.

I remember one particularly heavy snow fall. Our street was just off Orchid Road, a “major” thoroughfare in Levittown. My how it has shrunk since I was 13-years old. Anyway, the town plows would work to clear the major streets first and then get to the side streets eventually.

This timetable didn't suit the men of the block, and after each had cleared his own driveway (if he had one – more on this later) or walkway, there was the street itself keeping them from getting out to the plowed network of roads. Their solution? A bottle of Schenley's whiskey stuck in the snow a few feet from the intersection with Orchid Road, some shovels and a lot of military style teamwork. With that bottle as incentive, the street was soon cleared and they all enjoyed a well earned reward.

I mentioned the driveways earlier. These same ex-GI's pooled their resources to build driveways and walkways for their houses. Remember that the original package came with a flagstone path from the front door to the sidewalk. Well when it was time to upgrade to concrete, the men of the block agreed on a time table and each dug out (or assigned the job to an offspring) his own path and on the agreed upon Saturday they had a cement truck make a drop to each house; they helped each other finish the walks and driveways. They saved a lot of money by ordering an entire truckload of concrete, and of course, being part of the team gave them motivation to finish the job.

Do you recall that the upstairs area, with its counterbalanced trap door, was unfinished? A popular project was to finish that space into living space. First the area needed electrical wiring. Enter the team concept again. The school district offered an Adult Ed class on wiring a Levittown attic. Twelve weeks, 12 enrollees. Each week the class was held at another class member's home. Wives were assigned the task of providing coffee and cake, while the class went upstairs and, under the guidance of the licensed electrician/teacher, installed the wiring on that house according to code. I remember this because that's how my dad wired my upstairs bedroom.

Our garage was built using the same team concept. After I finished digging out the footing, which was not a team job, Dad hired a carpenter and ordered the lumber and other things he needed to build his garage. One weekend, the carpenter arrived along with the rest of the men on the block and, with the carpenter's directions, they put the garage up in two days. I guess that this was what on old-time barn raising was like.

Dad had a strong sense of community pride. Do you remember the hedges at the foot of the main entrance to DAHS? Well, the weekend they were planted, some vandals came by on Saturday night and pulled them out. Dad saw this on his way to church the next morning and came back after church and replanted them. They might still be there. That's the way a lot of the Levittown dads felt about their town.

I want to name these men because they were such a good example and because so many of them had children who went to Division. There was my dad, Dewain, and Gene Sherman, Irv Weiner, Noel Heineke, Dick McCarthy, Bob Waddle and Bill Condon. These men and many of our teachers were veterans who developed some worthwhile values during their service. Let's remember them.
________

Photo by Marilyn Monsrud Frese '63

ALTERNATIVE LIVES: HOW BAD COULD IT HAVE BEEN?

By DEWAIN LANFEAR, Class of 1960

Several years ago I read a book that fascinated me. It was Repay by Ken Grimwood. Jeff Winston is the main character and on his 43rd birthday he dies of a heart attack. He immediately wakes up to find himself 25 years back in time in his own 18-year old body.

He retains all the memories of his previous life and the 25 years to come. As the story continues, he realizes that he can change what happened, and events don't necessarily repeat themselves. For example, his “wife” is not so anxious to date him this time around – she needs to be wooed.

I realize that when I was 43 I didn't yet know how things in my life would turn out. I was in the middle of my teaching career and had a 13-year old daughter and an 18-year old marriage. There was a long road ahead and a lot of forks in the road. As I read the book, I thought of the different directions my life could have taken.

Before I go any further down this road, I want to be clear about one thing – I'm thrilled with the way my life has turned out. Nothing that follows ought to be construed as a wish that I had taken a different path or made other choices. Certainly there are moments that were not my finest and unlike President Bush and Vice President Cheney, I do regret them and wish I had done otherwise. Nevertheless, as I've said many times at private and public reunions, if this is where we've come to, how bad could our choices have been.

Let's for a moment imagine that we are Jeff Winston and have a chance to relive our lives from age 18 onward. Faced with choices after high school, would we pursue alternative paths for school, military, career, or relationships? How different would the ensuing decades be if we changed just one of those early choices?

Robert Frost in “The Road Not Taken” describes coming to a turning point and with limited knowledge of where it would lead, choosing one path over another. He says that each choice would inevitably lead to a whole different set of choices further on and that there was no turning back. Finally, he says he tells this “with a sigh”.

Think of the many choices, conversations and decisions that put you on the path to where you are now. As you think of the alternatives, can you suppress the sigh?

Garth Brooks will have the last word here. In “The Dance”, he says that if he knew how things would end, he could have missed the pain, but he also would have missed the dance. So let's acknowledge that we had choices and did the best we could to make good ones, but no matter what, this is where we ended up, and I hope you can say, “how bad could it have been?"

• • •

Photo of Dewain Lanfear in 2008 by Frank Barning.

The Class of 1960's most likely to succeed reflects on "What is success?"

By DEWAIN LANFEAR

For some unknown reason our blogger- in-chief likes the picture of me studying papers on a bulletin board . That picture is captioned “Most Likely to Succeed”. That honor has meant a great deal to me and has led me and others to wonder if I did in fact succeed. Introspection on my part, curiosity on theirs. I was a teacher in our school and our district for more than 31 years. Did I ever move on? Could such a career be called a success? Just what is success anyway?

One of the Greek philosophers warned that no man should be judged a success until his days were over. The quote is also ascribed to Samuel Johnson and Rabbi Zusha, but I know it's older. Trust me on that, after all you voted me Most Likely to Succeed.

Erik Erikson is a psychologist who listed eight stages of development, the final being old age (that's us) which involves looking back and deciding if we are satisfied with our lives and finally declaring ourselves to have succeeded (or not). I like both of these ideas, because they require a perspective on our accomplishments that is lacking when we only judge by some early, meteoric rise that might be followed by a crash and burn catastrophe. Think of sensational rookies in sports or a Bernie Madoff – early success is no guarantee of a happy ending.

In addition to withholding judgment until the end, there is also the issue of what standard determines success. There are many ways to succeed. Ask yourself these questions – did I contribute to raising a child or grandchild who is a positive influence in the world – did I support an aging parent, or a friend who was ill or suffering emotionally – was I there when my neighbors or community needed help - did I somehow leave my corner of the world better than when I found it – did I make others happy, not just myself – have I used my abilities to make a life for myself and my family – are there people in my life who would testify that I had succeeded?

If you can respond positively to one or more of these questions, you have indeed succeeded. I believe it's that simple. There are innumerable ways to succeed. Hearing life stories at reunions and reading them on Frank's blog makes me believe that not my picture but the picture of the entire class of '60 belongs over the caption “Most Likely to Succeed”.

_________________________________________

Early DAHS Most Likely to Succeeds
1960 Dewain Lanfear
1961 Tom Toscano
1962 Stephen Ashwal
1963 Jeff Harriton
1964 Edward Glucksman, Louise Gallo
1965 Renie Herman, Joe MacDonald
1966 No information
1967 Dyanne Speer, David Schnapf
1968 Debbie Heinecke, Charlene Wiener, Mike Swartz, Brian Kennan

Division Avenue's class of 1960 was at the right school at the right time

BY DEWAIN LANFEAR

Something about mowing the lawn causes my mind to drift to earlier times, maybe the repetitive walking behind the mower making a pattern in the grass - I don't know.

I was thinking further about our place in time at the threshold of the 1960s. I remember living in the Bronx and wanting to play basketball in the playground. Since I left the Bronx when I was just 12, I always had to wait for my turn after "the big guys" were through. "The big guys" might only have been 14 or 15, but they were "the big guys" and we weren't, so we waited.

I first became a catcher because that was the only position "the big guys" would let me play in their game - permanent catcher. They needed someone to throw the ball back to the pitcher and I would do anything to play. I just remembered this. Maybe it was the first time that I realized it too.

When I came to Levittown in 1954 from the City it was unimaginable that real baseball fields with infield cut outs, backstops and home plates, and home run fences were sitting unused, waiting for us to play if we chose. In my life in the Bronx, I couldn't dream of a basketball court being available and unoccupied, there for the using. In my piece in yesterday's blog, I concentrated on our role as the four-year seniors in high school. We were always "the big guys" and we didn't have to wait for our turns.

I remember going to a party of mostly Levittown Memorial High School students and how different they were. Their dress was more "preppy" and at least one boy was smoking a pipe. These might have been the influences of an older crowd on these people. I didn't know any group of Division people who dressed or acted like this. I know we weren't all the same, but this didn't seem to represent one of our varieties.

I'm going back to the theme that while we certainly did not all follow the same path, the majority of us followed a path of our own making. In fact I like this theme so much I'm going to beat this horse until it gets up and carries a banner around the field. Like Popeye, we were who we were, not a copy of someone else. We were lucky in so many ways, but especially lucky in our timing, or better, the timing of our parents. We were at the right school at the right time, in the right decade of the right century. It was a unique coming together of many factors and we won the prize.

Division Avenue High School principal James Reilly's letter in our first yearbook messed up the pioneer metaphor

Click on photos to enlarge

BY DEWAIN LANFEAR

I was looking through our Division Avenue High School's class of 1960 yearbook the other day and got as far as Mr. Reilly's letter. There was something about the letter that troubled me. He messes up the pioneer metaphor by first calling us pioneers and then calling the faculty pioneers and mixing their legacy with ours.

As much as I hold our teachers in high regard, they were for the most part not rookies, and Levittown was not a new place in 1960, and they didn't go on from there as we did to start new lives. So, I'm not a fan of the letter written by our principal. That's not to say that I don't feel we owe a great debt to the faculty, but we were the pioneers.

It is a rare circumstance to be "seniors" for four years. We set our own styles, helped along by American Bandstand, and followed a course that we set. We didn't "pay our dues" as freshman or any other underclass. We grew into a varsity sports program, we planned the proms, the newspaper, the yearbook, etc. the way we, with the help and advice of faculty advisers, wanted to do these things. There weren't any traditions until we did something.

I believe that this very unusual situation and opportunity shaped most of us in subtle but lasting ways throughout our lives. I think that a lot of us on many occasions in life chose our own paths rather than following established patterns, and that, to quote my most favorite poem, "has made all the difference". It's not a matter of being headstrong or obstinate, it's just a way of looking at the world - seeing not just the wellworn paths, but seeing the chance to make a new path. I think of Bobby Kennedy's quote about "seeing things that never were and saying why not".

Personally, I did so many things my way in college, the Army, teaching and coaching that I never even thought about it after a while. The results weren't always good and the creativity wasn't always appreciated, but I was who I was, and I attribute it to the unique position the class of 1960 occupied in the history of DAHS.

The incredibly creative people that our class produced, Woodstock, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Tony Awards, Oscars, Emmys, etc make it seem obvious to me that something extraordinary happened with our class. These awards are just the tip of the iceberg as anyone who's been following this blog will know. Our class includes many remarkable people who haven't been recognized with these high profile awards, but who nevertheless were outstanding in their field.

Being in the pioneer class of 1960 was a wonderful gift that many of us have used well.
______________________

Dewain Lanfear, a frequent contributor to this blog, was the editor of Division Avenue High School's first yearbook. Now retired, he taught English at Division for 18 years and a total of 32 in Levittown.

Dewain Lanfear was at Division Avenue High School for 22 years, 18 as a history teacher

Two members of Division Avenue High School's class of 1960 returned to their alma mater as teachers. Yesterday we featured Jack Ellerkamp, today we get a glimpse of Dewain Lanfear, including a recent picture and photos from the 1960 and 1975 yearbooks.

ABOUT DEWAIN LANFEAR, CLASS OF 1960
Graduated from Boston College. Had a "President's" scholarship from BC for full tuition.

Served in the United States Army and was commissioned as a 2nd Lt. from ROTC when he graduated. Served on active duty from May 1967 to April 1969, the last year as a Captain in Viet Nam.

Taught English at Division Avenue High School for 18 years and a total of 32 in Levittown.

Retired, does volunteer work, walks the dog, spends time with his grandkids and plays golf.

Lives in Anderson, South Carolina with his wife of 43 years, the former Marti Gold, who also taught at Division Avenue.

Quote from Dewain: WTF just happened?

Oh brother, Mr. Coates was the model for future Levittown teacher Dewain Lanfear

click on photo to enlarge

Mr. Lanfear taught at Division Avenue High School for 18 years and a total of 32 in Levittown. This photo is from the 1975 yearbook.

By Dewain Lanfear, 1960

This is about a man who influenced me more than anyone else did at Division Avenue High School, but was probably unknown to just about everyone in my class, Mr, Coates.

When I first met him I was in the seventh grade living in the Bronx. I went to a Catholic grammar school that used lay teachers and nuns up to the seventh grade, and then used Brothers (like priests but without the "power" to say mass) for the boys in grades seven and eight.

My teacher that year was Brother Leonard, an energetic, task oriented, athletic man. He was an excellent teacher who managed to explain the mysteries of math to me. There was no nonsense in his classroom, but after school, he changed out of his robe and showed up on our ball fields and played basketball and softball with us. He had such a good time and so did we with him.

I decided then that I wanted to be like him, a Brother and teacher. I was unhappy to leave his class when we moved to Levittown in January of 1955, although I was thrilled to see the ball fields and pools (as I've written before).

Early in the eighth grade I was walking through our halls and saw "Brother Leonard" walking toward me. I greeted him loudly, being surprised and thrilled to see him, and he quieted me and said he was Mr. Coates now. He had left the Brothers and was a "civilian" now. He taught at Division after that, but stayed in the junior high level, so I never had him in class.

When we were juniors he married the honors class's social studies teacher Miss Smith (remember when there were three of them!? Can you name them?) After that, he and she coached me for two years in the American Legion oratorical contest. I remember vividly how hard they worked to rid me of my New Yawk accent. My friends at Boston College and here in South Carolina would say they weren't very successful, but what do they know? I enjoyed working with him and cheered him on in faculty basketball games. As a couple they took several of us on a college visit to Washington, DC in their own car - a one day trip. Unthinkable today for sure.

By the time I came back to teach, they had both moved to Suffolk County and taught there. I saw them twice after that, but both times I missed the chance to tell him just how much he meant to me. He was my model as a teacher. I know how much those words mean to a teacher, and I'm sorry I never said them to him. Anyway, that's the story. If anyone else had some interactions with Mr. Coates, I'd like to read them.
______________

Thank you to Larry Loewy '75 for providing the photo

The dads of Levittown's Daisy Lane were teamwork personified

By Dewain Lanfear '60

Levittown was built primarily to provide affordable single family homes for the men returning from World War 2. My dad and many of the men on our block, Daisy Lane, fit this description. They had “served for the duration” and were ready for the home ownership that Levittown offered. The habits they formed during their service carried over to the way they worked with each other on the block.

I remember one particularly heavy snow fall. Our street was just off Orchid Road, a “major” thoroughfare in Levittown. My how it has shrunk since I was 13-years old. Anyway, the town plows would work to clear the major streets first and then get to the side streets eventually.

This timetable didn't suit the men of the block, and after each had cleared his own driveway (if he had one – more on this later) or walkway, there was the street itself keeping them from getting out to the plowed network of roads. Their solution? A bottle of Schenley's whiskey stuck in the snow a few feet from the intersection with Orchid Road, some shovels and a lot of military style teamwork. With that bottle as incentive, the street was soon cleared and they all enjoyed a well earned reward.

I mentioned the driveways earlier. These same ex-GI's pooled their resources to build driveways and walkways for their houses. Remember that the original package came with a flagstone path from the front door to the sidewalk. Well when it was time to upgrade to concrete, the men of the block agreed on a time table and each dug out (or assigned the job to an offspring) his own path and on the agreed upon Saturday they had a cement truck make a drop to each house; they helped each other finish the walks and driveways. They saved a lot of money by ordering an entire truckload of concrete, and of course, being part of the team gave them motivation to finish the job.

Do you recall that the upstairs area, with its counterbalanced trap door, was unfinished? A popular project was to finish that space into living space. First the area needed electrical wiring. Enter the team concept again. The school district offered an Adult Ed class on wiring a Levittown attic. Twelve weeks, 12 enrollees. Each week the class was held at another class member's home. Wives were assigned the task of providing coffee and cake, while the class went upstairs and, under the guidance of the licensed electrician/teacher, installed the wiring on that house according to code. I remember this because that's how my dad wired my upstairs bedroom.

Our garage was built using the same team concept. After I finished digging out the footing, which was not a team job, Dad hired a carpenter and ordered the lumber and other things he needed to build his garage. One weekend, the carpenter arrived along with the rest of the men on the block and, with the carpenter's directions, they put the garage up in two days. I guess that this was what on old-time barn raising was like.

Dad had a strong sense of community pride. Do you remember the hedges at the foot of the main entrance to DAHS? Well, the weekend they were planted, some vandals came by on Saturday night and pulled them out. Dad saw this on his way to church the next morning and came back after church and replanted them. They might still be there. That's the way a lot of the Levittown dads felt about their town.

I want to name these men because they were such a good example and because so many of them had children who went to Division. There was my dad, Dewain, and Gene Sherman, Irv Weiner, Noel Heineke, Dick McCarthy, Bob Waddle and Bill Condon. These men and many of our teachers were veterans who developed some worthwhile values during their service. Let's remember them.

Part 2 of Dewain Lanfear's Levittown memories

By Dewain Lanfear

There was a lot about high school that I enjoyed other than baseball. Mostly I liked the people I was in class with. Most of my class time was spent with the honors group students. We were so diverse: liberal and conservative, various faiths, outspoken and quiet, shy and confident. We were all friends and classes were lively. When I taught, I always wanted and usually was assigned to teach honors classes. A lot of teachers found them difficult, but I really liked them and saw them as our own group.

Probably the high school experience that has had the most lasting effect on me happened way at the end when I was chosen Most Likely to Succeed. Despite kidding from friends to this day, I have reflected on this honor at times of distress and found comfort and strength in knowing that people from that time had a good opinion of me. With my teaching and my family I feel I have succeeded, but in a class that has had so many successful people I know I'm not the most successful, and that's not important. So thank you for your faith in me.

Why did I choose Boston College? Because my guidance counselor told me to. Seriously, I never saw the school until I had my suitcase in hand walking to the freshman dorms. In those days there weren't the endless campus visits that kids go through today. I heard a rumor that the school had a good reputation and they gave me a scholarship and that was enough for me.

I received a good education there, but was shocked that just about everyone else there was in the top 10 percent of their class too. I worked pretty hard (well, sometimes) to keep a B average. I learned what it was like not to be so hot. I played freshman baseball and wrestled my junior year when they started the program, but a shoulder dislocation my senior year marked the end of my athletic "career". I graduated with an ROTC commission in the Army. I stayed at BC for a year of graduate work and then substituted at Division for a year and a half.

While I was substituting, and learning to teach I coached junior high wrestling and was advisor on a senior project, a full length spy movie "For Whom the Torch Burns". The movie, the brainchild of Kerry MacDonald ('67) was filmed in and around New York City during week days and weekends. It was a blast for me and the kids. While this was happening, I started dating Miss Gold (appearing later as my wife) and the Army said "It's time to go".

Since this is not a biography, I'll skip the details of the early days of our courtship and marriage except to say that we were together for about four months of our first two-plus years together, thanks to timing and the Army. I was a Company Commander in Fort Polk, LA for the first year, was promoted to Captain and sent to Pleiku, Viet Nam for my second and last year in the Army.

I value my time in the Army for teaching me many lessons including how to write clearly and that my loyalty is to those under me, not to those above me. Some people reverse these loyalties - they are called successful. Me, I stuck up for my men and my students first. I was never sorry.

When I came home, I taught at Division for 15 years. A number of my students were children of classmates and that was fun. Working with Jimmy Amen, Jerry Jewell and Gene Aiello was a real kick. Knowing them as coworkers and golf partners after knowing them as my teachers was a great experience.

After a while I was transferred to MacArthur, Wisdom Lane, Salk Middle School (as English Department chairman) and finally back to MacArthur, where I finished up. There are so many teaching highlights - some of them still happen as when I get an e mail from a former student who just found me on Facebook, but the best, maybe, was the group of honors students I had as freshmen, sophomores, and seniors. I had always wanted a class like that and it was as good an experience as I'd imagined. The interaction in the classroom was electric and we were like friends discussing a book or poem, not like a class. The cherry on top was they chose me as teacher of the year when they graduated.

As I mentioned, my wife Marti and I were married as I started my military service and when I got out in '69 we bought a house in Baldwin and started our family three years later. I was just back from Viet Nam in August '69 when my classmate Artie Kornfeld had his little gig in Woodstock, and we were ready to go until I heard the traffic report and thought otherwise. Sorry, Artie, I've regretted that decision ever since.

We moved to Oak Beach in '73, almost next door to Division Avenue teacher Dave Peyton, who moved there the same time we did. Our daughter Wendy knew him as "Uncle Dave" and we shared many good times together. I had been his paper boy when I was 12. Go figure. Marti and I enjoyed the life of teaching together and sharing vacation times and the beach was a wonderful place to live.

In 1989 in anticipation of retiring, we bought a house on the Maine coast in Penobscot. We spent 10 summers there and it was like being in witness protection - just a totally different lifestyle from Long Island. I gained tremendous insights into Robert Frost's poems from our experiences in Maine. Later we exchanged this house for one in Georgia on a lake. Warmer climate (duh) and year-round golf were the big factors.

We both retired in 1999 and moved to Georgia full time. Our daughter Wendy moved there also and the family has stayed together without having to travel all over for holidays, etc. We're all in Anderson, SC now; Marti and I live on a golf course and play frequently. We see the grandkids all the time and share holidays with Wendy and her husband. We found a small condo in Atlanta that we use when we go to concerts and shows. Sometimes I just need a "big" city fix.

The Division Avenue High reunions have been terrific. Seeing high school friends is just a joy. Being with Ira Selsky, Joan Lucas, Linda Votteler and Bill Stanley among others was like going back in time. We all owe much to Barbara Taylor and her helpers for organizing our 50th. The west coast/Vegas reunions with Russ Green, Rich Humbert, Larry Bory, Frank Barning, and Ken Plass were amazing. Heidi Perlmutter has been a life long friend and it was wonderful to spend time with her.

I am grateful to Frank for creating the framework that allows us all to stay in touch. Most of all I'm grateful for being part of our class. It's not over yet - see you at the reunion in Key West in February. Party on.

Part 1: Dewain Lanfear shares his priceless Levittown memories

Old Levittown golfing buddies were reunited in 2008. Left to right are Ken Plass, Dewain Lanfear, Richie Humbert and Russ Green.

By Dewain Lanfear '60

Living and teaching in Levittown were priceless experiences and I have fond memories of being a member of Division Avenue High School's pioneer class of 1960.

We moved to Levittown in January of the seventh grade, so that was 1955. I remember walking to school the first day in the snow. My first class was phys ed and Mr. Aiello was the teacher. Little did I know then that we would work together until he retired some 30 years later - that we would play golf in our teachers' league and share coffee in the faculty room and he would always be such a kind gentleman.

That first day in class, I was just lost. I came from a Catholic school in Parkchester in the Bronx. I had been trained to stand when I answered questions, and although it was obvious that this was not the rule at Division Avenue High School, it still took me a couple of weeks to break the habit. Talk about "training!"

I remember being thrilled at the sight of the baseball fields around town, especially the Jerusalem Avenue complex. In the Bronx, I played softball on an asphalt playground, and our Little League field was a backstop on a bare soccer field. Levittown was like heaven and I couldn't wait until spring to come and baseball season to arrive. I was astonished that the fields sat there empty and I could get some friends together and play anytime.

Mr. Reichert (Jerry's dad) and Mr. Greengold (Allie's dad) were my coaches in Little League. I don't recall the other players, I'm sorry to say, but it was a dream for me. The whole baseball program in the town was excellent, and is to this day, which is why Division and MacArthur are such powers.

Later on I played for Jack MacDonald who became a fantastic coach at Clarke HS, and of course Joe DiMaggio at Division. I played on the freshman team at Boston College and by then I could see that I had peaked baseball wise and I didn't play after that. That I stopped playing then is one of my few regrets. It led to my emphasizing to my students that their regrets ought to be things they did, not things left undone. Although it's early in this narrative, let me say that taking lessons learned in my own life into the classroom was my style throughout my teaching career.

I remember that Ken Plass was a very early friend and remains a friend to this day. The same can be said of Russ Green and Rich Humbert. Steve Tuck and I shared an interest in music. I played baseball on Jerusalem Avenue fields with Jerry Reichert, Jeff Swain (moved away early) and others along Blacksmith Road. There was a lot of table tennis (called "ping pong" then - now much classier) at Russ's house. Ken and I as we got older and he could drive, would play summer basketball in Massapequa. Ken got taller - me not so much. We were a good team though and played with some future college stars.

Ken himself went on to be a force in California and as an adult in national AAU circles. Rich and I lifted weights in my backyard using picnic benches for our bench presses and he was a very successful wrestler. The four of us "learned" to play golf at Bethpage State Park before it became famous as the US Open venue. We have played together the last few years and things haven't changed that much swing wise. I think that the formation of lifelong friendships is typical of our classmates. I am grateful to have these people in my life and others who haven't appeared yet in this narrative.

Baseball was my sport and I was lucky enough to be in Levittown, a place that had a great program. The youth leagues were well run and supported by adults in the community. They fed the high school programs and these programs were successful thanks to the stream of young talent. I remember lots of wins, a few losses, but mostly I remember the coaching of Jack MacDonald in the youth leagues and Joe DiMaggio at DAHS. They were good men who knew the game and liked their players.

I recall with fondness teammates: the late Pete Cybriwsky, Gary Parker, Mike Caldararo, John Shibilo, Jerry Reichert, John Koehler, Jim Urban, Ernie Villatore, Bill Stanley and Ron Albaum ( who went on to be a successful coach at Brentwood HS). We endured the miserable early season weather together and won a lot of games. I can't listen to Springsteen's "Glory Days" without thinking of Pete and tearing up a bit. What I took from baseball was a feeling that I could do something well, and that gave me confidence to do other things.
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The creation of the first Division Avenue High yearbook in 1960

By Dewain Lanfear, 1960

There are a couple of ways to think about the 1960 yearbook, which has been discussed previously in this blog. One could tell of its significance (nostalgia) or its location (lost long ago). No one has chosen to talk about its creation. Pages 144 and 145 of the first yearbook from DAHS has pictures of the staff that got the whole thing going. The group picture of the staff is at the top of this page. Somehow, I missed the photo shoot.

What I remember most was that we nearly missed every deadline for the production of that book, a habit I didn't break until my 40s. Anyway, Neal Manly, Karen Balos, Connie Drakos, Russ Green, Larry Bory, John General, Ellen Rees your blogger- in-chief Frank Barning and others who have the right to feel slighted that I didn't remember to list them, worked long hours the night before pages were due to put the book together. We had no model to go by and pretty much made it up as we went along. Working on the yearbook was a great excuse to miss the occasional class, but the real work was done in panic mode usually at Connie's house. Clearly it was a task worth doing.

I was editor in chief. Russ and Larry did finance (got the ads), Frank was sports editor. Other jobs were parceled out, but I have no clue who did what. Lots of people that I mentioned did a heck of a job laying out the pages and typing the captions (activities) for everyone. Also, all the underclass students had to be identified. It was a group effort, but 50 years later we know how much it was worth.

I still have my copy and I look through it once in a while to remember people and events from that time. Who knew the things that would happen, the friends we would never see again, the ones we would never lose, the way the internet would allow us to reconnect, with Frank's help. When you look at our faces in that book, who could guess the things we would accomplish, the places we would go. There was a lot of anxiety in those years, there has been much since, but except for my family, I've never been with a group that meant more to me than you all.

I have acquaintances from college, memories from the Army, colleagues from work, and former students whom I'll never forget, but none of them mean as much as the class of '60. And that's the truth. The turnout at our reunion was amazing and the satellite reunions in Vegas last April and the Key West gathering this coming February are examples of how we have stayed together.

THE READERS WRITE
Merrill Clark 1962: Bob Sharkey, in 1962, was truly the best dressed of our class but did not win the award. Bob worked at a men's clothing store and I think every penny he made went into buying clothes.

Dewain Lanfear wrote that he was witness to the validity of voting for the different categories, but in the case of my class, I don't remember a vote. I only remember that there were a number of questionable "winners", myself included. Tony Pace - most athletic? What about Gary Parker? Those are the ones that come to mind at the moment. Inasmuch as all this is history and shouldn't matter to anyone, my guess is that everything done in high school was not exactly "kosher".

Lynn Smith Dos Santos 1965: Regarding the subject of yearbooks, mine is very dear to me because I was the Copy Editor for it. In that job, somehow I got two yearbooks, one with my name engraved on the cover and the one I paid for. In 1992, I met my current husband Larry Dos Santos (Class of '64) and he also has his yearbook. I lost my college yearbook several moves ago but our DAHS yearbooks are one of our treasures in our home.

Arnie Galeota 1961: I still have my yearbook. It's kind of beat up with the 14 different times I've moved since 1993 but I have it. To me it's my memories of a fantastic time in my life, ones that I hate to let go of. It's true we can't live in the past or dwell on it either, but our lives consist of memories and those were some of the best for me.

I didn't realize then how good life really was, but I do now. A few comments made to me by a few teachers were to study harder. I guess they had the insight to know how uninterested I was in the academic portion of a school day and they tried to give me a heads up. I should have listened.

Dewain Lanfear, Class of 1960, still most likely to . . .

Scholar, varsity athlete, Army veteran, long-time Levittown English teacher, Dewain Lanfear has had an interesting and varied life. Now retired, he lives in South Carolina with his wife Marti who was a Levittown physical education teacher. Dewain was shown as Most Likely to Succeed in the 1960 yearbook. The photo at the top was snapped in Las Vegas in 2008.