NNHS Class of 1939--Reunion-60

---It was June 8, 1939, and the senior class at Newport News High School was making history. The 204 students were graduating - the largest class ever to graduate from the school. They gathered that night with a "feeling of victory and accomplishments," salutatorian Marie Claytor said during her commencement speech. And, she said, the students were all thinking back to 1935, when they were freshmen entering the school for the first time, "feeling anew the ambitions that urged them to success."
---Now, 60 years later, the class will again gather to reminisce. Though much smaller in number, it will meet tonight at the James River Country Club for a 60th reunion celebration dinner and dance. Of the 133 alumni who are living, 45 will attend with spouses or friends. They hail from across the country, some coming from as far as Washington and California.
---This is the class's sixth reunion, according to reunion committee member Ann Stephenson Johnson of Newport News. Since graduating, she said, the class has met for its 25th, 35th, 40th, 50th and 55th reunions.
---"We're all between 75 and 80 years old, and people are still willing to travel this far," said Johnson, 76. "We've always been close since we were in high school, and I think it's amazing that 45 of us are still getting around and doing things."
---When the alumni enter the country club tonight, they will be greeted with purple and white - their class colors - and old banners that were saved from the school after it closed. The master of ceremonies for the evening is their fellow classmate, George "Ken" Garrison, who owns Garrison Realty in Seaford.
---There will also be a commemorative booklet filled with everyone's names and addresses, career and family notes, comments from those who were unable to attend, and a list of all the class members who have died. Since the last class reunion in 1994, 19 have died, said Anne Stark, another committee member.
---As part of the reunion activities, Stark said, attendees will sign a huge card and poster for classmate Helen Siler of Oklahoma, who could not attend because she and her husband recently lost everything they owned when a string of tornadoes struck the Midwest last month.
---Newport News High School was started in 1896 on the third floor of the old First National Bank Building on 28th Street and Washington Avenue. Its first graduates, the Class of 1897, consisted of five young men. In 1924, a new school building was constructed on Huntington Avenue between 30th and 32nd streets.
---In 1971, the all-white Newport News High School was converted to Newport News Intermediate School after the federal government ordered the district to integrate its schools. The intermediate school closed nine years later. The building, now known as Huntington Hall, is a Navy barracks.
---According to a 1939 edition of "The Beacon," the 1939 class theme was "The Trylon and Perisphere," which were the trademarks of the World's Fair that year. They were "symbols of the world of tomorrow," according to a caption in the book: "Just as the Trylon points heavenward; just as the Perisphere symbolizes a whole, complete thing, so let our lives be that."
---The class motto was "Spectemor Agendo" or "Let us be judged by our deeds." After graduation, Johnson said, the students pursued a variety of careers. There have been engineers, a newspaper reporter, t teachers, doctors, lawyers, homemakers, real estate brokers, and an interpreter at Colonial Williamsburg.
---While the reunion efforts have been the work of an entire committee, two men in Richmond were behind the push to make sure it happened, Johnson said. The men, Jack Hunter and Enos Hargraves, sent interest letters and follow-up letters and prepared the commemorative booklet. "Everybody is looking f forward to this," Johnson said. "It's quite a nice gathering, and we always have a wonderful time together."