Classmates

Hello, Classmates! We've been here for 10 years now... We would love to have you update your profiles to include any changes during this time. For those of you just joining us, please include answers to the following questions:

1. What would you like to tell us about your life over the past 60 years? High points, unusual experiences, travel, career(s), jail time, family, passions, regrets, etc.?

2. What are your plans for the next years of your lives?

Select the "Add Your Profile" button below. Fill in the info (NOTE: PLEASE TYPE YOUR COMMENTS DIRECTLY INTO THE COMMENTS BOX. DO NOT CUT AND PASTE FROM ANOTHER WORD PROCESSING PROGRAM) and please upload your favorite "Now" photo. We will upload your "Then" photo from the yearbook for you when we receive your information.

We're looking forward to hearing from all of you!
 

Judith Kuhlman Weitzner (Kuhlman)

Then Then
Now Now
Marital status: Committed Relationship
Occupation: Consultant in Gerontolgy
Comment:

My professions have been in social work and education.  After U.C. Berkeley, I became a social worker for Contra Costa County.  I saved every penny until I could afford a round the world airline ticket.  I took off with my husband on a year long journey focused primarily on Asia.  When we arrived in Nepal, in 1968, we wanted to stay.  I secured a job teaching 3rd grade in the International School.  I became aware of the plight of Tibetans who were still escaping over the Himalayas, and have been involved with their cause ever since.  I founded two organizations involved in preservation of Tibetan culture and keeping the Tibetan cause alive.  I helped to start two schools in Nepal for Sherpa and Tibetan children.  In 1975 after many years of reading and study, I became a Buddhist practioner.  I was fortunate to have met Lama Thubten Yeshe in Nepal, who later founded centers around the world.  We helped start a center in Nepal which offers meditation courses to Westerners and education to Asian children.

After returning from that first trip, I helped found a school for Gypsy children which thrived in Richmond California for 5 years.  (Yes, I mean Romany)  We developed teaching techniques with the Gypsies that were not culturally biased.  Returned to Nepal in 1975 with the intent of teaching Sherpa and Tibetan children, but ended up teaching their teachers English.

I was present when His Holiness the Dalai Lama received the Congressional Gold Medal..  I remember when no one knew who he was or what the issue was with Tibet.  I am so glad to have seen the day when the U.S. Congress honored him for his incredible work on behalf of his people. 


In 1976, at the suggestion of Lama Yeshe, I went into the field of aging. I spent the rest of my career with Contra Costa in the Office on Aging.  I developed classes for older adults at Contra Costa College and taught there for 11 years.


For the past 15 years, I have been working with Japan helping deveolp their elder care system. I work with JFK University and SunLife educating eldercare professionals. 

I have retired from Contra Costa, but remain active in the field of Aging and offer my services pro bono to families and elders with elder care concerns.

I am sorry not to attend the reunion as there are many of you I would like to see.  His Holiness the Dalai Lama is giving teachings in Long Beach which I cannot miss.

I live in Crockett with my partner, Don, and two cats.

Joanne Lagerstrom

Then Then
Now Now
Comment: 1. I graduated from San Francisco State in 1964 and went back and student taught at Oakland High while earning my teaching credential. I taught high school for 35 years (the first years at De Anza High and then for the last 25 years at El Cerrito High, where my daughters went) before retiring in 2001. I have two daughters from my first marriage and was a single mom for most of the years they were growing up.



In 1993 I helped start a singles hiking and biking club and met my husband, Robert, while hiking on Sentinel Dome in Yosemite ten years ago. The following June we became friends while hiking to Half Dome and we married in 2002. Together we have four grandchildren, ages 5-18.



Traveling has been a priority for me--around the US, Alaska, Hawaii, Canada, Mexico, Europe several times (in '71 on $5 a day), Africa, Galapagos, New Zealand, Australia, and China. Robert and I have been able to travel a lot too; we like doing house exchanges. We were in Europe for six months in 2003, mostly in Italy, but we spent a month each near Barcelona and in southern Holland. Since then we have been to Sweden (where I researched information about my family for a book I am writing) and back to Italy twice. Through our travels we have made many wonderful friends and have been successful in getting some of them to visit us too. This fall we have arranged our first US exchanges in Maine and New Hampshire.



I am active in my church, a writing group connected with Cal, and two homeless respite centers in our area. Opera, symphony, theater, tennis, hiking, biking, reading, writing, tutoring, sailing, birding, entertaining, taking grandchildren to the park, making movies, organizing pictures--there is so much to do, and for most of my life I didn't realize that when I retired, I still wouldn't be able to do everything!



2. Continue trying to do everything!

Noel Lanctot

Then Then
Marital status: Married
Children: 3
Occupation: Retired San Jose Police Officer
Comment: Married 48 years to my wife Betty. We have 4 granchildren and as of 10/8/20 we have a great grandchild Emily Elaine. :o) Have been retired from SJPD for 27 years.  We love to travel and during this time I have played Senior Softball all around the country including Canada.

We currently reside in a senior community in San Jose called the Villages Golf and Country Club.

Andrew Lee

Then Then
Marital status: Married
Children: 4
Occupation: retired
Comment: After years at UC Berkeley and San Jose State, I accumulated enough units to obtain a BA degree from San Jose State and a commission in the US Army as a lieutenant. By the end of my service obligation, I had the responsibility of a company commander and was functioning as such.



I used the GI bill to obtain a secondary teaching credential at San Jose State and was pursuing a MBA at USF, when Southern Pacific Trans Co. offered me a position in their new computer department. I was there for the next 24+ years. It was a great company to be associated with and I was fortunate to be working with computers during its infancy. I worked as a programmer, system analyst, project leader, systems supervisor and pushed/dragged the railroad operation into the 20th century. It was satisfying work and the company liked me enough to promote me to be an officer of the company.

    

Unfortunately, our CEO made some (big) mistakes and SP became history. Our department was outsourced to IBM and subsequently I left after a year. I did contract work for Pacbell in SF and worked the last 12 years in the IT department of California Casaulty based in San Mateo. (great commute). I finally decided to pull the plug and retired in March, 2008.

    

While working in SF, I was fortunate to meet a young lady(Shirley) and found we had much in common. Eventually, we were married in her home town (Port Washington, Wisc pop 7,000). That was 34+ years ago and now we have four boys.



With life in suburbia, I was involved with local community activities, especially baseball. (This was probably influenced by OHS baseball coach Mike Marcoulis). I coached Little League and Babe Ruth (age 13-15) baseball. The high water marks were when I coached/managed a couple of Belmont all-stars  teams to the district finals.



I served on the Belmont Babe Ruth board of directors and helped run the league a number of years. Also I was president of the McDougal Neighborhood association in Belmont. As president I was involved with all the local issues real and/or imagery, political or not.  After serveral years, I decided to retire from public life.

 

Now I am in retirement mode and its wonderful. 

Daniel Lee

Then Then
Now Now
Marital status: Married
Children: 1
Occupation: Retired manager
Comment:
I attended UC Berkeley and graduated with a BS in Mechanical Engineering in January, 1964. I lived at home during my freshman year at Cal- often commuting to campus with Larry Stone (I was saddened to learn from the OHS website that he passed away). I was fortunate to get into the Bowles Hall dormitory at the beginning of my sophomore year and thoroughly enjoyed the Cal and Bowles Hall experience.

Early in my sophomore year I met Shirley Brash from Sacramento; we dated throughout college and married in June, 1964 following her graduation with a BA in English.We moved to San Jose where I joined IBM to work in data storage device development (the area where the disk drive was invented). While working for IBM I attended San Jose State and obtained an MS in mechanical engineering. After 5 years I became a programmer and developed, supported, and managed myriad projects.  I spent considerable time working on and managing the business aspects of projects, and I took an early buyout and “retired” in 1994. Retirement was short-lived because I immediately began consulting at IBM for another 10 years, during which time I had the most fun of my career. I retired for good in 2004.

Shirley and I have lived in San Jose since 1964. We have one daughter and two grandsons aged 9 and 11. Debbie and her husband and their boys live very close to us, and we enjoy a wonderful relationship. Our grandsons are the lights of our lives.

Shirley is also retired (from teaching), and we enjoy retirement immensely. We are busy with family, volunteer work (our grandsons’ school, the Stanford Memorial Blood Bank (Shirley), our synagogue, and other organizations), gardening, golf, hobbies, and travel. We just returned from a Mediterranean cruise and land tour of Turkey in July and will tour New England to see the fall colors soon after the reunion. My “current” picture (Shirley and me) was taken in July, 2009 at the famous Roman Library of Celsus in Ephesus, Turkey.

I look forward to seeing everyone and renewing old acquaintances.

Donna Leiske (French)

Then Then
Comment: I was married and widowed with one daughter, Darcy. I worked for Kaiser Permanente Hospital Regional Offices for 25 years. I have been retired since 1993 and have been living at a Del Webb community for the past 8 years.   For the next 50 years I would like to start over with my life knowing what I know now. Life is strange and hindsight could come in handy. 

Cary Lewis

Then Then
Now Now
Comment: Since Henry is on my case, here we go: Westlake junior high, then the magnificent OHS! Colleges: Oakland City (Engineering major); S.F. State (B.A. Psych 1964); Hayward State (grad); San Jose State (grad). 



After graduating from SF State and finding no possibility of employment, I joined the Secondary Credential program at Hayward State. While in the program my counselor recommended the Job Corps since I had a BA in Psych. Job Corps: Low pay. You can't do crap with a BA in Psych, so at the Job Corps a friend mentioned (many, many times) to apply at GE Vallecitos Atomic Lab. (WTF?) I got the job as a chemistry tech. After about six months the technician operating the Mass Spectrometer was sent to Vietnam. I was asked if I was interested. INTERESTED? Hell yes! It was huge, with four bays of electronics, etc.



Another friend, who left GE for Varian, was bugging me to apply there. In November 1967, I did just that. I was in Palo Alto at Varian— it was way cool. My daughter was born around this time and I remarked to my wife Linda that when our daughter grew-up she would have a computer on her desk. Yes, I could see the future. Remember, PCs did not exist. Varian started my career in NMR (nuclear magnetic resonance). BTW MRI was derived from NMR.



Since Varian I have run NMR laboratories and the final test for Nicolet and GE. I retired from the University of Nevada-Reno in 2008 where I ran the NMR lab. I now do part-time work and NMR consulting.



While at the Job Corps I lived in Hayward with three guys. One day a girl from the complex, who was friends with my roommates, came over for help moving furniture. I was impressed with her, but I still asked if she could iron a shirt for me (I had a date). She said “I only do my own ironing, Bud;” off to a bad start.  One evening I helped her move some furniture and we got along a little better. We married in 1966, and my daughter was born in 1970.



San Jose State, how did that happen? At Varian tuition was reimbursed, so I went back to redo the undergrad courses I screwed up in1960-61. In 1961 I got an 'F' in Physics II and in 1973 I got a 'B’.  I like to teach, run NMR and instrument laboratories. I built a house on Skyline, quarter mile from Palo Alto, in 1976. CFO in 1979? I swore I would never do that again.           



When I moved to Reno in 1988 an OHS alum showed me 53 acres 20 miles from Reno. Coming from California, I had to have it — can anyone get 50 acres in the Bay Area?   I bought the land in Reno in 1993 and moved into the house I built, with a little help, in 1995. There is an under ground telephone line and nothing else, no water, sewer, electricity. How can that be? Trust me it is. I have a well, septic tank and power comes from solar and engine/generator. Batteries power the house much of the time and the batteries are charged by the panel/generator. It is a constant battle, solar for them masses? No way!!    

Chloe Lietzke (Umstead)

Then Then
Comment: I attended Central State College in Oklahoma, married Fred Lietzke there, moved back to California with him and our two daughters, graduated from UCB, worked in a Montessori School, at an office, and at Laney College as an ESL tutor.  Later I became a property manager.  



Since retirement, we have taken six cross-country road trips. One of our daughters is an architect; the other one has her MFA from California College of the Arts, San Francisco.  My husband was an Oakland Policeman for 22 years, and our 45th anniversary will be in January.  We have one granddaughter.    



As for the future, I have no idea.  

Carol Liu (Same)

Then Then
Marital status: Married
Children: 3
Occupation: Retired

Ila Loeb (Miller)

Then Then
Comment: Growing up in Oakland had a kicker or two. I lost my mother at the age of 3 years 9 months but was fortunate to have a wonderful aunt and uncle who raised me as their own. My father remarried but fortunately I stayed with my aunt and uncle. I am an only child and definitely feel that I missed something. I have been lucky that I have several friends that are like sisters.



After OHS I attended college at OJC, University of Miami, and SF State studying business while working for my father. I married Lloyd Loeb in September of 1963 and moved to Modesto, CA where Lloyd worked in the family business. We proudly raised our three daughters. Lynelle, a real estate agent, married a man from Israel and has a daughter, 21, in her senior year at Stanislaus State, a daughter, Raam, a junior in high school, a son, Kfir, a freshman in high school and a champion golfer and a daughter, Barak, in the 4th grade. Our middle daughter, Michelle, is a biologist and married a man with three children, two boys, 15 and 13, and a daughter, 14. Our baby, Yvonne, is married to a materials engineer and has two daughters ages 3 and 2. My grandchildren are the loves of my life.



Unfortunately I lost my husband six years ago just prior to our move to the bay area. During my 40 years in Modesto, in addition to being a mother and housewife, I helped in the family business and for 7 years ran a fine jewelry business form the home.



Lloyd and I were involved in many fund raising events in Modesto, for the high school, local opera company and events benefitting MS. Lloyd had MS for 30 years and was an inspiration to all who knew him. I have become acclimated to life in the bay area and have made many good friends. I learned to play Mah Jongg and love the game. I am a member of New Corners, the Beethoven Society, and the Silicon Valley League of the San Francisco Symphony. I host about four musical events a year in my home. It is such a joy to fill the house with music.  



My passion is travel and with great fortune I have done more than my fair share, no regrets. My favorite trips were to East and South Africa. The people were wonderful and being able to see the diverse variety of animals coexist was a sight to behold. I would go back in a heartbeat. My goal is to become a member of the 100 country club. I have about 5 countries to go. Our 50th class reunion was the best ever and I hope to renew many friendships.  



My plans for the next 50 years are travel, crafts and grandchildren.