KU Class of '57 plans golden weekend / LJWorld.com

Archive for Saturday, April 21, 2007

A lot can change in half a century

April 21, 2007

Old friends Bobbie Hinds Kitzmiller, New Cumberland, Pa., left, and Pat Ellis Perry, Long Island, N.Y., right, greet each other for the first time in almost 50 years as they prepare for a campus tour during a Kansas University alumni reunion event. Kitzmiller, Perry and Kathlene Keck Meyer, Independence, Mo., center, are all 1957 KU graduates and participating in this weekend's golden anniversary at KU.

KU's class of '57 celebrates 50 years

50 years after they left KU, members of the class of 1957 return to their alma mater this weekend. Enlarge video

They have memories of seeing Louis Armstrong in concert, daring other students to walk between Wilt Chamberlain's legs and, in the case of the women, fighting for the right to wear Bermuda shorts.

More than 100 members of the Kansas University class of 1957 are in town this weekend for their "golden" reunion. The event began Friday with check-in at the Adams Alumni Center, bus tours of campus and a dinner. It continues today with a luncheon where class members will receive 50-year pins.

Perhaps the biggest difference between KU today compared with 50 years ago, class members say, is the sheer size.

"It was a smaller family" in 1957, Ray Voskamp said as he sat in the lobby of the alumni center, with doo-wop music playing in the background. "I can imagine it's very difficult to know anybody outside your own circle of friends."

Voskamp, a retired CEO of an architectural firm, on Friday dropped by his former fraternity house, Delta Chi, to meet some of the members.

"Everybody's got a TV in their room, a refrigerator, a microwave," he said.

Another big difference on campus is the fashion.

"A skirt and sweater would take you anywhere" in 1957, said Dorothy Hedrick, who is in town from St. Petersburg, Fla. "I might have owned a pair of jeans, but I didn't wear them very much."

Listof 1957 graduates Â»

Hedrick, who went on to be an elementary teacher, met her husband, Chuck, while at KU. She remembers spending plenty of time at The Dynamite Inn and The Stables, which she described as "bars with jukeboxes."

"We used to have our dates in the engineering library," she said. "But on the weekends we'd party."

A display Friday inside the alumni center included a photo roster of the 1954-1955 men's basketball team, alongside class members' written responses to a survey about their thoughts toward KU.

Ruth Roney Hughes, a member of Pi Beta Phi sorority at the time, wrote that she remembered winning Rock Chalk Revue her junior year. Chuck Garrett of Eudora recalled his professor in Economics 101 using the forearm of his tweed jacket to wipe chalk off the blackboard.

KU basketball legend Chamberlain, who played at KU in 1956-58, figures prominently in many class members' memories.

"I do remember offering a very short Gamma Phi a rather large fiscal pay-off if she would walk underneath Wilt Chamberlain's legs (or between them) on the way to class," wrote Jayne Callahan Brooks of Gates Mills, Ohio.

Jane Jackson Pronko of Prairie Village remembers walking on campus and "coming face to belt buckle" with Chamberlain, as well as hearing jazz greats Louis Armstrong and Dave Brubeck in concert.

Joan Ryan Ball of Shawnee Mission wrote that one of her strongest memories was "petitioning to wear Bermuda shorts."