Can everyone remember who their first grade teacher was?
\nA good number of people probably can\u2019t.
\nBut for a group of students who attended the old Grazierville School from 1928 through the mid-1960s, the names of all their teachers just seem to roll off the tongues.
\n\u201cWe really didn\u2019t have any intentions of making this thing grow like it has,\u201d said Dan Irvin, president of the Grazierville School Gang. \u201cNext thing we knew, there were a hundred people here. It just got crazy, but every minute of it is a good time.\u201d
\nAccording to Irvin, the Grazierville School Gang was birthed in April 1989 after the brainstorming of four friends who all attended the school. These include Irvin, Jim Bonsell, Jerry Steal and Jim Wilson.
\nThe group began meeting in the restaurant area of Wissinger\u2019s in Bellmeade one morning each month, but after a few meetings, that area became too small to accommodate the growing attendance of the group. They then moved into a banquet room on the property to conduct meetings.
\n\u201cEach one of us brought a friend to that second meeting,\u201d said Irvin. \u201cThen we asked each of those friends to bring another friend the next time.\u201d
\nAccording to Irvin, the number of attendees sometimes numbered well over 100 people.
\n\u201cWe\u2019ve dwindled down a little bit since then, but we still never dreamed of getting as large as we did,\u201d said Irvin.
\nSo what do a bunch of old schoolmates talk about?
\n\u201cReally about anything,\u201d said Irvin. \u201cFun at recess, lunchtime, our old teachers.\u201d
\nTeachers like Mrs. (Fannie) Shiffler, who taught grades three and four, and former principal William Barr, who also taught grades seven and eight, were all topics of conversation at one point in time.
\n\u201cWe talk about the old times, the good times and the new times,\u201d said Irvin. \u201cWe talk just to have a good time, and that\u2019s exactly what we have.\u201d
\nThe meetings are no longer in Bellmeade and have changed from the early morning hours to a luncheon meeting. The group now meets on the first Monday of every month at LaScalia\u2019s Restaurant in Vail.
\n\u201cAnyone who attended the Grazierville School are welcome at our meetings,\u201d said Irvin. \u201cWe don\u2019t charge dues and really don\u2019t accomplish that much. We just want to meet and remember how the good times were.\u201d
\nThe group spends a lot of time learning which fellow students have fallen ill and makes efforts to contact these people by telephone or through cards. It also holds a picnic each spring and a Christmas party.
\nThose looking for more information concerning the Grazierville School Gang is asked to contact Mr. Irvin at 684-4903.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Can everyone remember who their first grade teacher was? A good number of people probably can\u2019t. But for a group of students who attended the old Grazierville School from 1928 through the mid-1960s, the names of all their teachers just seem to roll off the tongues. \u201cWe really didn\u2019t have any intentions of making this […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-47647","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news-in-the-tyrone-pennsylvania-area"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47647","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=47647"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47647\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=47647"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=47647"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=47647"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}