PENCELAND.com - Payette, Idaho

(PHS - click to enlarge) Payette High School
Payette Idaho
Payette Pirates Pirates

Reunions:

Memories

Hi everybody, Eric Pence here. I created this page originally as a tool for PHS class of 1966 reunions, but I have broadened it to cover all things relating to Payette. Email me if you have any suggestions or requests. Most photos on this page will enlarge if you click on them. Some will show videos.

Idaho native

One amusing thing about growing up in Idaho but living most of my life in the Boston area is having to explain Idaho to people who have never been there and may not even be quite sure where it is located (somewhere in the Midwest?). I used to have people say to me "I know somebody else from Idaho." only to learn that the other person was from Iowa. I'd have to explain to them that Idaho and Iowa are two different states a thousand miles apart, and that Idaho is on the western edge of the Rockies, and besides farmland has mountains and ski areas.

Idaho & Iowa on U.S. map

View of the World
from 9th Avenue This Saul Steinberg cartoon (a View of the World from 9th Avenue), which appeared on the cover of The New Yorker magazine in 1976, shows a New Yorker's perspective of the U.S., which seems to include very little between the Hudson River and the Pacific Ocean! As you can see Idaho does not even exist.

Jewel - The Boise Song Jewel sings this great song with the lyric, "There is no Z in Boise." I grew up pronouncing Boise as BOY-SEE but I have always heard others say BOY-ZEE so I guess there is no "proper" way to say it. (In Massachusetts we have a city name Quincy that is nornally pronounced QUIN-ZEE, but we talk weird here.) I found this song on a Facebook link shared by my Payette friend, Barbara Wilson.

See my Idaho roots section on About Me for more.

Monthly no-host dinners

Some PHS graduates from the Class of '65 who live in the Boise area get together monthly at various local restaurants. All other classes, and teachers, are invited and I have been to a couple of these. Sandi (Anderson) Krasznavolgyi is one of the organizers and sends out an email announcing the next upcoming dinner.

September, 2009, dinner outing.
Ken Winther (remember our band director?) attended this outing.

Classmate on TV

Skip Cockerum's high quality bird food manufacturing business in Payette, Oregon Feeder Insects, was featured on the TV show Dirty Jobs on February 10, 2009.

Click to watch this episode.

The school demolition, 2005

The high school building many of us attended many years ago is no longer standing. Built in 1921 (read about school history) it housed the high school until 1974 (I graduated in 1966) when it became a middle school and the high school relocated to its current location. After 8 decades as a school building it was finally condemned and torn down when the new McCain Middle School was built on Iowa Avenue.

My thanks to Ron Shurtleff for these photos.

View as slideshow

Here are some Google Street Views from Center Avenue looking North where there used to be school structures.

What the PHS site looks like now
(See on Street View)
What's left of the Eastside school
(See on Street View)
Where the ballpark used to be
(See on Street View)

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R E U N I O N S

PHS '66 Reunions:	45th 40th 35th 30th 20th 10th
	2009 Armory Dance

Class Reunions – I got this cute poem from Sandi (Anderson) Krasznavolgyi, PHS class of '65

PHS Class of '65
45th reunion photos

In October, 2010, the Class of '65 had their 45th reunion. Sandi K. took these photos and created a Facebook album.

PHS Class of '65
40th reunion photo

In October, 2005, I attended (as did several others from the class of '66) the 40th reunion of the class of '65. Their reunion committee—Nancy Iseri, Wanda (Swigart) Newton, Ron White, Anita (Fallon) Smith, Clint Selover—deserves a lot of credit for a really outstanding job. Everybody looked wonderful and it was a blast for me to visit with so many people I hadn't seen since we were at PHS! I was told I am welcome to attend their future reunions and I want them to know the invitation goes both ways.

My thanks to Jackie (Hansen) Clark for this great photo. (Please note: After the picture loads click it to resize it.)

45th reunion, 2011

With names

Our 45th reunion had a pretty good turnout. Thanks to the good planning and actions of the reunion committee I would say at least fifty of the ninety-nine in our class came and had a great time. It was held the same weekend as the 23rd Annual A & W Cruise Night car show put on by classmate Jim Boyer. We had the usual 3-day celebration consisting of registration, drinks and food Friday night, events throughout the day on Saturday, the banquet Saturday night, and a brunch on Sunday. Friday night we gathered in the Bancroft Park during the cruise night parade down Main Street, Saturday we met in the Kiwanis Park during the SHOW and SHINE car show and saw many customized cars (Lynn Wininger won a prize for his great pick-up) and saw the lawnmower drags on the street in front of the A & W.

Sherill Rhodes' daughter took many wonderful photos that you can purchase and contribute to the 50th reunion

Jan Jarboe photos . . .

In Kiwanis Park
At the Banquet

Lyla Graden Aldrich photos on Facebook . . .

Friday & Saturday
At the Banquet

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40th reunion, 2006

View photos as slideshow

Our 40th reunion was held in August, 2006. Maggie did most of the work herself, with a little help from Skip and others. The Friday night registration was held at the Scotch Pines Golf Course clubhouse (like previous reunions) but the clubhouse was booked for a golf tournament on Saturday so the Saturday night banquet was at the Nichols Steak House in Fruitland. One of our favorite teachers, James Johnson, attended with his wife, Leora, and they were welcomed by all of us. Several of us went to the Ontario Armory on Saturday afternoon and reminisced about those great dances and took some pictures (see below). The PHS class of 1971 had a reunion dance. What a great idea! There is also a great website with lots of photos of those dances, Bob Dye's 60s Ontario Armory Album. Also on Saturday we attended a tour at the Four Rivers Cultural Center in Ontario where we learned a lot about the multi-cultural history of the valley.

Put the mouse over the following pictures to see the names of who's in the photos (high school names for women).

Friday night . . .

Saturday . . .

At the Ontario Armory

Saturday night . . .

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35th reunion, 2001

View photos as slideshow

Our 35th reunion was held the weekend of August 4th, 2001, at the Scotch Pines Golf Course clubhouse. It was organized by Maggie (Snook) Heide, who did an excellent job, and it consisted primarily of 3 events—the traditional Friday night social, the Saturday night banquet, and the Sunday brunch. At the banquet Maggie entertained us with a program of trivia questions about our high school days using her usual charming wit! Thanks again, Mags! We were having so much fun catching up with each other's lives that on Friday and Saturday nights some of us didn't get to bed until after 2:30am (I heard even later for some)! On Saturday we had a tour of our old high school, now a middle school, during which we sat in the bleachers in the gym and sang (with a little prompting) the school fight song, amazing many of us that we still remembered the words after 35 years! We had a good turnout—I think Maggie said 45 of our graduating class of 99 came to the reunion, some for the first time. Many photos were taken, and I will try to post them here as I get them.
Kathy Watanabe photos . . .

Here are Skip Cockerum's photos.

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30th reunion, 1996

View photos as slideshow

I went to this reunion without my family, so I spent lots of time catching up with my classmates' lives. This was the first reunion where several of us exchanged email addresses, and we have continued to stay in touch, which really helped in the planning of the next reunion.
These are some snapshots I took at the Sunday brunch . . .

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20th reunion, 1986

View photos as slideshow

This was the first reunion I attended, and I was unprepared for the emotional impact. I had not realized the deepness of the bonds I shared with many of my classmates—going through adolescence with them, and even 12 years of public school with some. I moved cross-country several years after graduation, and my parents moved to Boise, making my ties to Payette pretty remote, so I had lost touch with pretty much everybody. I had a smile on my face and tears in my eyes for pretty much the entire weekend of the reunion. Patti went with me and we had our 9-month-old, Alex.
These were taken at the Sunday picnic in the Kiwanis Park . . .

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10th reunion, 1976

I didn't attend this reunion but I did get the reunion booklet from Terry Adams. I lived 2,500 miles away in Boston, and it also seemed that I had recently seen many of my classmates anyway. I want to thank Mollie (Davidson) Minow, one of my regular email correspondents, for sending me this scanned picture.

Armory dance reunion, 2009

When we were in high school there were dances at the Ontario armory every Saturday night put on by Bob Dye. Live bands played at these dances, something you don't see anymore. Many of us attended these regularly and they were a memorable part of living in the SRV in the 60s. In August, 2009, Bob hosted a 40th Armory Dance reunion and had some of the bands from those days play for us again (Crystal Ship was excellent!). Before the dance there was a "Meet & Greet" gathering in the park across the street for a couple of hours which was just like a class reunion with many people seeing each other for the first time in years. Those of us who attended went on a major nostalgia trip and it was exciting to see all these 60-somethings carrying on like we did in high school!

As a result of this dance Bob Dye and I have gotten acquainted and stayed in touch.

Bob Dye's Ontario Armory & 60s Rock & Roll – the "official" site with a message board and many photos (temporarily disabled but Bob says he plans on putting it back)
Ontario Reunion 2009 Pics – photos of the entire event
Armory Dance Reunion photos – Idaho Press Tribune's photos can viewed or purchased here
Pacific NorthWest Bands – bands who played at the armory in the 60s
Treasure Valley Rock-N-Roll Revival – a Facebook page with many photos

Videos

Crystal Ship plays The Doors
Doors songs by
The Crystal Ship
Crossroads
The Crystal Ship

Photos

Here are some photos from Mike Blacketter and Janet (Seaweard) Jarboe—hover mouse for descriptions (high school names for women).

View as slideshow View photos as slideshow

Sandi (Anderson) Krasznavolgyi's photos put on Facebook.

Bob Dye

With 60s photo
With friend Patti

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See

Many of us from PHS have joined Facebook and have added each other as "Friends." To find my classmates I searched Facebook with a filter of Payette High School. I have uploaded the class photos from our years at Eastside and Westside elementary schools, and some of my friends and I have really enjoyed tagging people we recognize after so many years.
Somebody created this really cool page on Facebook to share Payette memories.

You know you grew up in Payette, Idaho if you remember this.....

  Facebook profiles

Here are links to a bunch of Facebook profiles of PHS classmates. I have added most of these as Facebook friends so there has been some exchange of information. Many I did not know at PHS and most I haven't seen since high school, but it is fun to use Facebook to interact and catch up some. Some left Payette before graduating but I have listed them in the class they were in when they lived in Payette. It is interesting to see where people have settled down, and I am always surprised to see that I am one of the very few that has come to the East coast (I have lived in metro-Boston since 1973, when I came here for college, so I an definitely an "Easterner" now). I have tried to include the names from high school to some that have changed below to make them more easily identifiable, and hopefully I have not made any mistakes. I'm not always sure so please contact me if you see an error.

In Facebook there are a couple of things that old friends would like to find in your profile . . .

A recent photo
Where you currently live
List "Payette High School" under Education in your profile to help other classmates find you

You might need to log on to Facebook for the links below to work fully.

     Class of '58
Pat Townsend

     Class of '59
Deana R. Long (Deana Watts)

     Class of '62
Stan Craven

     Class of '63
Dan Williams
Danny Davis
Donna Hardin (Donna Hildebrandt)
Glenna Maine (Glenna Yokum)
Jim Davidson
Patty Dragoo Sawyer
Sherry Swanson

     Class of '64
Bert Davis
Colleen Bezates (Colleen Withers)
Connie Lea Bowcutt (Connie Rogers)
Darla Gill Stoddard
Dennis Snyder
Dwayne Elliott
Gary Schrecongost
Meegan Stanton Kindall
Okey Dokey (Kathie Thrall)
Rhodonna Roberts (Rhodonna Warner)
Rod Debban
Stephanie Wight (Stephanie Hincks)
Tommy Reed

     Class of '65
Anita Smith (Anita Fallon)
Betty Scott Flaherty
Clinton Selover
Elayne Taylor (Elayne Green)
Gary Dennis
Jackie Clark (Jackie Hansen)
James M Christian
Judi Miller (Judi Carstens)
Kathy Evans (Kathy Swanson)
Keith Watson
Linda Barrie
Linda Nelson Hansen
Margaret Pruitt (Margaret Davidson)
Nancy Iseri
Pat Sumpter Harvey
Ron Gilster Price
Sandi Anderson Krasznavolgyi
Sharla Weber (Sharla Anderson)
Steve Fager
Verna Nelson
Wanda Newton (Wanda Swigart)
William Woodward
Albums
     Ontario Armory Dance reunion photos – Sandi's album; see more photos above
     45th reunion photos – Sandi's album
     45th reunion photos – Sandi's album

I have tried to list PHS people as I encounter them on Facebook. If you are a PHS grad and wish to be listed here contact me on Facebook or email me.

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Recent photos

These are recent photos of some of my high school classmates. You can see more, including those from other classes, on Facebook.

Mike Blacketter, Karen (Bates) Cartwright, Eric Pence taken by Bob Dye in Ontario, July, 2010

Cathy (Wiens) & Randy Taylor F

Mike Blacketter F

Lyla (Graden) and Mike Aldrich F

Jan Rogers-Levy and husband, Stew F

Dave Oglesbee F

Terri (Whiting) Lawrence

Eric Pence and Skip Cockerum at Riverside Cemetery in Payette, 2009

Janet (Seaweard) Jarboe and her grandchildren F

Wynn White in Rome F

Karen (Bates) Cartwright and husband Ron

Wynn White and his children Weston & Flora visit Skip Cockerum in Oregon

Eric Pence and Mollie (Davidson) Minow, at the old Davidson homestead on 1st Ave. S.
(now refurbished and lived in by Mollie's brother, Roland)

Mollie (Davidson) Minow, Melanie (Glover) Turner, and Melanie's son, Jason

Maggie (Snook) Heide, Skip Cockerum (with Ernie), and Kathy (Handley) Wagers

Wynn White, taken by his son Weston in front a gallery in Japan

Daniel Ortega, with his sons Jordan and Tyler

Jane (McHaffie) Blyseth, with Carina and Elizabeth on a trip to Turkey

Polly (Nicholson) Van Camp, and granddaughter Malea Rose

Dennis Carson and family, Thanksgiving 1995

Bill Chalke and his mother

Mike and Lyla (Graden) Aldrich

Mr. & Mrs. James Johnson's 50th wedding anniversary, October, 2001.

For my photos see the Gallery page.

F Photo from Facebook

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The Way We Were . . .

Photos (and above title) from Marlena (Harper) Bertholl.

An 8th grade group on the steps in front of the gym
(names below picture)

8th grade band on the steps in front of the gym

On the steps in front of the gym, 1966

A group of us in the Kiwanis Park, 1966

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Yearbook photos

Here are our senior pictures from the 1966 yearbook, "The Axe," and our 7th grade pictures from the 1961 yearbook, "The Treasure Chest." We were so young then! They are scanned in a page at a time.
For best viewing make sure your automatic image resizing is turned off in your browser.

View 1966 Axe photos View 1961 Treasure Chest photos (Thanks to Karen Bates Cartwright for these!)

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Grade school photos

These have been uploaded to Facebook where many of us have tagged those in the photos.

Eastside

(Gone but not forgotten)

I have scanned in my class pictures from my years at Eastside, 1954-1960. Sadly, the building is gone now. I will put other class photos here if anyone has them.
Thanks to Janet (Seaweard) Jarboe for her 2nd grade photo of Mrs. Schwartz's class.

1st grade
Miss Hisa 2nd grade
Mrs. Hickerson 2nd grade
Mrs. Schwartz 3rd grade
Mrs. Barrett 4th grade
Mrs. Hill 5th grade
Mrs. Betts 6th grade
Mrs. Williams

Westside

These photos are from Marlena (Harper) Bertholl.

1st & 2nd grade 3rd & 4th grade

5th grade

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Old Payette photos

Many of these are from postcards I picked up at the Payette County Historical Society museum (their website was on the now defunct Geocities), which is located at the corner of N 9th St. and 1st Ave. South, across from Central Park. The museum occupies the building that was the First Methodist Church when I was growing up. It contains many artifacts of my heritage that bring back memories of my childhood.

Payette high school, pre-fire, when it had a full 3rd floor
Payette high school, before the gym was added
Eastside elementary school, now gone
looking up main street, 1920s
looking up main street, 1940s
looking up main street, 1960s
looking up main street, 1970s
the old library
the old Town Hall
Bancroft Hotel, now gone
Union Pacific railroad depot, now gone (the statue went to Central Park for awhile)
Central Park
Harris Kiwanis Park
the Post Office
the Charm Theater – I saw many movies here
YMCA building, previously located catty-corner from the Post Office
the old train station
Old, old Payette
the old Ritz Theater
1924 May Day parade (note the flagrant display of KKK marchers!)
Payette National Bank, 1910
Peter Pence, my great grandfather, a Payette pioneer
Albert Lloyd Pence, my grandfather and a Payette resident, who died when I was 5

Greetings from Payette, Idaho - an old postcard

Payette County Photo Album – more old photos of Payette

Payette County Photographs – 6 pages of photos, click on Image 125K to see a photo

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Payette history

Here is some information I have collected that I thought belonged on this page. See more below under Links.

The City of Payette is located in Payette County at the confluence of the Payette and Snake Rivers, approximately three miles north of Fruitland and ten miles south of Weiser (in Washington County) at an elevation of 2,150 feet.		"Payette" is named for Francois Payette, the good-hearted postmaster for the Hudson�s Bay Company at Fort Boise, which was just upriver on the Snake. He was known as a generous friend to Oregon-bound emigrants in the 1840s.2
In the 1800s, Payette was a panorama of sagebrush and bunch grass covering rolling hillsides. The first white man to settle in the region was Francois Payette, a French Canadian, who came from Quebec in 1812. In 1867, James Toombs established the first principal settlement, the Payette Store, and from this small beginning a thriving town began to develop. A few years later, Peter Pence [my great-grandfather] brought the first cattle to the area, introduced hops to Payette, and grew peaches, and built dams and irrigation ditches. A. B. Moss arrived in the valley in 1881. He supplied ties to the Union Pacific Railroad and shipped the first fruit from the area in 1891. Thus began the long history of Payette as an agricultural center.3
In 1891, the City was incorporated and became the Payette County seat in 1917. Today (2005), Payette is home to 7,434 residents with anticipated growth to a thriving City of over 12,700 (2030).

2	Bill Loftus, Idaho Handbook, February 1992 (page 157)
3	"Payette, City Center Plan", Planmakers, November 1985, page 4.

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Memories

These are some of my memories of growing up in Payette in the 50s and 60s.

Faux status
My dad was the manager of the First Security Bank, the only bank in town until I was in high school. When I was a little kid, other kids were under the impression that as manager he "owned" the bank and that we were rich. Perhaps in the 1800s the banks were owned by the people who ran them (see my clock story) but by our time most banks were owned by corporations. Of course I didn't try to correct this misconception.

May Day
My dad's bank used to team up with American Fine Foods (the cannery) and enter a float in the May Day Parade every year. When I was little I used to ride on this float some years, and when I was older I drove the station wagon that pulled the float, and some years I was in the band that marched in the parade. A big part of the May Day celebration was the Inland Empire Carnival coming to town and setting up in Kiwanis Park. I used to spend several days there going on rides (my favorite was the "Tilt-A-Whirl" but if you were real daring you went on the "Loop-D-Loop"), and trying to win a prize at one of the games for whatever girl I had a crush on that year (whom shall remain nameless).

The cannery
I worked at the cannery several years during the corn season in the fall. The first year I ran the little lab in the back that tested the loads of corn that were brought in, primarily for moisture content to see if the load would be used for "cream style" (water was added so the dryer corn was used) or "whole kernel" (no water was added so the more moist corn went here). We also recorded percentages of bird-pecks and worms, which factored into how much the growers were paid. One year I was the "Retort man" who cooked the corn in these giant retort pressure cookers. I remember a friend of my dad's, who grew up in Payette, saying the Retort man was admired by the female cannery workers, which help motivate you to stand over the cookers where the temperature was 20-30 degrees hotter than the current air temperature.

The high school fire

Before the fire
In 1956 there was a serious fire at the high school. It was in the evening and much of the town gathered across the street to watch. As a result of this fire the 3rd floor was completely destroyed and much of the building was damaged. As a result of the fire many high school classes were moved to the junior high, some of the junior high classes moved to the elementary schools, and many of the elementary school classes moved to churches and other locations. My 4th grade class was held in the armory, which was really cool with the tanks and all. Oddly, I remember listening to the Everly Brothers sing Wake Up a Little Suzie and Elvis doing Hound Dog on a radio at the armory. Midway through the year everything shifted back to its original locations. About the only part of the 3rd floor that survived the fire was the old band room (a new band room and ag shop were located in a new building behind the high school later). When I started band in 6th grade at Eastside Elementary, which was located next to the high school, we practiced in that 3rd floor room. I think I also had a math class in that same room at one time (possibly in junior high, which shared space with the high school), with a Russian teacher named Miss Kutkowski.

Mr. Johnson
My favorite teacher at PHS was James R. Johnson. When I was a Freshman, instead of Algebra, I took Advanced Math from Mr. Johnson. One of the things we studied was number systems. He fabricated this very amusing story about explorers in South America coming across a tribe of people who had 3 fingers on each hand instead of 5, so their number system was based on 6 (apparently our number system is based on 10 because you can count to 10 on your fingers). We designed a number system based on 6, with different symbols for the digits (this was in 1962 but I can still remember they consisted of ). We created mathematical tables for addition, subtraction, multiplication and division, and did many exercises with these and even had tests. I found Mr. Johnson very stimulating, and he created a strong interest in mathematics (this really paid off on my math SATs for college). I also had Mr. Johnson for Chemistry and Physics, so I guess I had him for more classes than any other teacher at PHS.

Mrs. Driscoll
A crazy incident that happened to me in high school involved Mrs. Inez Driscoll, whom most (all?) of us had for English as Sophomores. One time she sent me to the principal's office as discipline and forgot she had done so. Mrs. Driscoll was explaining synonyms and antonyms to the class and she said, "Write this down. Synonyms are words which mean the opposite, and Antonyms are words which mean the same." I immediately knew she had said it backwards, so being the bold, assertive (argumentative) student that I was I said, "Mrs. Driscoll, you said it wrong. Synonyms are words which mean the SAME, and Antonyms are words which mean the OPPOSITE." She said, "Eric, be quiet. I am teaching this class." We went back and forth a few times and she finally said, "Go to the office! Now!" I left the classroom and went to the principal's office, and when I walked in Mr. Todd (the principal) said, "Eric, now what are you in here for?" (Mr. Todd and I fought many battles!) I expained how she had said it backwards, and he agreed with me so he and I walked back to Mrs. Driscoll's classroom to straighten it out. When we walked in she said, "Eric! Where have you been?" (She had forgotten the incident already.) I reminded her that she had sent me to the office and she said, "Sit down. OK class, let's continue." Mr. Todd (in one the few instances of him EVER being on my side) said, "Mrs. Driscoll, Eric says you and he disagree about the definitions of Synonyms and Antonyms. Can you give us the definitions please." Mrs. Driscoll says, "Well of course—Synonyms are words which mean the same, and Antonyms are words which mean the opposite." Mr. Todd says, "That's right. Eric, sit down." I am very exasperated and I say, "That's not what you said last time! Class—I know you all wrote down what she said in your notebooks and I know you will have it backwards. Would someone please repeat what she said the first time." I got no response from my classmates (nobody was going to stand up to Mrs. Driscoll), so I had to humbly sit down and pretend that I was the one who was wrong. Despite our clashes I enjoyed having Mrs. Driscoll as a teacher because she was such a character.

Sports
I went out for football in 8th grade (1961), the first year the junior high had a team. We started out wearing equipment that the school must
have had stored for decades, because the helmets were leather with no face guards, and the shoulder pads where pretty flimsy (we got modern equipment before our first game). I still remember George Cordes getting knocked out cold in head-on tackling practice, which caused several to quit the team, and all of us to question our decision to play this dangerous sport. I played football for several years in high school. I was a 2nd string center. In the final 2 weeks of summer before school started the football practices were twice-a-day, something they may have discontinued for health reasons. As a center I attended the practice for the backs, which consisted of hiking the ball to them so they could run their plays, instead of the linesman practices which included a lot of blocking drills. The farm boys would not be able to come to these because they had to work on their family farms, so when the first game came after school started they wouldn't be eligible (by state law?) to play because they hadn't attended enough practices. This could have put us at a big disadvantage, not having some of our big hulking linesmen, but I presume the towns we played had the same restrictions. As a Freshman my physical size was larger than average and I could pass for older wearing a uniform and helmet. At some of these early season games the varsity coach (Clabaugh?) asked some of us to suit up at the varsity games and sit on the bench to make the team look like it had more players. I don't think any of us played but we must have felt honored to do this. I remember one game we had with Fruitland we had practiced a trick play where between plays 3 people would run to the sideline to confer with the coaches, then only 2 would run back to the huddle, and the 3rd guy would stand just inbounds. When the ball was hiked the 3rd guy, whom nobody saw, would be in the open to receive a pass and score an easy touchdown. We rehearsed this play several times during the week, then when we played Fruitland they pulled this same play against us on the first play of the game! We should have been very disappointed for their easy touchdown, but the poor guy (whom many of us knew and shall remain nameless) dropped the ball. I think that play is illegal now (perhaps it was then also). I went out for basketball as a Freshman and they had the Freshmen and Sophomores practice together the first few weeks. Then they said 2 Freshmen would be selected to play on the Junior Varsity team (Terry Strong and I were picked) and the rest would be on a Freshmen team. I guess I looked good on the practice drills because I was not that outstanding as a player. Going on the JV team as a Freshman turned out to be a mistake because I spent the season sitting on the bench, and when I was a Sophomore and competed again for the JV team I had little experience and was out-performed by my fellow Sophomores, who had played a lot on the Freshman team the previous year, so I sat on the bench for another year. That was the last year I played b-ball. I was also on the golf team throughout high school, where I was 2nd flight behind Dennis Carson. I haven't played golf since and probably stink now. I also did a lot of skiing, but PHS didn't have a ski team, just a ski club that took a school bus up to Brundage Mountain near McCall every week. I also skied a lot at Bogus Basin outside Boise, and they had night skiing, which I really enjoyed.

Key Club
For several years in high school I was a member of the Key Club, a "student-led organization that teaches leadership through serving others" and a part of the Kiwanis International family. In addition to its local activities there were yearly conventions, sometimes in other states. I went to the convention in Salt Lake City as a sophomore and the one in Ogden, Utah, as a senior. These were really fun, taking a long bus trip with friends (including a stop at a truck stop in Bliss, Idaho, where we shoplifted), and staying in a hotel with a bunch of other high school kids. Of course one of the big thrills of these conventions was being away from home on a trip to another city.

Boys State
In the summer before my senior year I attended Boys State, a one-week event at BJC (now BSU). Being away from home (and mom and dad's supervision) for a week was quite a thrill. We stayed in the dorms and elected members to a state legislature that met and passed some laws. I didn't run for office but I had a blast, including meeting a girl named Kathy from Borah High at a dance whom I dated throughout my senior year, and I went to Borah's prom with her. Some of the guys I met there would later become friends when I went to college at the University of Idaho the next year.

Somebody created this really cool page on Facebook to share Payette memories.

You know you grew up in Payette, Idaho if you remember this.....

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Links

(see more at Idaho links)

Class of '66

Wynn White Photography – Wynn White

Vandyke Notes – Wynn's article on using the Vandyke process

Wynn's Gallery at Profotos.com

Wynn's albums at Clubphoto.com – some family photos here

Skipio's – Skip Cockerum

Mogensen Land – Mike Mogensen

Cheryl K. Shurtleff – Cheryl Shurtleff

ART in FLUX – Cheryl Shurtleff

Cheryl's faculty page at BSU

Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall – Make a virtual rubbing of Scott Flint's name

Health Enhancement: A Journey to Wellness – Mike and Lyla Aldrich

Curb and Vent Manufacturing – Mike Frazier

PENCELAND.com – Eric Pence (you are here now)

Other classes

Payette Class of 67 – this reunion site was created by Tom Zumwalt and has many great photos

Payette High School Class of 1982

L and S Enterprises (fun·and·fab.com) – Linda Barrie (class of '

65)

Payette High School Classes Of 1980 - 1989 – a beautiful website

Payette

City of Payette – the town website

Street map

Looking up main street ¹

Payette Chamber of Commerce

Payette Schools

Payette History

Payette County Idaho GenWeb Project – great site with lots of historical and current information

Boomerang – about the founding of the town

Early Mayors of Payette

Payette County Photo Album – more old photos of Payette

Peter Pence biography – my great grandfather, a Payette pioneer

McCain Student Articles – the work of former 7th and 8th grade students from McCain Middle School

Payette High School Fire of 1956 – this event caused many students to attend school in other locations one year

McCain Middle School History Quiz – many of these questions relate to our old high school building that became the middle school

Payette High School Class Lists 1960-1970

History of Payette schools

Other

The Portia Club

Bob Dye's Ontario Armory Album – 60s Rock & Roll and lots of photos (temporarily disabled but Bob says he plans on putting it back)

City of Fruitland

New Plymouth, Idaho

Presque Isle High School Class of 1982 Reunion Site – the best reunion site I have seen

Wy'East High--HOME – another great high school website

Payette on AmericanTowns.com

Payette Video Clips – people have added videos here, some that play larger on YouTube if you click on them

Also see Childhood associations on my Friends page.

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In Memoriam

Several of our classmates have passed away since high school.
If you have further information you wish to contribute, or you want to write something about any of them here, please contact me.

Janice Adams 2004*
Janice attended the 35th reunion in 2001.
John Brotherton

Letha Brown 1990*
Frank Crowder 1981*

Stacey Dewey 1972*, car accident, McCall
Stacey was a good friend of mine in high school.
He is buried at the Payette Riverside cemetery.
Scott Flint 1967, Vietnam
Scott is listed on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington, DC,
at Panel 19E - Line 117 (here is a pencil rubbing I made),
Here is his profile (with photo I uploaded) on the VVMF Virtual Wall.
He is buried at the Payette Riverside cemetery.

Warren Meador
Keith Reitz 1970, Vietnam
Keith is listed on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington, DC,
at Panel 13W - Line 101.
Here is his profile on the VVMF Virtual Wall.
Finished high school in Stotts City, MO.

Tim Moss 1989, Loma Prieta earthquake
Tim was in the class of 1968 but he was one of my best
childhood friends and I want to honor him here.
This photo is from our 1966 yearbook when he was a sophomore.

* I obtained some of the dates of death at these sites

– SSDI
– FamilySearch.org

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Classmates' information

Here is a list of the people in the PHS class of 1966 and some additional information. Please contact me with any updates you want to make.
I am trying to present the info in a way that won't violate your privacy or get you spammed.

¹ Click on Street View to see actual location.

	Friday night . . .


	Saturday . . .
	At the Ontario Armory

	Saturday night . . .

	Here are links to a bunch of Facebook profiles of PHS classmates. I have added most of these as Facebook friends so there has been some exchange of information. Many I did not know at PHS and most I haven't seen since high school, but it is fun to use Facebook to interact and catch up some. Some left Payette before graduating but I have listed them in the class they were in when they lived in Payette. It is interesting to see where people have settled down, and I am always surprised to see that I am one of the very few that has come to the East coast (I have lived in metro-Boston since 1973, when I came here for college, so I an definitely an "Easterner" now). I have tried to include the names from high school to some that have changed below to make them more easily identifiable, and hopefully I have not made any mistakes. I'm not always sure so please contact me if you see an error.
	In Facebook there are a couple of things that old friends would like to find in your profile . . . A recent photo Where you currently live List "Payette High School" under Education in your profile to help other classmates find you
	You might need to log on to Facebook for the links below to work fully.

	An 8th grade group on the steps in front of the gym (names below picture)
	8th grade band on the steps in front of the gym
	On the steps in front of the gym, 1966
	A group of us in the Kiwanis Park, 1966


	1st grade Miss Hisa	2nd grade Mrs. Hickerson	2nd grade Mrs. Schwartz	3rd grade Mrs. Barrett	4th grade Mrs. Hill	5th grade Mrs. Betts	6th grade Mrs. Williams

	* I obtained some of the dates of death at these sites
	– SSDI – FamilySearch.org