TASSS 50th anniversary reunion draws more than 1,000 Griffins

Thomas A. Stewart Secondary School was packed with alumni on Friday night as people gathered for the 50th anniversary reunion of the modernist school on the Otonabee River.

More than 1,000 people are expected for the reunion.

“Our goal was to fill the city with Griffins – and we’ve absolutely done that,” said reunion organizer Meredith Pilley at the opening ceremony in the school cafeteria Friday night.

Pilley, who graduated in 1987 from TASSS, said alumni have filled Peterborough hotels all weekend.

They’re coming from across North America and as far away as Australia and Dubai to attend, she said.

Saturday the festivities are ongoing: the school is open to visitors from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

There are rooms filled with memorabilia, as well as alumni sports games (such as volleyball and hockey), and a Mingling Room where people can hang out.

There will also be a Petes home game at the Memorial Centre starting at 4:05 p.m. Saturday, where the long relationship between the Petes and TASSS will be celebrated.

In the evening there’s a dance at The Venue (8 p.m. to 2 a.m.; all 600 tickets are sold out).

Pilley approached the principal at TASSS more than a year ago with the idea for a reunion. Since then she reconnected with classmate Elaine Simmons, who decided she wanted to help organize the reunion.

On Friday night there were many moments of laughter and hugging in the school halls as people met for the first time in years.

On the football field, former players and cheerleaders high-fived the junior and senior football team just before their games.

“That’s tear-jerking,” Simmons said.

On Friday at the Peterborough Golf and Country Club, about 65 former teachers gathered for their own reunion; Pilley said the oldest attendee was 98.

Coun. Henry Clarke – the first deputy mayor – spoke at the opening ceremonies on Friday about enrolling at TASSS in September 1967.

It was a brand-new building then, he said, and the teachers were “absolutely phenomenal”.

Rose Kitney, the public school trustee for Peterborough, was a classmate of Clarke’s.

Kitney said the modernist architecture of the building - designed by architect Eb Zeidler - was widely considered too modern at the time.

“The idea of a high school having air conditioning or a swimming pool – we just didn’t do that, in the 60s,” she said.

Hiawatha First Nation Chief Laurie Carr was also invited to give remarks; she went to TASSS for Grade 9 and 10, she said, and finished high school in Cobourg.

Carr said TASSS has provided “a sense of community” for students from Hiawatha, over the decades.

Curve Lake First Nation Chief Phyllis Williams also spoke, telling the crowd about how students from her community now take the bus to TASSS (since the high school in Lakefield, where Curve Lake students have attended for years, has closed).

“I embrace this new relationship,” she said.

Peterborough MPP Jeff Leal also brought greetings, as did Mary Smith, the mayor of Selwyn Township.

As groups of old friends posed for selfies, Donna Clarke – the wife of Coun. Henry Clarke - said she didn’t really know her future husband back in the days when she was in Grade 9 and he was in Grade 13.

Henry was just some tall guy who once held the door open for her as she was leaving home ec with bolts of fabric in her arms, as she recalled. It took another four decades for them to meet again – and to marry.

Donna Clarke also said the design of the building seeming too modern for some people’s taste, in the early days: “Oh it was controversial – the air conditioning was going to spoil the children!”

Yet the building still looks great today, she said – it hasn’t changed much over the years.

“It’s just wonderful to have a building like this to hold all these memories.”

NOTE: See more photographs on Page A6 and see related coverage on Page D1.