• Tara Bozick •
• Originally published July 26, 2008 at 11:46 p.m., updated July 26, 2008 at 11:46 p.m.

The sisters opened up the 1963 Stingaree yearbook and pointed to the faces they saw in the crowd Saturday night.

Grady Yarbrough Jr. saw the women and joined in the fun as those with names toward the end of the alphabet always hang out together, he said, remembering assigned seats.

“Let me see where we are,” he said, taking the yearbook from Lupe and Gloria Ybarra, now Lupe Perez and Gloria Casas.

“Look, see her?,” Perez asked the group about a woman walking by. “There she is,” she said, pointing at her senior photo.

The sisters shared the 1963 graduating class but lost the yearbook.

They bought one at the Victoria Community Center during the Lost in the ‘60s Mega Reunion, where all 10 classes from ‘60 to ‘69 were welcome.

Nearly 1,200 Victoria High School alumni and guests came out to greet old friends Saturday, event coordinator Gloria Fric said.

Everyone exchanged hugs and examined old class photos, trying to recognize people with magnifying glasses in hand.

The ‘60s classes grew up dancing, Yarbrough, who now lives in Boerne, said.

He remembers they would dance every weekend at places like Club Westerner or Schroeder Dance Hall.

Sunny and the Sunliners with their hit “Talk to Me” was all the rage in the Tejano scene, Lupe and her husband Steve Perez recalled.

It was a safer time, Casas said. She didn’t lock her door and could walk miles to school safely.

That generation seemed closer than today’s teenagers, Ray Williams from the ‘63 class said. He and the five friends he would fish in Seadrift with back in high school still get together every year for fishing.

Although the Vietnam War was going on and the draft scared the boys, Williams most remembers the ‘57 Chevy’s and driving to the Corral for a couple Cokes and chatting.

What about the dancing?

“When ‘Twist and Shout’ comes on, don’t let it scare you,” wife Beverly Williams said. “Everybody will jump up on the floor and twist and shout.

Williams agreed, adding it was like the class song.

The dancing began and ended with Danny Everitt from the class of ‘68 playing “Old Friends.” Everitt now lives in The Woodlands.

The song about friends coming back into town was fitting, Fric said, listening to her first-grade boyfriend.

“We’re just good at getting together and we love to party,” Fric said. “A lot of people say reunions are dead. We are alive and kickin’.”

Tara Bozick is a reporter for the Advocate. Contact her at 361-580-6504 or tbozick@vicad.com, or comment on this story at www.VictoriaAdvocate.com.

• Print
• •
• Share
  • Share this item

    Send this to a friend

    Share on FaceBook

  • Grab the link

    Copy and paste the link:

  • Blog about it

    Blog about this page.

  • Close
• •
• Post a Comment
• •
• Favorite
• •
• Report error
  • Thank you for your submission.
    Error report or correction

    Contact name (optional) Contact phone/e-mail (optional)  

    
  • Close
• •