More than 30 members of Tecumseh High School’s graduating class of 1955 assembled for a reunion held last week in Springfield. The event, organized by longtime New Carlisle resident Don Wallace, brought together a class of people with some notable accomplishments and fond memories to share.

Wallace and nearly a dozen other graduates of the class of 1955 meet each month for a meal and to catch up on what’s going on in each other’s lives. He said the official reunion was a way to connect with others that they haven’t; seen in many years, with some coming from as far away as Florida, Colorado, and even Canada.

Herb Hayes, class of 1955, attended last week’s reunion to catch up with his classmates, saying it had been many years since he had last seen them. After graduation, Hayes, who now lives in Indian Lake, worked for Ohio Bell/AT&T in Independent Relations. He said it was through his work at Ohio Bell that he got to meet Neil Armstrong’s parents in Wapakoneta. Armstrong had just rocketed to fame through his lunar landing and Apollo mission, so the press was constantly hounding his parents. Hayes said he was assigned to travel to Wapakoneta to build a scaffolding on the Armstrongs’ property that would serve as a platform for their various media interviews with the Associated Press, Time Magazine, and more. Hayes also worked on coordinating one of President Richard Nixon’s trips to the area, collaborating with other phone companies to organize the logistics of his visit.

Hayes, originally from Donnelsville, said his mother was a cook in his school, and that she was never far away if he got into trouble at school.

John and Nancy (Baber) McCullum made a two-day drive from Atlanta to attend the reunion, which Wallace considered to be “almost heroic” in that they both have been dealing with some health afflictions. John, who graduated with the class of 1955, worked as an engineer for Boeing, and raised three children with Nancy, who graduated in 1959. The McCullums said they made the trip to catch up with their old classmates, as it had been many years since they had visited. Nancy said this reunion was “a big one” for John, noting that it was good to see so many people after so many years. John said that they were also traveling to Huber Heights before returning home to attend a large family picnic held by his wife’s sister this past weekend.

Bruce and Pat Everhart also attended the reunion, with Bruce recalling the class of 1955’s good old-fashioned troublemaking antics. He said the old high school used to have crawlspaces under the floors that spanned many classrooms. Everhart said he and several other boys would wriggle themselves into the crawlspaces and move through them, banging on the floors as they inched along. He noted that there was one teacher in particular whose classroom floors they always targeted, saying she was always good for a reaction.

Joe Ballenger of Salt Lake City reflected on his high school football career with Wallace at the reunion, recalling how if they both timed their move perfectly at the same time, that they could take down Tecumseh’s famed Wayne Embry, who went on to become the NBA’s first African American team president. Ballenger said that Embry was a “tank” in high school, standing over six feet tall and weighing more than 250 pounds. He said it was possible to take Embry down on the football field, but only if he and Wallace precisely synchronized their attack together, as their tactics were ineffective alone.

Ballenger started in the banking business soon after high school, and has worked in that field for 50 years. He said he came back for the reunion in 1980, but has not seen anyone since then. Ballenger said one of his fondest memories from High School was a fall hayride into Springfield one evening. He said it originated from the Rockway School and that many of the high school students coupled up and rode the haywagon into “the big city” of Springfield. He said a fight almost ensued between some Springfield City high-schoolers and the Tecumseh students, but that thankfully it was diffused before it escalated.

Many of the classmates at the reunion candidly said they felt it important to attend in order to see who is still living, as they fear that each year will take another member of their class. Wallace announced at the beginning of the reunion that the class of 1955 “had lost some very important people from our class.”