Ronald Sanders stood at the podium, urging his former classmates to grab a seat so the official 50th class reunion for R.E. Hunt High School could begin.
About 60 of the 155 members had gathered in what used to be the band hall at the old high school, which is now R.E. Hunt Museum and Cultural Center. Included in that number was Sanders, who still sported the impressive Afro he had 50 years ago.
All things change, some more than others, and Sanders’ Afro looked as though he had just walked under a flour sifter. No matter. It’s still “outta sight,” to borrow a phrase of that era.
Back in the corner of the room, a group of three or four men declined Sanders’s invitation to find a seat on the basis of “we’re stretching our legs.” Among that group was Donald Sanders, Ronald’s twin brother, who’s been living in San Francisco for the past 33 years and is a semi-retired psychologist.
Ronald’s choice to linger near the back of the room – he seemed to be observing more than participating – could be explained as a function of his profession. Psychologists listen, observe, take mental notes.
But there was another reason, too.
“To tell you the truth, I don’t recognize half these people,” he quietly confessed. “I get back, maybe every four or five years, so I’ve lost touch with most of my old classmates. It’s nice, though. Fun.”
The Class of ’67 spent the weekend renewing old friendships, comparing notes on the truly important things – children, grandchildren and trying to remember who was still alive, who wasn’t and who could be accounted for either way.
Esther Hairston made the 11-hour drive from her home in Muskegon, Michigan. She left Columbus for Michigan shortly after graduating from Hunt, partly to babysit her older sister’s new baby and partly because she had heard another of her classmates, Barbara Raspberry, was headed to Muskegon for college. A familiar face in a far-way city eased Hairston’s mind about the move.
“She was talking about going to Muskegon Business College, which is where I ended up going when I got there,” Hairston said. “But I never did see her. I’m hoping she’s here this weekend. I’d like to know if she ever went to Michigan.”
For class members such as Hairston and Donald Sanders, the end of graduation meant leaving home for opportunities that, in the turbulent late 1960s, did not yet exist in Columbus.
Others stayed, though, including Jerry Turner, who now serves as the Hunt Museum director after 33 years as a math teacher at New Hope High School.
“It was a lot different then, the way teachers and students interacted,” said Turner, reflecting on his own experiences as both a student at Hunt and a teacher in the county. “Teachers, they were the people in the black community that were looked up to the most. We respected our teachers. They were almost like fathers or mothers to us.”
If the old high school is now a repository of history and culture for the black community in Columbus, the folks who gathered here Friday are part of the later chapters on that history. A few years after the Class of ’67 left, the schools in Columbus were integrated, 17 years after the Supreme Court’s ruling in Brown v. Board of Education or, to think about it another way, when the Hunt Class of ’67 were one-year-olds.
Hairston said she never heard much talk of integration as a teen, though, and never felt the students at Hunt were deprived.
“Our teachers had us believing we were the smartest people in the world,” she said. “And we believed it.”
With integration, came opportunities – not only access to better materials and materials – but in opening the door to a broader world.
“I never sat next to a white student until I was studying for my masters in Germany when I was stationed there in the Army,” said Donald Sanders, who graduated from Jackson State and spent six years in the military. “Everything changes.”
Yet for all that was gained through integrations, some things were lost, too, and you could hear those undertones Friday as old classmates embraced and reminisced.
Turner said Hunt was more than just a school.
“For black people, the school and the church were the two pillars of the community,” he said.
In fact, you could make the argument that Hunt High played an even more important role in strengthening the bonds of community than the church. Black residents might go to any number of churches, after all.
“But Hunt was the only black high school in the county,” Turner said. “People from Caledonia, New Hope, across the river and in the city – if you were black, you went to Hunt. Everybody knew each other. We were close. It’s not like that anymore.”
When Hunt was closed – upon integration it was converted to a middle school, eventually closed altogether and became a museum six years ago – one of the touchtones of the community passed into history.
“It’s just not like it was when we were coming up,” Turner said.
“Like I said, everything changes,” Donald Sanders said.
Except for his twin brother’s hairstyle, of course.
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected]
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 43 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.