To Life!
Then
Historic Reunion
Now
Central's 1955 classes remember another era.
BILL CARROLL
Special to the Jewish News
I
t won't be "just another high
school reunion" when the January
and June 1955 graduates of
Detroit Central High get together for
their 50th reunion Saturday, Sept. 10.
It will mark the end of an era of sorts
for Central grads in the Detroit-area
Jewish community.
That year in the mid-1950s was one
of the last times a large number of
Jews graduated from the 147-year-old
school, now being renovated in its
third location on Tuxedo Avenue at
LaSalle.
The reunion at Temple Beth El in
Bloomfield Township probably will be
the last big gathering of Jews at any
50-year Central reunion. During
major changes in demographics in the
early '50s, many Jewish families gradu-
ally moved to northwest Detroit.
Students started an exodus from
Central to attend Mumford High
School, which had opened on
Wyoming Avenue in 1949 with a 10th
grade only; some Central students
even transferred to Mumford for their
senior year.
Close to 350 Central alumni will
attend the 50th reunion, out of com-
bined January-June '55 classes of more
than 500, according to Irwin
Rabinowitz of Farmington Hills,
reunion coordinator for the third
straight decade. "About 85 percent [of
those classes] were Jewish," he said.
"There probably are no Jews at
Central now.
The venue for Saturday's reunion, a
synagogue, also is a bit unusual.
"It was a great idea to have it at
Temple Beth El," said Rabinowitz, a
Detroit pharmacist. "There have been
no repercussions among the gentile
members of our class. A number of
them said they will attend. We'll have
a buffet dinner, a disc jockey for music
— and there'll be a lot of reminiscing."
The reminiscing is bound to include
stories about Principal Thomas
("Tommy") Gunn; Mr. Magnell, an
eccentric English teacher; Mr.
Ottewell, a physics teacher who put
misbehaving students in a closet; Mr.
Beauvais, the handsome gym teacher;
Miss Delbridge, the kindly counselor,
and others.
Reunion attendees will recall Art's
Tuxedo Junction Restaurant, Mason's
Soda Shop on Linwood Avenue,
Boesky's Delicatessen on 12th Street,
the Eagle Dairy on Davison, plus the
Avalon Theater, Sandy Beach and
Friday night girls' club meetings —
that the boys infiltrated.
Central's athletic teams, the
Trailblazers, had a large share of Jewish
athletes. Our basketball teams were
great, but our football teams were just
mediocre; it got so bad that football
homecoming was scheduled as an
`away' game," quipped one '55 gradu-
ate.
More than 50 out-of-towners will
attend the reunion. Traveling the
longest distance will be Barry Ruskin,
a lawyer in Anchorage, Alaska, plus
alumni from California, Florida and
New York. Some of the better known
'55 grads are Barbara Halpern Levin,
wife of U.S. Sen. Carl Levin, D-
Mich.; pharmacist-philanthropist
Eugene Applebaum; and local retailer
Linda Varkel Dresner. One of the
Jewish faculty members in '55, Ben.
Chinitz of West Bloomfield, is expect-
ed to attend.
Sixty members of the '55 classes are
deceased "and their names will be list-
ed as a memorial," said Rabinowitz.
Four couples, who met as classmates,
later got married, including Eugene
and Elaine (Zeidman) Driker, still liv-
ing in Detroit, married for 46 years.
"The classes of '55 represented a gen-
erational change in the community,"
observed Eugene Driker, a Detroit
lawyer. "Those were the Eisenhower
years when the nation was booming and
Detroit was thriving with a population
of about 2 million people — and 1955
was the high point."
"High school was a wonderful experi-
ence for all of us," added Elaine Driker,
a retired Wayne State University execu-
tive. "I'm sure it helped set most of us
on the right course for the rest of our
lives." El
20
Then
Now
Elaine Driker
Then
Now
Eugene Driker
Then
The Central High 1955 reunion is
at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 10, at
Temple Beth El in Bloomfield
Township. For information, call
Irwin Rabinowitz, (248) 888-1470.
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9/ 8
2005
Eugene Applebaum
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Irwin Rabinowitz
Now