Hall of Fame Weekend - Dave George, 10/15/04

Is one picture really worth a thousand words? I hope so, because I can't find the words to convey what an impossibly magical and wonderful thing the Hall of Fame events last Friday and Saturday were.

So see the pictures and if you were there, savor the memories all over again, and if you missed it, turn your imagination to the "Most Vivid" setting and try to imagine how wonderful it was.

On Friday, eight of the inductees came to the school for a luncheon with OACS seniors who, on Saturday, "presented" the inductees at the dinner. My first thought when I arrived at the luncheon was one of shock. Sitting around the table were an incredible "who's who" of some of the most important and accomplished people to have ever graduated from OACS... and a bunch of high school kids. The kids were dressed up for "spirit week." One was a bloody-faced ghoul. One was wearing camouflage paint. These two flanked Norm Zigrossi, who entered the FBI during the J. Edgar Hoover era, when a limp handshake or uncreased trousers could derail a career. Other students had stars painted on their faces.

Well, I shouldn't have worried. It became instantly clear that the inductees and the students were "clicking." Although I very much wanted to introduce myself to the honorees, it took me more than an hour to meet all of them because I didn't want to interrupt all the deep conversations going on between pairs of people with two generations separating them.

Later, they were introduced to a roaring crowd in the 80-degree sunshine at an outdoor pep rally, given a tour of the school, and invited to attend the homecoming football game.

Saturday night's dinner was even better. Moving presentation speeches from eleven great seniors who were missing part of their last homecoming dance to be in the first-ever Hall of Fame dinner. Watching 150 people talking animatedly among themselves as they met long-lost friends or tried to make the most of their moments with someone they were meeting for the first time. The food, absolutely delicious and marvelously presented, was wonderful and perfect, but paled in comparison to the many human elements in the evening.

Having nothing of my own to exactly describe the weekend, I'll throw out two things that perhaps come close.

First, some of the comments from the honorees and the guests there:

• "best event at the school in many decades"
• "a weekend I'll always remember"
• "incredibly classy"
• (from someone whose parents were there) "To get thru a discussion without hearing in detail what food was served tells me the night was a hit."

The other is Simon and Garfunkel's 1981 concert in Central Park. Stepping to the microphone to address a half million people gathered to hear a concert on a beautiful September evening, Art Garfunkel looked speechless, rubbed his hands together, and finally said, "What a night!" Well, we only had 150 people on Saturday, but it took me ten minutes to make my way through the people in the school lobby and reach the gym, and once into the gym, another ten minutes to reach my father to say hi. I must have talked to 45 people in those 20 minutes.

"What a night." Indeed.