'57, '58 St. Raymond students gather for reunion

Twenty graduates of the St. Raymond School classes of 1957 and 1958 and their spouses gathered Saturday for a reunion.

The 50th and 51st reunions began with a tour of their alma mater, led by the Rev. Bernie Pietrzak, followed by a Mass and then the party adjourned to the Inverness Country Club.

"It was so much more than I even expected," said Mary Hagan Wajer, a member of the organizing committee and resident of Prospect Heights. "We laughed, we cried, we had so much fun."

The class of 1957 was the first graduating class of the parochial grade school and the members of the class were only there one year, according to Wajer. Her class the following year attended seventh and eighth grades in the school.

"Between the two classes, there were 75 graduates," Wajer explained. "But we couldn't find them all. We were happy to get 16 members of the class of 1958 and four members of the class of 1957. In fact, including the class of 1957 in our reunion was a late thought, so we didn't have a lot of time to find them."

The alumni particularly enjoyed looking at their old classroom. One graduate of the class of 1957 even remembered hiding a time capsule under the floor level bookcases in the classroom and got down on the floor to see if he could find it. But, someone had obviously cleaned under there in the last 50 years and it was nowhere to be found, according to Wajer.

Those who organized the reunion with Wajer were Cathie Leider Burns, Wayne Palach, George Sullivan, Jill Schroeder Wosneski, Sue Engelson Flanigan and Mary Ann Trebat Breitfelder. Mass was celebrated by the Rev. George Steinmiller of Alabama, a member of the class of 1957.

British Export: British Export, a Beatles tribute band, kicks off a monthlong exploration of British culture at the Mount Prospect Public Library, 10 S. Emerson St., by presenting the musical genius of those lads from Liverpool at 7:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 3. British Export has earned accolades as the top Beatles tribute band at "Beatlefest" events in New York and Chicago. The program is part of the Library's Cultural Month Series, "Channeling the British Isles," and is sponsored by the Elizabeth J. Clough Memorial Fund. To register, visit www.mppl.org/events or call (847) 253-5675.

Parent education: The Prospect High School Teacher-Parent Council will host a parent education program called "Substance Abuse and Use" at 7 p.m. Thursday in the Prospect Theatre, 801 W. Kensington Road, Mount Prospect.  The presentation will feature trends, signs to look for, legal and school ramifications of drug use and recovery. Representatives from Families and Adolescents in Recovery, as well as young people in recovery, will be on hand. Admission is free. Call Prospect's Dean of Students, Patricia Tedaldi-Monti, at (847) 718-5205.