The Class of 1958 celebrated its 60th anniversary with gatherings at Leo’s on Friday night and Canterbury Brook Inn on Saturday night. If you do the arithmetic, you’ll realize that the alumni were a year behind schedule. But that didn’t spoil either occasion.
Life was different in 1958. Grades 7-12 attended school in the same building. There was no superintendent. Tom Shost was the district’s highest official, and his title was “Supervising Principal.”
The 1958 yearbook listed 68 students in the senior class. They put on their own show, entitled “Pulling the Curtain” in the fall. Their yearbook included a full page ad from the Firth Carpet Company, and large ads from Seaman’s Beach in Salisbury Mills, Hulse Brothers Ford, and the Angola Roller Rink.
Cornwall won the OCIAA basketball title in 1958 and finished the year with a 13-7 record. The season ended with a loss to Suffern. The football team did not have a good year, but Tony Wands and Richard Blair earned berths on the All County team. In baseball, Tom Douglass was the Dragons’ most valuable player.
There was a good mix of activities for students in 1958. They could join the Hall Patrol or Junior Red Cross. After school, they could do ceramics or try modern dance or art and cartoons. There were clubs for future teachers or future nurses.
There were 18 alumni at the Canterbury Brook Inn on the evening of Oct. 19. We didn’t ask them why they waited a year to get together. They promptly mentioned their unique role in Cornwall history. They were the first class to graduate from the high school on Main Street. Their predecessors had graduated in a joint ceremony on the grounds of Town Hall.
The Class of ‘58 entered the new building in September of their senior year. Sixty-one years later, Tom Douglass made an important “then and now” distinction. “Our address was Cornwall,” he said emphatically, “not New Windsor.”