It was a slow day at work when I was "surfing the Internet", instead of doing whatever it was that I was supposed to be doing. I stumbled across the name of Armand Henault, who had once signed in to the City of Worcester's Online Guest Book on their Internet web page. It was obviously the same guy that I've known since we were pre-schoolers, growing up on Main Street in South Grafton. I sent him some e-mail to say hello, and we started exchanging messages on a regular basis. It was Armand who initially inquired about a reunion, being our 25th anniversary.
When I mentioned this to my good friend John Ledoux, he offered to help me put it all together. So, we had a reunion committee of 2, with Armand as an honorary member. After making some preliminary plans, we put an article in the Grafton News. Very soon, Mary Jane Castonguay, Laurie Croteau, Carol Stankevicus, Diane Pichette, and Diana Lavalley came on board and gave us a hand. Armand mentioned that Alison Comey had compiled an extensive collection of period music. So when we asked, she readily agreed to put some tapes together, to play during the social hour of the reunion.
The Internet also played a big role in finding a lot of classmates. John Swift's company, Banyan Systems, has a web page that is similar to a nation-wide White Pages in your telephone book. Having only partial information on some of our classmates, we were able to plug in what info we had, and instantaneously get back a list of people who matched. For example, some one told us Peter Babowitch was "somewhere in Iowa". In a mouse click, we had his address and telephone number before us!
We weren't all that successful finding everyone on the Internet. Do you have any idea how many Brenda Mason's there are in the United States? Somehow, we lost site of the fact that Henry Nelson's parents are still in North Grafton. But we did find a Henry E. Nelson on Cape Cod. So that's where we sent the invitation. We promptly got a reply, indicating that he was not the Henry Nelson we were looking for. This gentleman even went to the trouble to look up all the other Henry Nelson's for us on the Cape!
It's been a lot of fun catching up with old friends as we plan this reunion; be it in person, by U. S. Mail, or through e-mail. We hope you enjoy our 25th Reunion as much as we have putting it all together.
Best regards,
Joe Kuras
