In response to my request for information on Wildcats who served at Pearl Harbor during the attack 55 years ago, I received a response from my classmate, Nancy Hardwick Parrish, ’76:

“I don’t know if it counts, but James C. Hardwick lived through that fateful Dec. 7 as a shipmate on the U.S. Honolulu. He was not a Woodrow graduate, but lucky for me and Susan, Janet, James E., Marjorie and grandchild Madeline, we were born and got to be Woodrow graduates.”

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Lucky for us, too, Nancy.

All these Hardwicks made outstanding contributions to Woodrow. And Mrs. James C. Hardwick served as PTA president.

In preference to my observation of two Japanese ships docked directly across from the U.S. Arizona Memorial last summer, Nancy writes:

“Dad drives a Toyota Camry with a Pearl Harbor survivor license plate – pretty ironic, don’t you think?”

My neighbor on Woodcrest, C.R. “Bob” Wilson, sent a letter to tell me that U.S. Congressman Sam Johnson graduated in 1947, not 1948 as reported in a previous column.

“Both Sam – he was known as Robert in high school – and his wife, the former Shirley Melton, graduated with me in May 1947,” he writes.

Bob says that there may be some confusion because “an unusual situation occurred between these two classes.”

“A significant number of the class of 1947 elected to stay over and graduate with the class of 1948,” he writes.

Unfortunately, many of the holdovers took class officer favorites and cheerleader honors away from the juniors, Bob writes.

He went on to say that the class of 1948 had its own hero, Capt. Alfred Haynes, the United pilot who saved more than 100 lives in a fiery crash landscaping a few years ago in an Iowa wheat field.

Another Cafeteria Casualty

Highland Park has become another cafeteria casualty. Formerly owned and run by Woodrow’s Lovvorn and Yates families, the new owners shuttered the serving line just before Thanksgiving.

In response to my lament a few months ago over the closing of the Lakewood Wyatt’s, Durene Heed Sinclair, ’43 writes:

“The first Wyatt’s Cafeteria (inside the Lakewood grocery store) had a special: half a fried chicken, mashed potatoes, peas, slaw, and peach cobbler for 39 cents. Perhaps it was a Sunday special – around 1939.”

Sounds pretty good. As for me, I shall miss the baked eggplant at Wyatt’s and the smothered steak at HPC.

Oh well, Happy New Year!