A centennial celebration at the Discovery Bay/Uncas School on Aug. 26 revived school-day memories for a number of its former students, including one man who attended the school 86 years ago.

The old school, which opened in 1917 on Bentley Place, was closed and pretty much forgotten for more than 20 years until Doug Breithaupt, who was a first-grade student at the school in 1964, bought the building in 1986.

Guests gathered for the reunion on a beautiful summer day to eat cake and reminisce about times fond and challenging.

John Germeau, now in his 90s, still commands the power to hold an audience with his chiseled profile and strong voice. The son of a logger and himself a veteran of WWII and the Korean War, Germeau recalled playing sports and watching school plays, standing in the same room of his boyhood memories and looking about at the book-lined shelves, the windows and the stage.

“I remember playing basketball in here,” said Germeau, gesturing to the room and audience. “Except now, this room looks so small. The stage shrunk!”

Nearly 50 former students, and their friends and family joined Germeau at the invitation of Breithaupt, who has turned it into a home while preserving the school’s character. The building is listed with the National Register of Historic Places.

Breithaupt has a strong connection to education. He is president of the College Planning Network, a nonprofit that connects students and schools with businesses and scholarship opportunities.

RAISING KIDS

“It’s a cool place to live and a great place to raise kids,” said Breithaupt, who has four children.

“I came from a logging family and returned for a visit after my marriage to [his late wife] Vicki in the mid-80s. I thought, ‘What a shame the school is nearly covered by ornamental plants,’ and decided the school ought to be saved. I made a deal directly with the school district.

“For the first 10 years, I paid the school directly. Then when we sold our Seattle home, we used the money to begin renovations. We had to remove asbestos, replace the roof, electric, plumbing and insulation.”

The former school still bears its original solid maple wood plank floors from 1917. Classroom blackboards bearing writing in white chalk line the walls in Breithaupt’s master bedroom. “That was my first-grade classroom,” he said.

“Doug’s an historian – he never stopped being a student,” added Liz Quayle, Breithhaupt’s partner and cohost of the reunion.

The scent of old classrooms still lingers throughout, evoking memories of chalk dust, sweat, excitement and obedience to rules.

Germeau and other former students fondly recalled their favorite teacher, George Perkins, who taught fifth through eighth grades from the 1930s until he was drafted for WWII.

“He was beyond his time,” said Marjorie Cochran, formerly Marjorie Udd, her face lighting up at the recollection. “George Perkins taught us extra classes, like basket weaving, percussion and oil painting. Our best times were at Christmas – you have to recall that this was in the years after the Great Depression and we didn’t have much – Mr. Perkins gave us bags of candy with an orange inside! We performed plays that far surpassed anything you’d expect to see in a little school like ours.”

RECESS AND DISCIPLINE

Cochran, who was a student from 1941 until 1947, recalled the school having to close for a while to house soldiers during the war. Her friend Jo Stover was a student from 1936 to 1939. The two women sat together at the reunion in the great room and laughed as they shared memories.

“Marjorie was a little girl who always sat in my lap,” Stover said. “My dad was a dairy man. I milked cows with my brother Johnny after school.”

Siblings John, Helen and Mike Gatchet were students during the 1950s. Their teacher was Mrs. Northrup, a strict, no-nonsense woman.

John Gatchet, the oldest of the three, recalled having a hard time learning to read and said he was one of the boys mentioned earlier who remained hiding in the woods when the cowbell was rung to summon students back in from recess.

“Because I struggled with reading, recess was my favorite subject,” he said. “You know, there was a closet in one of the classrooms, and I was taken in there to be hit by a strap or by a ruler across the palm.”

“Shh,” said his sister, Helen. “Mrs. Northrup’s daughter is standing over there and she might hear you.”

Gatchet laughed and said that was the way discipline of the time was meted out, and he grew up none the worse for it and went on to earn a master’s degree and become superintendent of Seventh-day Adventist schools.

While the siblings are retired now, they recalled picking salal to earn money for college and having a party-line phone. The salal was processed in Quilcene and sent to the East Coast for use in floral displays. Their next-door neighbor Mr. Jorganson wrote gardening columns for the Port Townsend Leader.

Helen Beacraft, daughter of the aforementioned teacher Ruby Northrup, recalled her mom’s tenure as a teacher from 1949 to 1964.

“Dad was a custodian and bus driver, and Mom taught three grades,” Beacraft said. “We lived in the basement.”

Toward the end of the reunion, everyone went outside and stood on the steps for a reunion photo.

Breithaupt explained the origins of the school’s unusual name, Uncas: “The name ‘Uncas’ reflects the community that formed just south of Discovery Bay in the later half of the 19th century. The post mistress was a big fan of the author James Fenimore Cooper and her favorite character was Uncas from ‘The Last of the Mohicans.’ She selected that name for the community. The name survives today on West and East Uncas roads. After WWII, the name of the school was changed to the Discovery Bay School as the communities of Uncas, Fairmont and Maynard had merged into the community of Discovery Bay.”

Kate Poss is a freelance writer who lives on Whidbey Island.