High School Reunion Could be Largest in State

It was the decade of Woodstock, the Vietnam War, the Beatles, President Kennedy's assassination, Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination, the Apollo moon landing, Elvis Presley and the first Super Bowl.

The 1960s was a big decade, and the "Tigers" are hoping to hold a big reunion - one that includes members of Roger Ludlowe High School's graduating classes from 1960 through 1969.

"We've contacted about 700 right now," Town Building Official James Gilleran, a 1965 Ludlowe High graduate, said this afternoon. "By the weekend, we will have contacted around 1,500."

Roger Ludlowe High School was in the building that now houses Fairfield Ludlowe High School from 1963 to 1987. In 1987, the Board of Education closed Roger Ludlowe High School and moved its students to Andrew Warde High School on Melville Avenue, which was then renamed Fairfield High School. The town reopened Ludlowe High in 2003, but changed its name to Fairfield Ludlowe High School, and the old Andrew Warde High School and Fairfield High School was renamed Fairfield Warde High School.

James Lee, a Fairfield attorney and 1965 graduate of Roger Ludlowe High School, said Ludlowe High was in what is now Tomlinson Middle School until the fall of 1963 and that the high school moved to Unquowa Road for the 1963-64 school year. "He and I were classmates in the Class of 1965," Lee said of Gilleran, "and we spent our first two years in the old building and the next two years in the new building, or what was then the new building."

William Fortune, a 1965 RLHS graduate who plans to attend Ludlowe's '60s reunion on Sept. 10 and 11, recalled record hops in the high school's auditorium; the rivalry between Ludlowe and Andrew Warde High School; and hanging out with classmates at the Q Room, a former downtown billiards hall, the Duchess Restaurant on the Post Road, Junior's in Bridgeport and the Crest in Westport.

Fortune said so many Ludlowe High students used to hang out at the Duchess that a special cop was assigned to throw them out if they weren't eating or drinking. Fortune said he was at Duchess in early 1964 when he heard girls' screaming in the restaurant's parking lot and went to see what was happening. "They were listening to the Beatles on the radio," he said.

Gilleran figures at least 3,000 people graduated from RLHS in the 1960s and he has the ambitious goal of informing all of them of Ludlowe High's 1960s' reunion, to be held Sept. 10 and 11 at the Fairfield Theatre Company on Sanford Street and at the Klein Memorial Auditorium on Fairfield Avenue in Bridgeport.

Fortune, who organized Ludlowe reunions in the past, said he found that about a third of the class would go to a reunion at the drop of a hat, another third didn't want to be bothered and another third couldn't be found. He said it was important to identify one member from each class who would be devoted to finding classmates and informing them of the reunion.

Gilleran's been busy doing a lot of work so far.

On Friday, information about the reunion is going out via e-mail to about 800 people Gilleran's found on www.classmates.com and information about the reunion also is posted on that Web site and www.facebook.com. Gilleran said he's asking everyone he contacts to tell two classmates about the reunion who aren't listed on www.classmates.com and to direct them to the reunion's Web site, www.rlhs60s.com, for information.

"I know 300 people who are not on Classmates...We're going to reach almost all of them," Gilleran said, adding that he has a fellow RLHS 60s' alum on the West Coast who's contacting graduates living out there.

The Tigers' 1960s reunion won't be like the typical reunion in size or in scope. Gilleran's planning to hold the reunion over two days, and he's flying Chad & Jeremy, a 1960s band, from England to perform the night of Sept. 10, a Friday, in the Fairfield Theatre Company. Jay Stollman's band also will perform Friday night at FTC after Ludlowe graduates mingle at an open bar and enjoy free food, Gilleran said.

On the afternoon of Sept. 11, Gilleran plans to set up a tent over FTC's parking lot and invite artisans and local restaurants before a Saturday night concert by the Fab Faux at the Klein Auditorium. "Any of the reunion people, after the show, we can hang out until they throw us out," Gilleran said.

Gilleran figures tickets for Friday will be $100 and from $50 to $80 for Saturday, depending on where people want to sit in the Klein.  "You get the two days for $150. That's not too shabby," he said.

Fortune said it makes sense to hold the reunion over two days because Ludlowe alum who live out of state won't want to fly in for the reunion only to turn around and fly back a few hours later.

The reunion's Web site features a song by Dick Grass & The Hoppers, a local rock band from the 1960s that featured the late Bobby Lindsey, who lived on North Pine Creek Road in Fairfield and who sang in the choir at St. Thomas Church and in RLHS' choir. Gilleran said Lindsey had "a gorgeous voice" and would later sing in Las Vegas under the stage name Anvil Roth and in a band called Chirco.

Gilleran said he thought up the idea of a 1960s reunion for Roger Ludlowe High School about three years ago after he attended his graduating class' 40th reunion. "After you get 40, the attendance kind of dwindles," he said.

As of this afternoon, Gilleran said he's gotten word that 250 graduates and their guests plan to attend the reunion, and it's still three months away. "I expect between 400 and 500 for Friday night," he said of Sept. 10.

All ticket sales for the reunion will be through the Fairfield Theatre Company's Web site, www.fairfieldtheatre.org, and any profits will go to FTC's Fairfield Theatre for the Performing Arts, Gilleran said.

A snapshot of Fairfield in the 1960s:

First Selectman: John J. Sullivan (1959 to 1983)

Population: 46,183 (1960); 56,487 (1970)

High Schools: Roger Ludlowe High School (Tigers); Andrew Warde High School (Eagles)

High School colors: RLHS (orange and black); AWHS (maroon and white.)

Town Budget: $12.4 million (fiscal year 1965-66)

Board of Education Budget: $6.7 million (fiscal year 1965-66)

Notable Town Facilities Built in the 1960s: North Stratfield School, Jennings School, Timothy Dwight School, Roger Sherman School, Fairfield Woods Branch Library.

Notable Fairfield Stores from the 1960s that Have Closed: The Fairfield Store, Mercurio's, Henry's Men's Shop, Gene's Boot Shop, Clampett's, Fairway Beef, Stratfield IGA Supermarket.

Notable Stores Still Around: Rawley's, Blinn's, Fairfield Stationers, Switzer's Pharmacy.