Tennent Alumni Take One Last Look

Hundreds of former William Tennent High School students turned out Thursday evening to walk the aging halls of their alma mater one last time.

The final walk-through was organized by alumni, district staff and school board member Thomas Reinboth. A Facebook page for the event garnered thousands of fans and more than 500 people said they would attend the event. School board member Jane Lynch said toward the end of the evening about 500 former students had checked in.

“Once it was on Facebook [the walk-through] just kept growing and growing and growing,” Lynch said.

Groups of former classmates filled the hallways and empty classrooms to share memories from when they attended the high school, which is set to be demolished by spring of 2012.

Warren Varker, class of 1975, said with a smile, “Coming back for this, it just makes you feel old.”

Varker, who now lives in Doylestown, chatted with a group of other alumni, many with whom he graduated high school.

Other groups of former students discussed senior pranks, such as taking the school’s sign, placing a cow on the third floor and painting the paw prints that led up the school’s driveway pink.

“There are lots of memories here,” said Erin Randis, class of 2000, who fondly recalls using plastic lunch trays to sled down the schools large hill after snowstorms.

Former students of all ages, who found out about the event through social media, came out to get a parting look at the building that helped shape them into the people they are today.

“I’m sad to see Tennent go. I loved school,” said Cindy Kirsch, who graduated in one of the first classes to attend the building after it’s construction in 1973.

“Try it, 14-0-28,” one former student told her husband as he tried to open her old locker.

Other students such as, Joe Murray, , walked the hallways and recalled stories from their recent good times at the school.

The new high school which is being built on the side and in the back of the 1973 Tennent is set to open in September, said Superintendent Dr. Jennifer Cressman.

A surplus equipment sale will be held at the school on August 13 starting at 9 a.m. at the former high school. The district will auction off refrigerators, book shelves, old desk, TVs, carts, a drill press, carts, and hundreds of other items.

Just days later power will be shut-off to the school and asbestos abatement will take place and then demolition work will begin, according to Assistant Superintendent William Gretton.

“I thought I would remember so much more. I had such great memories here,” Lisa (Petrov) Brown, class of 1988, remarked as she left the school.