Tom Hofer recently reached out to us about posting an item of interest on our website. This certainly qualifies. Here is Tom’s note….

I am the President of the St. Pete Area (FL) Chapter of the Military Officers Assocation of America (MOAA) and I recently had the opportunity to present four $1000 scholarships to St. Pete JROTC graduates in May of this years 

In my short speech presenting the award, I noted that as a JROTC cadet, I sat in their place 59 years ago in May 1963 in St. Paul, Minnesota.  I told them that I never dreamed that my journey would include 29 yrs of military service service and an additional 10 yrs with civil service.  I emphasized that this could be their journey as well.   I was very proud to note the seriousness and attention to detail of the cadets.   (Important to note that 3 or the 4 schools that have Army JROTC programs are inner city schools and the majority of the cadets are Black or Latino.

Here is a photo of me in uniform making the presentation to the outstanding military graduate at Hollins HS – JROTC cadet, Ms. Gabriela Potrero-Luna.  She will be studying engineering at the University of South Florida here in Tampa.

Regards.

Tom Hofer, CW5 USA RET
President
St Petersburg Chapter – MOAA
#MOAASTPETEAREA.COM
NEVER STOP SERVING

On Sunday, May 15,  Joseph M. McGrath celebrated his 75^th birthday along with his 77^th (his 75^th was postponed because of the pandemic).  A good sized crowd showed up at the Lift Bridge Brewery in Stillwater to wish Joe a Happy Birthday!

Several of the Class of ’63 luncheon contingent made an appearance.   And we ran into classmate that most of us had not seen in decades, five in my case.  Michael Schilling was in my homeroom and he is just right of the birthday boy in the photo below.  Others in the photo are Gary Stoffel, Joe Brooks, Tom Troskey, Joe Schufman, and Dave Britz.

We all enjoyed the positive atmosphere that gave us a reason to celebrate.  And we are hopeful that Mike Schilling will join us at a future class luncheon.

Best wishes to all.

Joe Schufman

Hello all,

What a climate. Last month April 14^th we had the class lunch and it was a snow storm; today sunny and 90 degrees.   I’ll vote for the 90’s!

14  classmates got together today to socialize and enjoy each other’s company.

When looking at the photo in the u shaped table setting from the left—–Gary Stoffel, Ed Sund, Tom Troskey, Dave Britz, Joe M McGrath, Dave Tyree, Don Danneker, Gene Bovy, John Lentsch, Joe Schufman, Joe Brooks, Larry Moser, Tom Schleck, and John Runyon.

I heard from Greg Halbert this week and he wondered if we could have an outdoor lunch this summer. As many of you recall, for the past 6 years our classmate George Bonfe hosted a class lunch each August at his home on Forest Lake. I asked the group to think about how we could do this this summer. Any ideas let me know—THANKS.

Dave Britz has got the golf outing ( The Charlie) scheduled for Wednesday August 10^th at Highland National with tee times beginning at 11:00 AM. After golf a trip to the NOOK for something to eat and drink.

Dave also spoke with the St Thomas Academy class of 63 who also meet at the Pool and Yacht Club the same day we meet to see if they have an interest in doing a combined golf outing with us. Dave will keep us informed as to how that develops.

Over the past couple of months the topic of our 60^th anniversary of graduating from Cretin was brought up with the idea being what should we do. Along those lines John Runyon has been thinking and formulating some ideas about what we could do to honor the veterans in our class with a financial tie in to CDH which would be directed by us on how CDH would  use our gift. John will be working on how this might work and sharing his thoughts with us; and if anyone has ideas about this please contact John at   jrunyonnov@gmail.com  

So that’s it for today and hope you guys are well and don’t forget to check the class web site    https://cretinclassof1963.org    If you have something you would like to post on the class web site let me of Joe Schufman know.

Thanks

Tom Troskey

You Minnesota city dwellers thought our spring was late. Here is a note that Jim Dimond sent Tom Troskey yesterday.

Tom: Can’t make it this month. Going to be down in Iowa watching one of my daughters get awarded her Ph.D. Proud dad!

On your comment about the snow at last lunch, attached are photos from last week up at the border. They are still looking for Spring. The waterfalls were incredible!

Jim Dimond