23 Wholly Fictitious Members of the Bryan Adams Class of 1971

PATRICIA BARNWELL

A Gill and Hill girl, Patricia was vice president of the Art Club, a lab assistant and a PTA representative at Bryan Adams. She drove her Buick convertible (a gift from her father, a downtown banker) to school all three years. Her best friends at BA were Terri Brown, Nancy Johnson (see below) and Steve Trimble. Patricia, who got a bit tipsy at the prom, later studied at Eastfield, UTA and East Texas State. Her first husband died in 2003, and she remarried in 2009. One of her children, Mary, is now the dean of the English department at Harvard University.

DANIEL EPSTEIN

He went to Casa View, then Gaston and then BA, where he was a self-described wallflower. “I begged every girl in Mildred King’s senior English class for a date,” Daniel recalled. “The answers ranged from ‘sorry’ to ‘no deal’ to ‘bug off, loser.’” But look what he did. By the age of 40, he had written several best-selling books, been interviewed by Ted Koppel on Nightline and earned enough money to retire. Daniel today lives with his wife, a stone-cold hottie, in a 7,000-square-foot pleasure dome in Honolulu.

LAURIE BROOKS

A cheerleader at Gaston and again at BA, Laurie was one of our school’s “golden girls.” But she got in a little trouble after graduation, the nature of which I would rather not divulge. She is now cooling her heels in the slammer at Huntsville. Although Laurie (inmate number 186673) is up for parole in 2027, her chances are not good.

TOMMY and TEDDY CLARK

These twin brothers transferred to BA from Woodrow Wilson in 1969. Although they shared the same DNA, they were quite different. Tommy was in the ROTC program and proudly wore his uniform to school. Teddy, on the other hand, was a bit of a rebel. He always bragged that his buttocks absorbed more licks from the paddle of assistant principal Jerry Madison than anybody else in the class of 1971. Tommy is now a beach bum in Samoa, while Terry runs a holy-roller church in Wichita Falls. Say hallelujah!

CAROL KENSINGTON

A straight-A student at Truett, Gaston and BA, Carol was not your typical brainiac. She also volunteered at a homeless shelter, mowed lawns, washed cars and delivered the Dallas Times Herald for extra money (her family was not exactly rich) and did yoga at Harry Stone Recreation Center. Carol earned a degree in biotechnology at the University of Idaho and has been a resident of Boise since 1972. Her hobbies are knitting and traveling throughout the Pacific Northwest with her dogs, Fifi Lafoo and Big Jim (a schnauzer and a basset hound, respectively).

TIMOTHY McGILLICUDDY

Timothy is a native of New Hampshire whose family moved to Dallas in 1965. He attended Casa View and Gaston before heading to Bryan Adams. He was the president of Quill & Scroll (good) but was once busted by Officer Kozlovsky for skipping school (not good). Timothy later went to a junior college in Alabama and Yale, then spent two years as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford. Tim, who climbed to the top of Machu Picchu in 1982, is married and the father of three children. He retired from an executive position with IBM two years ago. Other than a gall bladder operation last summer, he is in tip-top shape.

DEBORAH JONES

Another import, but from Perth, Australia. Deborah used to make jokes in Frank Davis’ history class about kangaroos and koala bears. She was a member of the Belles, the swim team and the Ice Skating Club. Who knew that she used to spend all her spare time playing the lute? She mastered this instrument and later gave concerts to rapturous audiences from New York to Rio to Bombay. She returned to the Land Down Under in 1984 and is today professor emeritus at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music.

RODNEY ERICKSON

Rodney went to Reilly, Hill and BA—12 long years in the Dallas Independent School District. He wrote sports stories for the Cougar Chronicle, twice tried out for the football team (cut both times, alas) and was part of something called “Youth Encounter Seventies.” Rodney has done rather well for himself, starting a series of high-tech ventures. Each one was successful, and his bank account has nine zeroes—soon to be ten because he has invested wisely. He and his wife Germaine (BA ’74) have a fancy house overlooking White Rock Lake.

ANNABELLE FOSTER

A member of the Shy-Annes at Gaston, she was there the night the Warriors beat Hill by a score of 26-6 (a bitter recollection for persons of the red-and-green persuasion). Annabelle abjured drill team at BA, considering it frivolous and unbecoming a young woman of her pedigree. She went straight academe instead. Her grades sparkled, and she got a full-ride scholarship to Cornell. She earned a master’s in history at Princeton and a Ph.D. at Columbia, with some post-doc work at Dartmouth. Dr. Foster was a high-ranking member of the Reagan administration and has won praise for her biography of Arkansas-born musician Sister Rosetta Tharpe.

JEFF HUTCHINSON

Jeff, a three-year starter on the Bryan Adams basketball team, is considered one of the best hoopsters the school ever had. And why not, in light of the fact that he led the Cougars to the 1971 state championship? He averaged 27 points, 13 boards and 6 assists through the UIL tournament and followed that with a fine career at Baylor. The Detroit Pistons took him in the first round of the 1976 NBA draft, giving him a $2 million contract (considered big at the time). Things did not go well for Jeff in the pros, however. He was out of the league within three seasons, and his whereabouts today are unknown.

ELEANOR “ELLIE” SMITH

Ellie is an alumnus of Hexter and Hill, as were all four of her sisters. Her worst memory of BA is not making Belles (“Nina Sparks never liked me”), and her favorite is taking one of Stanley Brumbaugh’s rollicking Spanish classes. Ellie matriculated at SMU and got revenge on Sparks when she was chosen by Dr. Irving Dreibrodt as the “doll” in the school’s “96 Guys and a Doll” in 1973 and 1974. She was active in the Dallas punk rock scene for many years. Still unmarried, Ellie has a big neck tattoo and rides her Harley-Davidson every weekend, rain or shine.

KEITH THOMPSON

Voted “most likely to succeed” in the BAHS class of 1971, he did not disappoint us. Keith became a virtuoso singer with the New York Metropolitan Opera, filed patents with the USPTO that have earned him a fortune, swam the English Channel seven times, chatted up David Letterman and served two terms as mayor of San Francisco. Today, Keith resides in Morant Bay, Jamaica with his partner.

NANCY JOHNSON

A born thespian, Nancy did children’s theater at BA, not to mention serving as president of the Cothurnus Club and having the lead female part in the senior play (“My Sister Eileen”). She went to England and learned to handle various Shakespearean roles—her thick Texas accent notwithstanding. Nancy originally scorned movies and TV but changed her mind when they waved a bunch of dollars at her. She is today, at age 68, regarded as an enchanting blend of Marilyn Monroe, Vanessa Redgrave and Bo Derek.

STEVE “HANDS OF” STONE

A relatively quiet guy at Bryan Adams, he changed after graduation. Steve lifted weights, got muscular and became a professional boxer. I will never forget watching him knock out Abraham Washington for the world middleweight championship at Madison Square Garden. I thought Washington would never get up! Steve’s two sons could fight, too. Both won Golden Gloves titles, although they never went pro.

VICKY WAGNER

The darling of BA teachers and administrators, she stayed busy all three years: Office assistant, Belles, Tennis Club, El Conquistador staff, A honor roll, homecoming queen and so much more. How could it possibly go wrong? Well it did, starting with the day she was caught stealing hubcaps in the school parking lot. Vicky’s reputation was never the same.

JEREMY McDOUGALD

Before he was a Gaston Warrior and a Bryan Adams Cougar, Jeremy was a Kiest Indian. His life changed when his sixth-grade teacher insinuated that he was less than brilliant. “You are so dumb, you couldn’t spell ‘cat’ if I spotted you the ‘c’ and the ‘t’,” she told him. He decided to prove her wrong and started a comprehensive study of his family’s Funk & Wagnalls dictionary. When the Kiest spelling bee came around, he was ready. Jeremy won, and he did it again at the Dallas championship and the Texas championship. At the big meet in Washington, DC, he won by spelling “antidisestablishmentarianism” correctly. Sad to say, that was the high point of his life. Jeremy today washes dishes at a restaurant in Miami.

KATHLEEN WOODSON

We can find no better example of why BA needed a full-fledged girls’ athletic program than Kathleen. Her choices back then were tennis and swimming—that was it! She started doing long-distance runs because the inaugural White Rock Marathon would be taking place on March 6, 1971. With no coaching to speak of, she won the women’s division in a time of 3 hours, 34 minutes and 17 seconds. Victories followed at New York, Boston, Berlin and Chicago. Her times dropped, with her best being a 2:28:07 at the Los Angeles Olympics in 1984. (Kathleen did not medal, finishing behind Joan Benoit, Grete Waitz and Ingrid Kristiansen.) She coached track and cross country at Tulane University for 25 years.

CHARLES “CHUCKSTER” CAMPBELL

Yet another high-achiever from BA. Charles was in the marching band, the German Club, the National Honor Society, the Foreign Studies Program, the Science Club and the Key Club. And don’t forget that he was the starting second baseman on Dolph Regelsky’s baseball team with a batting average of .397. Charles went to Texas A&M and then law school at Georgetown. He argued several cases before the Supreme Court, winning most of them. He retired in 2016 and today lives in the Mississippi Delta, playing raw blues music at local juke joints.

ALICIA MENDOZA

Student body president at BA, Alicia went on to more of the same at North Texas State. While in Denton, she majored in accounting. Before the 1970s were up, she had opened her own accounting firm and then franchised it. Alicia Mendoza Tax Service has long surpassed H & R Block as the top company of its kind in the USA. She and her husband, Benny, are inveterate travelers, having been to Brazil, Taiwan, Israel, Russia, Afghanistan, Bolivia, Lebanon, Iceland, Burkina Faso and numerous other countries. National Geographic did a special on them in the summer of 2011 when they hiked across the Sahara.

LARRY MONTGOMERY

Larry had an interesting back story, coming as he did from Manchester, England to Dallas. We welcomed him in 8th grade at Hill because of his personality and his wacky British manner. Larry adjusted well to American culture, making friends and staying active—Spanish Club, Future Red Raiders Club (he graduated from Tech in 1975 with a major in business administration), Student Council representative, Variety Theater, etc. He went back to the UK and served for many years as a roadie with Led Zeppelin; he often talked about smoking “doobies” with Robert Plant.

CAROLYN LANCASTER

She went to Reinhardt, Hill (Lassies) and BA. The daughter of two architects, she might have gone into that field but was disinclined. Instead, Carolyn gravitated to the artistic side of life. It was not long before she was rendering paintings that were considered the equal of Rembrandt, Picasso, Warhol and Van Gogh. She has written books on art history and often speaks at the DeGolyer Gardens in Dallas.

WILLIAM “BILL” JONES

Born in California, he came with his family to Dallas early in our senior year, so Bill was the “new kid on the block.” But he made up for lost time by joining the orchestra (where he played a mean double-bass), earning a spot on Bob Cowsar’s football team and dating all three of the Belles’ officers simultaneously—causing a certain amount of tension therein. Who can ever forget when two of them tussled in the girls’ bathroom? Bill went back to the West Coast, earned a degree from UCLA and worked for three decades in the aerospace industry. He is now retired and spends his spare time watching re-runs of “The Beverly Hillbillies.”