Class of '43 gathers for impromptu reunion

Knox Johnson was in on Thursday to check on his multiple subscriptions. Knox said he just had lunch with classmates from the Douglas High Class of 1943.

Knox said he told them he was going to the newspaper to get an item like Bert Selkirk used to run.

"No matter how busy he was, he would always make time for people who came in," Knox said.

Lunch with the Class of '43 on Jan. 19 was at the JT Basque Bar & Dining Room, featured lamb stew and among the guests were Marcella Oxoby, Worth Borda and Rhoda Jacobsen.

"We've known each other for all these years and you would be surprised how many new stories come up."

The guest list rotates, Knox said and includes Walt Muller, Wynne Maul among others. In all, 19 graduated from the class of '43. The meeting place rotates as well.

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A Gardnerville Ranchos man is getting ready to publish his first novel, according to his daughter.

Frank Rocha has lived in Carson Valley for 17 years and within the next few weeks will be publishing his action adventure novel "Scope of Death."

Frank has been writing since he retired after 21 years with the Salinas Police Department in California. A career police officer, Frank was a lieutenant when his heart went bad and had to give it up.

He said he wrote the book in 1990 and put it on a shelf with three others, where it was discovered by his daughter, who shopped it out for a publisher.

The finished book will run 314 pages and is the first to be published.

"I gained a lot of insight while working, but the story itself is out of my head," said the 62-year-old, who helps his wife, Jean, deliver the mail in the Gardnerville Ranchos.

The couple has been married for 41 years. They met at a Tulare, Calif., drive-in where she was working as a waitress.

Frank has a bachelor's degree in administration of justice from Sacramento State.

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Sonnie Imes is back from her trip to Antarctica where she worked passage by teaching painting classes.

She actually set foot on the icy continent and got to watch the "March of the Penguins" in person.

"It was incredible, I watched a penguin fight and one ran past me 2 inches from my foot," she said. "We got to watch them steal rocks from one another to make nests."

Sonnie said passengers rode a Zodiac boat from the cruise ship Marco Polo to shore in three places.

Passengers are allowed within 15 feet of the penguins.

"It was cold," she said. "They scrubbed our boots off when we left the land so that when we went to another spot, we wouldn't take the chance of spreading something to the other penguins."

She said she had three-dozen art students on the ship, more than she was supposed to have.

"I couldn't turn them away and when class was done I couldn't get them out of the room."

Her next teaching gig is in May when she will be heading for far warmer seas in the Mediterranean.

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Former KGVM disc jockey Larry Williams has been nominated for the American Disc Jockey Association's "Peter Merry Leadership Award," which is the highest award given out in the DJ industry.

Larry is the owner of The Reno Tahoe DJ Company and was selected to perform at the wedding and reception for a member of Dick Clark's immediate family in 2003.

He has operated the company since 1990 and is a contributing writer to Mobile Beat Magazine and authored a book on small business development due out next month.

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Sheri Asay called to say that Realty Executives donated $1,000 to Corey Hawker's fund.

I got to meet Corey for the first time when he and wife Jennifer were at dinner last Friday on his first night back in the Valley. It's good to see how well he's doing.

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R-C photographer Shannon Litz cut her hair over the holidays. She donated a foot to Locks of Love, which makes wigs for children with cancer. This is the third time she's done it, sending in a yard of hair to help sick kids. Shannon is a 2000 graduate of Douglas High School and a 2005 graduate of the University of Nevada, Reno.

n Kurt Hildebrand is editor of The Record-Courier. Reach him at khildebrand@recordcourier.com or 782-5121, ext. 215.