John Astad:  

Kept getting this classmates banner on my computer, so I thought I'd put my two cents in. Unfortunately, I didn't graduate from Smiley High (Class 75). But Lakewood and the Lake Forest neighborhood was my real home beginning in 1961, adjacent to Mt. Houston Rd. A decade later, my family moved to Sharpstown on SW side of Houston in summer 1971. Two years later I ventured to the west coast with a knapsack on my back and and my thumb in the air. Ended up in the state of Washington, picking apples, pears, and cherries in a migrant camp. The best golden delicious apples come from that Yakima Valley region. Was fortunate enough to also pick up a GED at Yakima Valley College. Finally in 1974, I enlisted in the Navy out of the recruitng center in the Sharpstown Mall and headed out west again, this time as a seaman recruit. Never made it to that graduation class of "75" while deployed on my first WestPac as a gunners m...Expand for more