John Madden:
CLASS OF 1970
East Brady High SchoolClass of 1970
East brady, PA
Groveport Madison High SchoolClass of 1970
Groveport, OH
Goddard High SchoolClass of 1970
Roswell, NM
Mesa Middle SchoolClass of 1967
Roswell, NM
John's Story
I’m just finishing an autobiography (August 2023) addressed to my great grandchildren (of whom I have none presently). It’s just over 400 pages and would bore you to tears, so I’ll just give a brief synopsis here. Born in Pleasanton, California, while Dad was in the Air Force. Spent a year there, then three years in Illinois, one year in East Brady while Dad was in Korea, one year in South Dakota (Vandenberg Elementary), three in Seville, Spain (San Pablo Elementary), then four years in Roswell, New Mexico (2 yrs at Del Norte Elementary, 2 yrs at Mesa Junior High, watched Goddard High being built, but unfortunately left my friends behind and did not attend), followed by one year in Groveport, Ohio (Groveport Madison High), where Dad retired from the Air Force. We then moved to Kaylor (where Dad was born) and on September 1, 1967, I enrolled at East Brady Area High for my last three years of high school. I still remember the funny look that Miss Hicks gave me that day when I told her my name (She’d taught my father 25 years earlier).
For the next three years, you probably know as much as you want to. A decade ago, my sister ran into one of my former classmates, and, after my sister explained who she was, the classmate said, “I remember him. He didn’t belong.” And that’s pretty much the way I felt while at Brady High. As I look back, I can understand how much of that was my fault, being both a geek and as socially awkward as I was. Fast forward three years to Tuesday, June 2, 1970. Graduation day. Despite failing 10th grade and coming within three days of not graduating due to 54 homework assignments I owed Mr. Bittenbender being long overdue (I got them done the weekend before graduation, turned them in, got my “D”), I graduated. Four days later, I was on a TWA jet and headed for my family in California.
30 days after graduation, I enlisted in the Marines and 18 days later was in Boot Camp in San Diego. From there, I went to communications school in Pensacola, Florida for six months, then to Monterey, California for language school, where I learned French. Then to Hawaii, North Carolina, Taiwan, back to Hawaii, then Camp Pendleton, from where I was discharged at the end of my three years.
I went back to Bradys Bend in July of 1973, tutored math at East Brady and Worthington High Schools, got hit by a car, recovered, moved to Butler, started classes at Butler County Community College, ran on the cross country team, dropped out, then re-enlisted in the Marines.
I first spent six months at Camp Lejeune, then seven months on an Amphibious Unit deployment to the Mediterranean where I visited Spain, France, Italy, Greece, and Turkey. Upon returning to Camp Lejeune, I spent a month at the Marine Corps Rifle and Pistol competition. I was next sent to Ft. Meade, Maryland for three months to work with the NSA, then returned to Camp Lejeune, from where I was discharged in November 1976.
After six weeks with my family in California, I headed back to Butler and re-enrolled at BC3. Took three semesters of classes, then took a break. I worked at a pizza shell bakery for three months, then for an electrical supply company in Butler for about six months. In early 1979, I started working for Mine Safety Appliances as a lab tech. I married Mary Laskowski, from Beaver Falls, in July, 1979, and we just celebrated our 44th anniversary last month (July 2023).
By late 1980, I had decided that MSA’s middle name only applied to its stock price and not to the working conditions of the Quality Control labs in Callery, Pa. So, I enrolled at Slippery Rock and spent the next two and a half years getting my Computer Science degree while washing UPS truck...Expand for more
s at night to pay the rent.
After graduating in 1983, I spent the next 38 years working as a computer programmer and systems analyst for a wide assortment of companies in western Pennsylvania, eastern Ohio, and Michigan. A lot of my work was contract work, so many of my assignments only lasted for three to six months between 1983 and 2001. After 2001, I took a job with Heritage Valley Health System and except for a year with Highmark BCBS, spent the next twenty years there, and retired in April of 2021.
Mary and I had five children (four girls and a boy), four born while living in Butler and one while living here in Steubenville, Ohio. All five are married and they have presented us with ten grandchildren, one of whom died last year but still makes the count. Two more grandchildren are currently on the way! Three of our children are local, within a 45 minute drive, one is in Missouri, and one is living in Mexico. Thank God for WhatsApp and video phone calls that allow us to stay connected. Remember making three minute calls in the 1960’s and the prices that Ma Bell charged?
As our children grew and began sports careers in multiple sports, I got roped into coaching soccer. So, for about 20 years, from 1995 through 2016, I coached at multiple levels from under-8 through high school. I had to stop in 2017 because of my cancer treatment interfering with practices and games.
I was found to have prostate cancer in 2010, a year after a missed PSA test result showed abnormal results. I had surgery in 2010 and for the last 13 years, I’ve been in a quiet wrestling match with it. I’ve never had an actual symptom of the cancer (I call it “small ‘c’ cancer since its more an annoyance than the devasting disease that killed my parents and many of my friends), but I’ve had the surgery, two rounds of radiation, and two rounds of hormone therapy treatments. Now, the cancer appears to be gone and I’m trying to clear up all my loose ends, so that I can die, whenever, and not leave piles of detritus that are treasures for me, but an upcoming pain in the arse for our children.
Four of my grandkids are playing soccer now, so I’m considering going back into coaching again. Other than that, it’s just retirement, cooking, building a deck, working on cars, cutting the grass, and catching up on a lot of the books on Miss Hicks’ reading list that, somehow, I never got around to reading.
The group “The Association”, in 1969, recorded a song called “Look at Me, Look at You”. One verse contains the lyric “It's not the bridges burned that bother me but the ones that I never crossed.”
For the most part, I attempted to avoid burning bridges, and when I did, I generally felt that it was a well reasoned decision. The bridges that I never crossed, however, are too numerous to count. They are all the “what if’s.” What if I’d dated this person? What if I’d taken this job? What if I’d majored in another discipline in college? What if I’d been a saint from my youth till now? I’ll never have the answers to those questions in this lifetime and I don’t waste time worrying about them. I’m approaching “old”, have finished my three score and ten, and am not going to try to recapture my youth or middle age. I love my wife and children and they love me. And that, amounts to more in the scale than any other set of valuables or successes that I might have had.
For any of you that I offended or harmed in any way during my three year stint at East Brady, my year at Groveport Madison, or my two years at Mesa Junior High, I sincerely apologize, and though it’s likely that few will see this “story”, know that I pray daily for all who have had a part in my life, for good or ill.
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