I grew up in Manhattan but my mother, her sister and brother-in-law and many others we knew were born and raised in Brooklyn.
"Where did you go to high school?" was always an important question to that generation of Brooklynites. And they could always tell you where Woody Allen, Barbra Streisand and others went to school.
My mother was in the first graduating class of Midwood High School. Her
sister and her husband went to Madison High School. They were and still are proud of their alma maters.
My uncle tells a story about a group of Madison High School alumni who wanted to make a gift to the school and were told that the school needed a trophy case. My uncle, a big high school and college athlete back in the 1930’s and 40’s, assumed it was for sport’s trophies. Nope. It was for all the chess trophies that the school has. Apparently they have (or had) an incredibly good chess team.
Here’s some news from the Brooklyn Record about Madison High School that will really make my uncle proud.
This week’s elections named Rep. Bernie Sanders, an Independent from
Vermont, as the successor to retiring Independent Sen. Jim Jeffords of
Vermont. At a Christian Science Monitor breakfast earlier this week
Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) predicted the historical significance of
this win — when Sanders takes office, it will mark the first time the
the Senate would include a Democrat (Schumer himself), a Republican
(Norm Coleman of Minnesota), and an independent (Sanders) who all
graduated from the same high school — Brooklyn’s own James Madison High
School, a public school in Midwood. Can anybody report on how things
are going at H.S. 425 nowadays? According to Inside Schools, "Some 85%
of graduates go on to four-year colleges," and "unfortunately, metal
detectors are building fixture, something the principal is not crazy
about."
Does anyone know where or how I can find Kellyanne Mckechnie??? Class of 1986????
I graduated in 1959. I knew a Bernie Sanders who was a miler on the track team with me.
Would love to find friends who graduated from Madison in 1959.
Does anybody know what happened to Larry Adelman, Madison Class of 1969?
Not only am I a proud 1968 alumna, but since 1998 I’ve been The “Official” James Madison HS Alumni Cyber Yenta!
That’s the year in which I opened my online Madison Guestbook to help my classmates reconnect and for
reunion planning.
As word of it spread others asked to use it so I opened it to all who needed it.
I’ve tried to help every person who’s signed in by
tracking down their old friends and lost family members.
To date, I’ve put together over 10,000 people. They’ve
included a licensed private detective and a fewcmembers of the media.
Many of those people never even went to Madison. But they sure knew to contact The Yenta!
As many know, what I’ve been doing has not only been a labor of love, but my therapy
through years of serious illness.
Although at times costly, it sure beats sitting around in my undies staring at my feet.
Does anyone know if SING is tonight???
The New York Sun also had an article today, Friday, November 10, 2006 about James Madison HS as “A School for Senators”.. with details about many famous alumni, past and present.