Chester Alumni gather for annual reunion

CHESTER-The Chester Alumni Association's annual dinner-dance brought many old friends to Brookside Manor in Middletown last Saturday night. Of the 105 people who attended, 65 are alumni. This year's 60-year graduates included four alumni: Harriet Tolley Beers of Blooming Grove, Robert Galloway of Walden, Angela Maiorana Russo of Goshen, and Russ Battiato of Chester. The Class of 1945 numbered only 14. "Has it really been half a century?" asked Mary Nicotra Abbruscato, Class of 1955. She spoke about relationships that have matured over the years as she introduced her 50-year graduate classmates Helen Gettler Mallett (the class valedictorian), Lena Previtera Hall, Sylvia Frustachi Sevedio, Maryann Ottogalli Gurda, Phyllis Santucci Hubbard, Carol Lang Moore, Lauren Moore, Marion Bason Arraiz, John Arraiz, and John Nucifora. Those gathering represented classes spanning 77 years, from 1928's Anna DeStafeno Cimmino to 2005. A representative of the Class of 2005, James A. Baltimore, also received the Chester Alumni Association Scholarship Award. He will be studying radiology at Orange County Community College. His parents were present, including Chester graduate Carol Gauthier Baltimore, Class of '76. Scholarship winner James Baltimore said about his home town, "Going to school in Chester was a great experience, nice small neighborhood, good friends." Accepting the alumni association's Ruth Parkin Carroll Memorial Scholarship for his granddaughter Amanda Peterson was Chester resident Charles Johnson, Class of '47. Amanda was away making preparations for college. Christine Lupinski Battiato, Class of '62, introduced each and every alumnus, including Class of ‘74's Village of Chester Mayor Susan Bahren. "For those of you who don't know, Sue is Chester's first lady mayor," Battiato said. The alumni association's historian, Marion Lupinski Cavallaro, Class of '54, is asking for help in the work to which she's dedicated herself for so many years. She broke her hip in January from slipping on ice, and needs help storing the memorabilia she has so carefully been gathering, documenting, and preserving. She is looking for a volunteer with some dry space to spare n "not a cellar or attic" n to store "about 10 boxes of stuff." The Class of ‘55's motto is: "Tonight we launch, where shall we anchor?" Everyone at dinner Saturday night seemed delighted to see their old classmates return to home port once again.