Travel Agency They Paid $200,000 Is Bankrupt : Students Hoping to Save European Tour

More than 50 Orange County teen-agers, who were left without the money they had saved for a European summer vacation when the travel agency went bankrupt this week, will meet with advisers Sunday to learn if the trip can be saved.

On Friday it appeared there are two sources of hope that the cruise, or at least some of the $200,000 paid into it, can be salvaged for the 54 students from Capistrano Valley High School in Mission Viejo and San Clemente High School.

Karl Andrews, a director of the Walt Disney Travel Co., and Bob Roth, spokesman for Disneyland in Anaheim, said they are trying to find a way to reschedule the trip.

“The kids have earned it, and their faith in the system has to be restored,” Roth said. “There’s a lot of work for us to do in a very short time, but we are committed, and Andrews and I will be at the meeting Sunday.”

That meeting will be with the students, their advisers and teachers at 4 p.m. in the San Clemente High School Little Theater.

Many of the students had worked long hours at after-school jobs to earn the money for the monthlong trip, which was to have started Tuesday. But that money and the trip appeared lost when Travel International of Campbell, near San Jose, filed for bankruptcy Monday.

Tom Youngerman, a San Clemente High School English teacher who organized the tour, and Kathy Barnum, mother of one of the students, hesitated to comment on the Disney firm’s chances of success.

“Too many people have been hurt too much already, without risking further disappointments,” Youngerman said.

Some Donations Received

Meanwhile, the Bank of San Clemente has set up a trust account called “The Students-to-Europe Fund.” The bank is seeking donations from businesses and individuals.

The bank has already received some pledges of unspecified amounts, according to vice president Connie Clevenger. She said the bank address is 300 S. El Camino Real, San Clemente 92672.

The tour was to have taken the group to New York, London, Paris, Austria and the Netherlands, followed by a 13-day Baltic Sea cruise aboard the Soviet steamer, Leonid Brezhnev, with visits to Leningrad, Helsinki, Stockholm, Copenhagen and Oslo.

High school and college credits would have been earned on the tour.