City Embraces Its Most Famous Native

On a day when a cheering crowd of about 2,500 gathered to celebrate the birthday homecoming of Fillmore’s favorite daughter, it seemed as if most people had rediscovered some relationship to Joanne Kemp.

High school pals. Friends of her parents. Former teachers.

“I think she has to be the most famous [Fillmore native],” said Barbara Dosien, 69, of Santa Paula, who grew up in Fillmore and attended the town’s Presbyterian Church along with the former Joanne Main and the rest of her family.

“We’ve kept track of her over many years because of Jack, thinking that possibly he may be vice president. . . . Fillmore is going to be on the map.”

Indeed, city officials ensured no one would fail to link Fillmore and the Republican vice presidential nominee and his wife.

A banner proclaiming “Welcome Home Jack and Joanne” hung from the partially completed City Hall. Another large sign in Central Park read “Welcome to Fillmore, California, Joanne Kemp Country.”

“Fillmore was a wonderful place to grow up,” Joanne Kemp, who turned 60 Friday, told the crowd. “There is so much support to be had from a small community.”

The crowd sang “Happy Birthday” while a massive white balloon “cake” complete with red, white and blue balloon “candles” bobbled in the breeze.

“The lady that will be the wife of the vice president of the United States grew up in Fillmore,” said Mayor Roger Campbell. “That’s a valuable lesson for these kids. You can come from a school in small-town America and do anything.”

Joanne Kemp came from a prominent Fillmore family.

Her father, Donovan Main Sr., was high school principal and school district superintendent when she graduated in 1954. Her mother, 83-year-old Lois Main, still lives in her longtime hillside home overlooking the city.

Kemp’s numerous scholastic activities included editor of the school newspaper, student council member and pompom girl.

At school she hung out with a group of five other girls who would eat lunch on the school lawn together and attend church youth group Sunday evenings to meet boys, remembered Ojai resident Anne Scanlin.

Scanlin, whose husband of 40 years dated Kemp a couple of times in high school, said she was soft-spoken, popular and never gossiped behind others’ backs.

“Of all the people that I knew in high school she would be the most likely [to be well known],” Scanlin said, adding the two have exchanged Christmas cards over the years. “She certainly had the ability to handle this.”

Kemp returns to Fillmore three or four times a year, often attending Faith Community Church with her mother and husband.

“We talk very openly about politics and religion,” said Pastor Chris Cone. “Occasionally, Lois will say, ‘I was talking about something with Joanne and I wanted to get your opinion on this . . . I know that changes Joanne’s mind.’ ”

Stu Smithwick, 60, who was managing editor of the school newspaper in 1954 and is now a history teacher at the school, received a phone call Tuesday inviting him to Kemp’s birthday luncheon at her mother’s house. He and his high school age daughter also accompanied the Kemps Friday on the train ride from Santa Paula to Fillmore.

“Joanne remembers me, and Jack is a very nice guy,” said the liberal UC Berkeley graduate. “Says he will turn me around with his tax plan.”

Kemp said she and her husband fell in love with Camarillo’s ritzy Spanish Hills neighborhood when they looked at homes there two years ago and thinks it would be a “great place” to retire.

But if all goes according to plan--for the Kemps and Fillmore--retirement will have to wait.

Retired Fillmore teacher Win Hill, 74, recalls a comment Joanne Kemp’s father made in a barbershop to him in the 1960s.

“He says, ‘Keep your eye on my son-in-law, he’s going to be important someday.’ ”