Thanking Teachers Who Cared

Nearly 40 former students, teachers and staff members of 112th Street Elementary School--some of whom attended the Watts campus nearly 40 years ago--gathered Saturday for a collective thank you, recognizing the high points of their education.

“There are a lot of accomplished teachers here that never got the recognition they deserved,” said Sean Hannah, 34, who graduated in 1978, when he was 12. “They didn’t seek recognition. They did it because they cared.”

The group chatted about teachers who have died or students who graduated from college. They listened to classic Marvin Gaye hits while studying black and white class photographs from the 1970s--students clad in butterfly collars and bell-bottoms.

And, as they ate lunch at the Proud Bird Restaurant in Los Angeles, they remembered how teachers and staff members had gone the extra mile for students.

In the 1970s, teachers from 112th Street School made regular evening visits to families of students who were struggling in class. Teachers often stopped by their students’ apartments in the Nickerson Gardens public housing project near the school, where many 112th Street students lived, Hannah said.

Those were also the days when it was not uncommon for a teacher to swat a child with a ruler or a paddle if the student misbehaved, Hannah said with a chuckle.

“I’ve still got scars,” he joked. “I was always acting up, fighting, talking too much in class and talking back to the teachers.”

But Hannah grew up and became a father, writer and production manager. He also worked as a teacher in Los Angeles Unified School District’s Locke High School for a year. Hannah still sends former teachers his unpublished poems and novels to edit or critique, he said.

“You guys were truly the start of my life,” he told the retired educators in an opening speech. “Without you being around for me then, who knows where I would be today?”

Joyce Lockridge, 63, who worked as a teacher at 112th Street School from 1960 to 1978, organized the event along with Ann Bouie, another former teacher.

“I enjoyed teaching, but the years brought on more trials,” she said. “The world changed, and so did the children.”

Parents became less supportive, and drugs infiltrated the neighborhood, she said.

But it satisfied her Saturday to talk to students who had grown up and become successful.

Chris Jackson Sr., 36, a former student, graduated from 112th Street and went on to junior high and high school in Los Angeles Unified. He is now a vice president at a local branch of Primerica Financial Services.

The teachers “used to tell me, ‘You can be whatever you want to be,’ ” he said. “That was important to me.”

Mae Zentmyer, 87, was there on Saturday because the reunion signified an unforgettable part of her past, she said. As one of a handful of white staff members at 112th Street, which at the time had mostly African American students and teachers, Zentmyer said the school became her family. There were days when Zentmyer sang “We Shall Overcome” during the civil rights era “harder than anybody,” she said.

“The teachers bonded so much, it didn’t matter what race we were,” she said. “We were all in this together, helping the children.”