Blast from the Past - Check out a newsclipping photo of the band from the 1957 Homecoming Parade!  It was found in an article in the November 29, 1973 issue of the Herndon Tribune.  Thanks to Pam Freund (Phillips) HHS Class of 1976 for providing the photo and article.

From Christy Rappoport, School Counselor, Herndon High School

The issue of field trips and their relative educational merit has recently been discussed, especially in light of testing preparation, etc.  Without getting deep into that discussion, I thought I would share this email and photo from a friend of mine who graduated from HHS in 1969.  Some of you oldsters like me will find that the historical context of this particular field trip will spark your own memories from that time.  Hopefully even the youngsters among you will appreciate this little piece of history.

Dear Christy, I found the picture I mentioned to you and , I hope it comes out alright.  There is a bit of history behind this picture.  It was taken in front of the White House on April 4, 1968, the night Martin Luther King was assassinated in Memphis, TN.  We were participating in the National Cherry Blossom Festival and had been practicing diligently for more than four months on the music and the half time show we were required to perform.  We felt confident we could win the competition, but unfortunately we never got the opportunity since they canceled the competition and the rest of the festival due to the civil unrest that followed the assassination.  They awarded the trophy to the band that had traveled the greatest distance, a fair thing to do under the circumstances.  Our director, Mr. James M. Swinney, told us the judges had said we were the best band in the competition, but he could have just said that to ease our disappointment after all our preparation.  The recent 40th anniversary of the assassination is what reminded me of this picture and I thought maybe someone at HHS might be interested in a little local history.  Trust me, 40 years goes by much quicker than I could ever have realized in 1968. In retrospect, we really grew up in an amazing period of American history, since many of us in this picture were in middle school at Herndon (which at the time was co-located with the high school, so many of us played in the high school band for 6 years) when JFK was assassinated.  The Vietnam war was also going pretty good.  Interesting times. Luther Nossett, HHS Class of '69

Please email the webmaster if you would like the original scan of this picture.  The version here on the web site has been reduced for easy viewing online.


From Pam Freund, Class of '76, Herndon High School

This is a picture from the 1975-76 Wind Ensemble.  Gene Duman is the Director.  Marianne Moskowitz Henle (class of '78) provided the photo via FaceBook.  The WE uniforms that were just replaced I believe were first purchased in 1970-71.

And here are some pictures from 1981 from the first competition that the Pride of Herndon competed in.