School to Celebrate Half a Century

Lydia Tavares remembers her 40th birthday, when her friends and fellow teachers at the young Camellia Avenue Elementary School helped her celebrate.

Almost 50 years later, she still walks the same breezeways to the same classrooms as she gets ready to help celebrate another birthday--the school’s 50th.

“There have been a lot of changes, but the children are still the same, smiling and laughing,” said Tavares, 86, a substitute teacher at the school.

On Saturday, Tavares hopes the good spirits and good times will continue when the school celebrates the anniversary.

From 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., the small beige buildings on the campus will be decorated with colorful paper and banners. Clowns will make children laugh. Teachers will work game and craft booths. Music and the smell of good food will fill the air as alumni, families, students and teachers walk the breezeways that have stood since the school opened in the fall of 1946.

The anniversary is to commemorate the first graduating class in the spring of 1947.

“It should be a wonderful day,” said Principal Judy Hergesheimer. “A day to celebrate our school’s history and accomplishments.”

As recently as Wednesday, school officials celebrated an accomplishment, winning the Getty House Foundation’s City of Angels Above and Beyond Award, worth $25,000. The prize is a grant to the school’s fine arts program, which helped students learn to play the violin music that escaped the auditorium and spilled onto the courtyard on a cold, rainy day.

“This is a special place,” said Tavares. “Hopefully, the rain will go away for Saturday.”

Hergesheimer is keeping her fingers crossed that the rain will cease on a day that, she said, the community has embraced.

“Everyone is helping out. Home Depot will have a special projects booth. The police, Fire Department and the Poly High ROTC will be here,” Hergesheimer said. “It’s a day for the community as well as the school.”

For more information, call (818) 765-5255.