Summary: John Cosso was interviewed by Julie Sullivan in October, 1994. John’s uncle, who had emigrated from Genoa, Italy, bought 55 acres in Happy Valley in 1920. Members of his family operated a truck farm for almost thirty years, after which they sold most of the land to developers who built homes. Individual lots were […]
Oral History: Louis Persico — June, 2005
Summary: Louis Persico was interviewed in June 2005. He was born in Oakland in 1918, but a year later his family moved to Lafayette, where they at first operated a farm on the present day site of Acalanes High School. After serving as a mess sergeant in World War II, including the Battle of the […]
Lafayette History Rabbit Holes – Acalanes Radio Station KCEQ: Mystery Radio Club Member (1956 Aklan)
In the 1956 Aklan… you can find a student named Steve Luther Syverud. It lists him simply as having been in the “radio club”. There’s no year after it. As such, we don’t know exactly when this person was a member of the Radio Club. It’s likely that it was during their senior year, but […]
Lafayette History Rabbit Holes – Acalanes Radio Station KCEQ: 1955-1956 Radio Club
The 1955-1956 Radio Club can be found by looking at the things that each student did at Acalanes, which is listed next to their senior pictures. There’s nothing in 1955-1956 Handbook For Dons. There’s nothing in the 1956 Aklan. When you go to the section with the senior pictures, we find one person who is […]
Lafayette History Rabbit Holes – Acalanes Radio Station KCEQ: 1954-1955 Radio Club
The 1954-1955 Radio Club can be found by looking at the things that each student did at Acalanes, which is listed next to their senior pictures. There’s nothing in 1954-1955 Handbook For Dons. There’s nothing in the 1955 Aklan. It’s in the 1956 Aklan where we find evidence that this Radio Club existed. When you […]
Lafayette History Rabbit Holes – Acalanes Radio Station KCEQ: 1951-1952 Radio Club
The 1951-1952 Radio Club had to be inferred from the senior pictures. This time it was as straight-forward as it gets. We went to the 1951-1952 Handbook For Dons. Then we looked in the activities section and found a listing for the Radio Club under “Additional Activities”. Out came the 1952 Aklan… and in the […]
Lafayette History Rabbit Holes – Acalanes Radio Station KCEQ: 1950-1951 Radio Club
Finding the Radio Club for the 1950-1951 school year illustrates the difficulty of trying to find when clubs existed at Acalanes High School. Let’s take it step-by-step. We have our trusty Handbook For Dons that was given to students at the start of the school year. Under “Additional Activities” we have a listing for the […]
Lafayette History Rabbit Holes – Acalanes Radio Station KCEQ: 1949-1950 Radio Club
The Radio Club for the 1949-1950 school year not only made it into the Handbook For Dons. It made it into the 1950 Aklan. We may have our first, as we’ll dub them, Radio Club graduate(s) in Joan Siebert. Right now we can’t confirm that it is her in the picture of the club. She […]
Oral History: Ray Peters — October, 2005
Summary: Ray Peters was interviewed by Julie Sullivan in October, 2005. He came to Lafayette in 1962 when he co-founded a civl engineering and surveying firm, and he soon became fascinated with its history. Ray used his skills to locate the sites of the three homes built by Lafayette’s founder, Elam Brown, and in 1978 […]
Lafayette History Rabbit Holes – Acalanes Radio Station KCEQ: Possible 1942-1943 Radio Club
Acalanes used to give students a booklet called the Handbook for Dons. This booklet had everything from a list of available activities/clubs to Acalanes songs/yells. Up until the past few days, we thought we only had the nice compact versions from the late-1940s through the mid-1960s. While digging through our archives we discovered an older, […]
