Cary Stelmachowicz Remembers

Those Seward days were always the coolest memories of my [Cary's] youth. They certainly beat the scarier memories of junior high in the streets of Detroit.

By the way the Stelmachowicz clan numbers five kids (my youngest sister Corrie was born when we moved to Detroit). Four of us would remember many of the stories told in this Seward Faculty Kids Nostalgia Ride. Sisters Candy and Cheryl probably more than I.

I loved the Sylwester family cause they had almost all boys and supplied me with the brothers I never had. The nonstop baseball games (I remember the bat with the nail in it Steve!) in the backyard were what I lived for -- then there was the golf, football, army games, baseball card collecting, riding our bikes around the CTC campus, trips to Hand grocery store, Plum Creek, walking on some railroad track. School is hardly in my memory banks, but all the days in the back yards are -- especially after the BIG MOVE.

I do have some memories of Faculty Lane -- running through the DDT, my sisters putting on endless plays in the garage. The Hackmans and Becks I sort of remember, and the Schwicks -- Robbie was my age, I believe. We use to run against each other in track meets -- the big St. John's meet.

I've always credited Werner Klammer for getting me started loving the game of golf -- he was always out back hitting golf balls.

Nobody has talked abouot catching grasshoppers and mutilating them every which way -- maybe that was just Larry and me. Hey, we were younger and didn't understand we might be contributing to global warming.

Is Tricia still with us???? She was in my class I think.

(Mike Sylwester:) Tricia always has had a major crush on you, Cary. She has her computer programed to Google for your name and images once a week.

I'm getting sisters Candy and Cheryl in on these -- they will add the female perspective and then some.

Jim Hardt teaches and lives nearby -- I play golf with him once or twice a year.

Seward was indeed an Idyllic place to grow up. I tried to create the same atmosphere for my kids here. That is why we live in a small town, Fredonia WI on aboout a 2 acre lot.

Candy says a reuninon should be in the works -- interesting idea.

I could go on and on -- but will stop for now. Keep the stories rolling, and for your reading pleasure check out a poem called "Fern Hill" by Dylan Thomas. I think he wrote it thinking about our days in Seward.