Page 1 December 2016

Bear Tracks The Suda East Butler High School Alumni Newsletter

Inside this issue:

Page 2

Medal of Honor Winner

Membership Update

Page 3

Wine and Music Festival

Bleacher Donation

Page 4

Christmas Past—1956

2016 Year - Review

Page 5

2016 Year - Review cont.

Basketball Past

Page 6

Alumni Obituaries

Memorials

2017 Meetings

SEBAA Logo Creator Making a Career in Graphic Design Blake Beamer heads west for his first gig

In 2012, shortly after SEBAA formed, we asked Butler’s art department for help designing a

logo for the new alumni association. The art teacher assigned this task to an unnamed art stu-

dent and after a few days we were presented with several choices. We selected two of these

logos and we still use them in emails and publications. We didn’t think much about this until

recently, when we learned that our designer, Blake Beamer, a 2012 Butler alumnus, had taken

a job with the University of Utah’s football team as a graphic de-

signer. We thought that might be an interesting item for our news-

letter and we contacted Blake. Blake responded with a laugh and

said, “I will be glad to participate and I’m glad you’re still using the

logos I designed when I was a senior.” SEBAA is not taking credit

for launching Blake’s career but we hope we at least helped him get

an A in art.

After graduating from Butler, Blake went to the University of Ken-

tucky and graduated with a degree in integrated strategic communi-

cation (creative advertising). “I was hired at Utah in May 2016 so

I’m still fairly new,” Said Blake. “I’m the graphic designer for football

recruiting operations.”

So what does a graphic designer

for a top Division I football team

do? Blake explained, “My main focus is the branding and art

direction of Utah football. I design various types of marketing

material for the Utes football program such as social media

graphics, brochures, posters and I’m heavily involved with

recruiting.” Simply stated, anything you see on the various

Utah football social media accounts that is graphically com-

posed was built by Blake.

We asked Blake about his work on social media. “The main

reason we use social media is to connect and build relation-

ships with football recruits that are talented enough to play at the college level. I’m responsi-

ble for making personalized graphics and marketing material that will appeal to our priority

recruits,” Blake explained. “I also do freelance when I have some extra time. This work con-

sists of logos or basic branding material for smaller businesses.”

Teachers who remember Blake are not surprised that he is taking this career path. Greg

Lauder, former teacher and baseball coach, is not surprised with Blake. “I coached him and

had him in class. We knew early on that Blake was a good student and baseball player with a

enthusiastic personality.” This enthusiasm shows today as Blake talks about his “job.” “I love

my job but why shouldn’t I? I work in a multimillion-dollar football facility, I wear sweats to

work every day, travel to various Pac-12 venues on the west coast and I love what I’m doing.”

View some of Blake’s work on his website Blake Beamer

View Blake’s work on the University of Utah football’s Twitter account

Blake Beamer ‘12 takes a

Blake’s work for this year’s bowl

game in Santa Clara, CA

Page 2

SEBAA Lifetime Memberships Available for $25

Did You Know? Medal of Honor Winner Attended Butler High School

You may know that Suda E. Butler High School has one of the best and

largest Veteran’s Day programs around. And you may know that 10 for-

mer students have lost their lives in our country’s battles. But you

probably didn’t know that a former Butler student, John J.

McGinty, received the nation’s highest valor award for his actions

during the Vietnam War.

According to the New York Times obituary in 2014, “Staff Sgt.

McGinty, a platoon leader, had already been severely wounded in

the left eye by shrapnel during heavy fighting on July 18, 1966,

when about 20 of his men became

separated from the others and found

themselves pinned down by enemy fire on three sides. He received the Medal of

Honor for sprinting through gunfire and mortar shell blasts to reach them and lead

them to safety.”

John McGinty was born in Boston, Massachusetts. He moved to Louisville, where he

completed elementary school and attended the ‘new’ Suda E. Butler Junior High

School in September 1954. He attended Butler through the 10th grade until his family

relocated. Charlie Myers remembers John. “We called him Jack and he was well

liked. But like a lot of us he was considered a little on the rowdy side.” John Deaver

’58 knew him best and he agrees with Charlie. “We were best friends but you prob-

ably can’t print any of the stories about us in the newsletter. We stayed friends for

over 60 years and I miss him every day.”

There is an interesting twist to this story. The New York Times reported that

McGinty renounced the award in 1984 after becoming more ardent in his Christian

faith; he came to view the medal as ‘a form of idolatry’ because it bore an image of Minerva, the Roman goddess

of wisdom and way – to him ‘a false god.’ Michael McGinty, John’s son said, “He was modest about his heroism

and indifferent to the medal from the time he received it. My father used to say that he did what any Marine ser-

geant would have done in that situation.”

Read one of the many articles about John McGinty – New York Times

John ‘Jack’ McGinty receives his Medal of Honor

from President, Lyndon B. Johnson

John “Jack’ McGinty

1956 year book

Welcome New Lifetime Members

Glen Eakle Faculty

Darrell Johnson 1966

James Dozier 1967

Alan Miller 1967

Billi Smothers Bailey-Miller 1969

Cheryl Blansett Aubrey 1970 *

Bill Seawright 1970

Pam Freeborn Sherrard 1972 *

Gary Creamer 1976

Marybeth Eakle Schmidt 1985

Amy Coombs Calhoun 1992

Sherry Coombs Culler 1995

* Memorial memberships donated by Judy Gibson Skaggs ‘70

Memberships Important to SEBAA

Lifetime memberships will be an area we hope to improve in 2017. We

had 68 new members in 2016 but we hope to do better during the next

12 months. Our plan is to make it easier to join. Our online application

process is clumsy and we are working to improve that now. This will

include the acceptance of credit cards for payments. Once we get that

set up the membership process will be easier to follow.

We also need to get better at contacting our alumni and letting them

know we exist. We have over 5,000 alums and friends on Facebook but

only 1,300 members. We hope to entice some of our FB friends to join.

The membership fee is still $25 and it is a onetime donation. Members

will never be required to donate again. NEVER. If you want to join, just

contact us at admin@butleralumni.com and we will send you the

application envelope. Or you can download our application, complete

it and mail it to us along with your donation. If you’re not a member,

please join today. If you are a member, please encourage your family and

friends to join.

2016 Wine and Music Fest

On Sunday, October 9, many Butler alumni and guests gathered at Brooks Hill Winery for a great fall afternoon.

The Winery is owned by Mike Hatzel ‘61. SEBAA appreciates Mike’s generosity and support of SEBAA.

Page 3

Brenda Martin and John Menefee—Class of 1970

David ‘Larry’ Williams ‘66 and Guest

Sharon Hayes Bott ‘66 and Guest

Glenna Neagle Wilkins ‘65 and Sue Ann Seidle Henning ‘65

Click to view more 2016 Wine and Music Fest Pictures courtesy of Floyd Phelps ’58

SEBAA Buys Bleachers for Small Gym Recently installed bleachers in the small gym were donated by SEBAA.

The cost was $22,000. The bleachers are ADA compliant and will be

used for a variety of events. You will notice from the two pictures that

these bleachers are not as big as the original bleachers were but we

are sure they will be safer. William Allen, Principal expressed his

thanks. “We’ve needed these bleachers for a long time. The small

gym is one area of the school that every student uses.” 1956 pep rally in the small (original)

gym and original bleachers.

A Butler Christmas Past

Page 4 December 2016

2016 In Review A Celebration of five Years

On December 5th, SEBAA held its annual meeting for 2016. It is hard to believe we are com-

pleting our fifth year as an association. We have accomplished much during that time. In fact,

we are completing our strongest year yet. But like any nonprofits, we are facing challenges. In

2017 we will focus on the areas that are the most enjoyed and important to our members.

These are also areas where we could use your help. Almost all this work can be done from

home, even if you live out of our area.

Officers and Board of Directors – Most of our leaders have been involved since day 1. We need some replace-

ments! This should not reflect negatively on SEBAA or anyone on the board, it is just a natural progression for any

organization. Our president, Fred Wright ’58 has indicated he will step down but will stay on the board and continue

his involvement. Fred explains, ‘I’m pleased, and some ways surprised, with what SEBAA has accomplished but to be

stronger we need new people to be involved in the leadership. Five years is a long time to be the president of any or-

ganization.” The current officers and board members will stay in place until we hold our election during the first quar-

ter of 2017. We meet four times a year and conduct 2 or 3 events a year so the work is not overwhelming. (continue on page 5)

Page 5 December 2016

Butler Basketball It’s basketball season. We thought it would be fun

to take a look at the roster of Butler’s first basket-

ball team (s). From the December 1956 Ink Spot.

(continued from page 4)

Golden Bear Induction – This is a top priority and

by far our most popular event. Each year we have

made a few changes to make this event better and

2017 will be no different. We will try to make this the

best event yet as we welcome the Class of 1967 into

the club.

Membership – We are gaining new members each

month; however, we have many more people to

reach. This will be another area of emphasis in 2017.

We feel this is the best indicator of interest in our

association.

Website – We need to upgrade our website. We’re

not sure if we need a new website or upgrade the one

we have. We want to place items on the website that

make people want to visit our site.

Database – This is an area where we can demon-

strate our value. Reunion planners often ask us to

provide our contact information and we are glad to

help. We have a database of 23,000 alumni. We esti-

mate that ~30 percent of the data is up to date. We

need people to help with this project. We have found

that doing this by class is the most efficient way and

can be fun.

Gaming – This will be a big year for our gaming ven-

ture. We depend on this revenue to fund our dona-

tions to the school but recently, bingo sessions have

taken a hit. We will show a net profit in 2016 but in

the past two months we have lost money. We are

making changes on January 1 and we have positioned

ourselves to act quickly depending what direction we

need to take.

Membership Information

Click to see if you are a Lifetime Member. If you are not on the list and think you should be, send

us an email at admin@butlerhighalumni.com.

If you are not a member, please consider joining and/

or purchasing a membership for a family member or

friend. Click to download a copy of our application.

Complete the application and mail it to us with your

onetime donation.

Newsletter Articles Articles you read in our newsletters are the result of a lead

or idea given to us by alumni. We appreciate the coopera-

tion of those we interview for our stories. If you have a

suggestion for an article, let us know. Or just let us know

how you like the newsletter. Click to email the news-

letter editor at admin@butlerhighalumni.com.

Click Our Links

When you see Bold Blue type in our newsletter, it

is a hyperlink. Just ‘click’ on the Bold Blue type and

open the link

Suda E. Butler High School

Alumni Association

Website: www.butlerhighalumni.com

Email Address:

admin@butlerhighalumni.com

Board of Directors

Charles Myers ‘58

Fred Wright ’58

Alan Akridge ‘59

Earl Dever ‘59

Dr. Tom Wilkerson ‘60

Fred Krebs ‘61

Charles Rogalinski ‘62

John Kink ‘64

Larry Birkenfeld ‘67

Brenda Darnell Cease ’67

Diane Potts ’71

Eddie Cannon ’72,

Vicki Sinegra Ziegler ‘72

Kathy Embry Denzik ’74

David Moody ‘75

Brittany Campbell Braun ’00

Advisory Board

Joan Sternberg Butler ’64

Brenda Duncan Blevins ‘69

Brenda Martin ‘70

Mike Turley ‘70

Scott Kolter ‘73

Marc Jennings ’74

Kylie Kiesel ‘08

Principal

William M. Allen

Bear Tracks Staff

Eddie Cannon ‘72

Marc Jennings ‘74

Butler Notes / Alumni News

Visit our website at www.butlerhighalumni.com

Suda E. Butler Alumni Association

SEBAA

PO Box 16685

Louisville, KY 40256-0685

Alumni Obituaries

We extend our sympathy to the family and

friends of these Butler Bears. If we have

missed the passing of one of our friends,

please let us know and we will publish it in

our next newsletter.

Memorials and Tributes

You can express your sympathy by making a

donation to SEBAA in memory of these Butler

Bears. Memorials can be sent to:

SEBAA

PO Box 16685

Louisville, KY 40256-0685

or to PayPal info@butlerhighalumni.com

When SEBAA receives a memorial gift, an acknowl-

edgement is sent to the family and to the donor. We

have received positive comments about this process.

Memorial gifts made to SEBAA are tax-deductible.

James Rothfuss 1961

Larry Kniss 1962

Bill Ricketts 1964

Bill Colyer 1967

Cheryl Blansett Aubrey 1970

William Seawright 1970

Barry Grey 1972

Karen Roberson Huffman 1972

Marleen Cornett 1981

Richard T. Metzmeier 1996

Amber Marie Williams 2008

2017 Board Meetings

Monday February 6 3 PM

Monday May 22 6 PM

Monday August 21 6 PM

Monday December 4 6 PM *

* Annual Meeting

On November 28, Bill Colyer ’67 passed away unexpectedly. Bill was on the SEBAA

Board and worked tirelessly for our organization. He will be missed by many.