Brenda's 63rd Anniversary of South Cobb High

September 17, 2022

Brenda and Rod attended the 63rd Anniversary celebration of her South Cobb High School graduation in 1959. It was at the Freeman Poole Senior Center. There were about thirty five in attendance. Reunions were held in 1979 , 1994, 1999 , 2009, 2013, 2014, 2017 and 2018. The last reunion was the 60th in 2019.

Besides the Memorial table, we had a special memorial for Betty Gray, their teacher and Senior Class sponsor, who passed away this year.

We got to visit with Roy Barnes, a long-time friend from a Mableton family who owned Barnes Hardware, and who was Governor of Georgia for a term. He served over twenty years in the Georgia Legislature. Roy was a South Cobb graduate about six years after Brenda, and he was our speaker for the gathering. As part of his remarks, he told about the experiences he had as Governor at the time of the 9/11 attack. He had been to Kentucky for a district meeting of Governors and was flying back to Atlanta when the 9/11 attack on the Twin Towers occurred. Fearing that the attacks might be part of a major war attack on the country, they announced on the plane that they were bringing down all planes for safety, but finding that the Governor of Georgia was on this plane, they gave permission to proceed on to Atlanta. Reaching Atlanta, he found the whole of Atlanta and even the state in panic and dealt with crises all day, and a few days thereafter. One panic was in the National Bank building where several state agencies were housed, and he was able to calm that one without incident.

There was a banking panic in south Georgia and a run on the banks, which were running out of cash. He had to sign a note for five million dollars for the state to get money sent to the banks. But then he received a threat to the Atlanta Airport and he needed to move 12,000 people out of the airport. After gathering all the buses he could find, they commandeered Atlanta city buses, asking all the passengers to get off, and they succeeded in evacuating the Airport. He had a report of danger to an ammonia plant in the middle of the Savanah river and had to send the National Gaurd to protect it. Then they had a concern about an approaching ship into Brunswick if I remember correctly, and had to stop and board and inspect it. There was a threat of an anthrax attack, and then a threat to the CNN station. So he was totally exhausted at the end of this day.

We sat at the table with Ann Pittman Frazier and her husband. Brenda and Ann started in first grade at Riverside Elementary School together and were in school together all twelve years. Brenda's cousin Marie Ergle Lewis was also at out table, but attended a different school before South Cobb.

Brenda Duncan Nave enjoyed visiting with Brenda Coalson Beasley. She was a niece of Preacher Edwin Wix and Brenda had gotten to know her in activities related to Mt. Pisgah Church. She also sat with us at the table.

Everyone seemed to enjoy the occasion, and most of the time was spent sitting around the tables in conversation.