Alum-Mates

In the fall of 1989, two star-crossed lovers were fated to meet amongst the balanced rows of school desks that made up Mrs. Reinhardt’s American Literature Class. Ann-Janette was an accomplished musician, member of StuCo and on the fast track to realizing her dreams. Jay was on the swim team, a wannabe poet and a boy destined for legless hopes for the future.

Their romance began in earnest over Christmas break that year and grew quickly. The unlikely couple traded verses and sonnets (often shoe-polished on the other’s car windshield) and expressed their love at a level that regularly disgusted their friends (rightfully so). Their romance was so strong it couldn’t be undone even when a company transfer kept them apart for 11 months when Jay and his family moved away to Houston their senior year.

They met up again at the University of Oklahoma’s school of Journalism in the fall of 1991.  By the Christmas break of their sophomore year, the two sealed their plans for a happily ever after with a wedding on the stage of Bartlesville’s Community Center. (It’s the only wedding known to include a playbill, musical numbers and an intermission.)

Following graduation and three head football coaches at OU, the two began a multimedia production company together (PioneerDream).  They traveled the country and were quite content for 18 years…until they abruptly switched lanes and had one daughter, Evanjalyn Jayne Webster.  The disruption was minimal. The energetic “three-family” continues to rule their vast empire from their hometown (Bartlesville) and this past New Year’s Day, the couple celebrated 31 years of marital bliss together. So far, so good.

We met in the 8th grade at Madison Junior High but only began dating our senior year. We had both been accepted to “other” colleges but decided that wasn’t going to be wonderful. We both moved our college applications to OU and were accepted. With our parents’ blessings, we married in a small family ceremony, then went off to Norman in August of 1971, the year of our high school graduation. Later, we returned to Bartlesville to work in the family business, enjoyed having 2 sons who both attended Bartlesville schools, one of whom married his high school sweetheart, 3 grandsons, 2 of whom attended Bartlesville schools, and we remain here. Our oldest grandson is now a middle school teacher at Central. We both are active volunteers in our church, community and family. August, 2024, will be 53 years. Did we miss anything by marrying young? Maybe, but likely none of it would have been as interesting and surprising a journey as ours has been.

It was a hot, steamy August night at the Hilltop Drive-in, that summer of ‘64. “Buck Night” brought out hordes of B’ville teenagers roaming the back rows of the drive-in. Judy Pierce (1966) and Bob Allen (1965)  were destined to meet among the crowd of squirrelly teenagers. 5 years later, after prom, OSU and a US Navy enlistment, we married at the beautiful First Christian Church in Bartlesville.

The GI Bill, plus a naval scholarship, sponsored much of Bob’s education at OSU & Tulane School of Medicine. 27 years of active and reserve duty with the US Navy have been a large presence in our lives. Booker T. Washington High School in New Orleans found Judy teaching while Bob studied at Tulane. In the summers, Bob worked while Judy continued on with her master’s at OSU. It was a tandem partnership in education. 5 years after we married, and 10 days before Bob graduated from medical school, our daughter Kelsey was born. From New Orleans we were off to San Diego for Bob’s Anesthesia residency at Balboa Naval Hospital & Judy substitute teaching in the San Diego school district. Bob’s mother, Virginia, who had graduated from Tulane School of Medicine in 1943, inspired Bob to become an Anesthesiologist, like herself. Continuing with the medical commitment, we transferred to Newport, Rhode Island where our son Kyle, was born. (Kyle also is a Tulane School of Medicine graduate, making that three generations Tulane medical graduates. He is a fourth-generation physician.) Ultimately, we settled in the beautiful Black Hills of South Dakota, home of Mount Rushmore, Crazy Horse and many other beautiful sights. August 2023, we celebrated 54 years of marriage, after 5 years of dating.  We continue to be blessed by the two marvelous spouses of our children and 6 amazing grandchildren.

We’re blessed to still be each other’s best friend and thankful to have grown up with the wholesomeness of Bartlesville & Col-Hi in the 60s.

Nicole and I meet back in the sixth grade while attending Central Middle School. She had just moved back from Norway where her Dad Bill Akin and family were doing a stint as a Chemical Engineer w/ Phillips Petroleum. I felt Nicole was the talk of the school at this time and I had no idea who she was. I soon found out more about Nicole and we had a lot of the same friends, as we all know Bartlesville is a small town! Once Nicole and I started talking we soon found out we had a lot in common or as much as two kids can in the sixth grade. We went to a lot of friends birthday parties where we would talk in more depth, hold hands and even danced at a few others. Nicole and I soon became inseparable attending all Junior High, Mid High and High School dances. Nicole was always part of the school royalty circle and asked me to tag along or be her escort. Through our High School years we had a great time together and decided to both go off to the University of Oklahoma where she received her Bachelors in Nursing and I received my Bachelors in Business/MIS. We booth decided to join the Greek system at OU where she was part of the Gamma Phi Beta Sorority and I joined the Sigma Phi Epsilon Fraternity. OU was a great time where we meet a lot of life long friends, attended different functions and continued our education. While in our Senior year at OU I got up the nerve to pop the question to Nicole and she said YES! (imagine that only been dating pretty much since the sixth or seventh grade!) Life has taken us to a lot of different places and a small handful of different jobs. Nicole now has her Masters of Nursing and works as a Nurse Practitioner and I am a IT Director here in the Oklahoma City area. We have two great kids Brooks and Madison. Brooks attends the University of Oklahoma and Madison attends the University of Minnesota. We will be married twenty five years this August and it all happened because two kids meet in the Bartlesville public schools!!!!

Clay and I met when he started attending Central Middle School in the 7th grade. We hung out with some of the same people but never started talking to each other until we were in 12th grade. I was dating one of his friends, which I’m pretty sure he convinced to break up with me so he might have a chance! We had history class together. He would sit next to me and flirt with me every day. It worked. We started dating in February of 2000. His life led him to OSU Okmulgee for college and mine took me to OSU in Stillwater. We would drive home every weekend back to Bartlesville for the next 4 years so we could see each other. We were married in 2004. In 2009 we had twin boys and in 2012 a precious girl. Clay works for the Corps of Engineers and I am a first grade teacher. We made our home in Gore, OK. We have been together 23 years now and life couldn’t be better. I’m thankful we met in Bartlesville Public Schools all those years ago.

Ryan and I meet in 2002 in our Business Law class. He was a senior and I was a junior. We have been together (mostly) ever since. We got married in 2009 and have two beautiful children. I’m so lucky to have married my high school sweetheart.

Chris and I met at Madison Middle School, but officially started dating off and on starting when we were Freshman. We became exclusive our Junior year, and haven’t looked back since. We attended the University of Oklahoma, myself graduating with a Bachelors in Psychology and Masters in Human Relations and Chris with a Bachelors in Administrative Leadership. We moved back to Bartlesville in 2006, where we have lived since. We have two daughters that are now BHS students, Peyton (11) and Bethany (6), who attend Ranch Heights Elementary. We did some time in the corporate world at Phillips 66 but decided to leave in 2019 and follow our dreams to own our business. We are the proud owners of The Candy Basket in downtown Bartlesville and absolutely love what we do in our community we grew up in. We definitely consider ourselves to be high school sweet hearts and can’t imagine life any other way. And, to top it off, both sets of our parents met in elementary school in Bartlesville and are still married and going strong today. Thanks BPS!

We started dating my senior year of High School (1999), which was Pat’s junior year. However, we actually met in the Jane Phillips Medical Center nursery on the day I was born. Pat is only 12 hours older than me. Pat was born January 14 at 8 pm in the evening, and I was born January 15 at 8 am the next morning. Also, our grandmothers worked together at Southwestern Bell Telephone Company for 30 years. It was kismet! We got married at 19 years old. It was less than 3 months after Pat graduated High School on August 5, 2000. We’ve been going strong for 21+years! We have 2 kids, and we live and work in Bartlesville. Pat works at ConocoPhillips, and I work at Phillips 66. We love Bartlesville!

Our love story started when we were kids. Tim and I were just 12 when we met and 13 when we started dating (if you can even call it that)! Tim attended Central Middle School and I went to Madison, but we had a few mutual friends, so we found ourselves hanging out frequently. He made a special effort to come watch me play soccer and I didn’t miss a wrestling match. We spent our Thursday evenings at K-Life, Friday nights side-by-side in the stands at Custer stadium, and our summers at the pool. In the fall of 2007 several soccer families threw a joint 13th birthday party at the Canteen for four or five of us. That’s where Tim asked me to dance and the rest, as they say, was history! Speaking of history, Tim’s mom’s 10th grade World History course was the only class we had together sophomore year! We were all relieved when that year was over! 🤣 After dating all through high school, I decided on the University of Oklahoma to pursue a teaching degree. Not long after that decision, Tim was offered a scholarship to wrestle for OU. That’s when we knew God was aligning the stars for us. He made it very clear he was making a way for us to be together. We married just before our senior year of college, finished up our last year in Norman, and returned back to where it all started to begin our lives together. I taught first grade for four years at Wayside Elementary before staying home with our two children, Evelyn (2.5) and Harvey (4 months). Tim works as a Pipeline Controller for Phillips but still loves to spend time on the wrestling mat whether that be coaching or officiating. We feel very fortunate to have started our love story at such a young age and we will forever have BPS to thank for that!

Callie and I met doing CMT shows when we were in middle school and then we were in Choir together at (then) Bartlesville Mid-High and Bartlesville High School. I asked her to be my girlfriend on January 28, 2006 at the Mardi Gras dance. Friends gave us the nickname Calex since we were always together. We both graduated from the University of Oklahoma in 2013. I’m currently teaching Choir at BHS, but my first 5 years of teaching were spent at MMS. My very first year, Callie was my teaching assistant! Yes, every hour, every day. And we loved it! There were definitely tough moments, but because we were both committed to growing together, being married to our high school sweethearts has been very special.

Lee and I met at Madison Middle School but started dating officially within the halls of Bartlesville Mid-high in 2002. We have pictures together from basically every school dance from 8th grade forward. We are happy to call ourselves high school sweethearts! We are proud Alums of BHS and are beyond thrilled to raise our two beautiful children in BPS!  Lee went on to become a firefighter for the Bartlesville Fire Department and I am a dental hygienist and office manager at Safari Smiles Children’s dentistry! We would not be a couple, a family, or the professionals we are today without BPS! BRUINS FOREVER!

Tyler and I met through friends the summer going into sophomore year. We were inseparable and somehow knew we were it for each other, everyone thought we were crazy or puppy love phase. Tyler joined the USMC after he graduated in 2005. For military/financial reasons we decided to elope the same day I graduated in 2006 (only told our parents) and then had the big wedding months later. We’ve had our ups and downs but wouldn’t change a thing. We proudly live back in Bartlesville (honestly we used to joke as teens that we would never come back here) and we’re happy to be back. It’s fun to raise your kids where the love story started.

We met at the mid high and started dating junior year! 7 years later we married, 3 years after that we had a beautiful daughter, 9 years after that still living the dream!

Heath and I were friends in high school and ran in similar circles. When we graduated, we would periodically see one another in Stillwater and Norman. We both graduated undergrad in May of 2006. I began teaching at an elementary school in Bartlesville and he was working for Phillips and applying for dental school. Both our brothers were seniors and on the football team. We decided to begin attending football games together, in and out of Bartlesville, and soon began dating. We got married in June of 2010 and Heath now owns a dental practice in Bartlesville and I am a stay at home mom to our three girls.

Our love story began in the halls of Madison Middle School in 1996 with a first “date” at the Sweetheart Dance in the Madison gym.  I think we actually met in Mr. Mueller’s 2nd hour class in 6th grade, but Kristen thinks we met in 7th grade.  Apparently not a great first impression.  We had the title of “going out” which did not require actually speaking to each other all that often.  Lots of notes were passed in those halls and then real conversations started in high school.  Here we are just a *few* years later married with three kids attending Bartlesville Public Schools.  Go Bruins!

Ron and I met in August of 1993 at Bartlesville Mid-High. We were both Freshman and after a schedule change, he joined my English class taught by Mr. Redmon. We became friends and began dating on April 28, 1994. We were young and very much in love and as we neared the end of our Junior year at Bartlesville High School, we learned I was pregnant with our oldest son. Ron and I decided to get married and had a small ceremony with friends and family on July 27, 1996. We began our Senior year in August as husband and wife. We welcomed our son, Lukas Brody, on November 27, 1996 and graduated on May 23, 1997. On January 28, 2000 we welcomed our second son, Kyle Preston and our only daughter, Emma Grace, on May 23, 2007.

Ron and I graduated from Rogers State University and both currently work for Phillips 66. Ron works in the Midstream organization as a Projects Controls Lead and I work in Human Resources supporting the Energy Research & Innovation organization at the Phillips Research Center.

We celebrated 25 years of marriage in July of 2021. We welcomed our first granddaughter, Millie Mae, in April of 2021 and are expecting our first grandson, Karson Atlas, in April of 2022. We definitely consider ourselves a successful high school sweetheart story! Thanks BPS!

Chance and I met the summer before my freshman year when my family moved in across the street from his.  He was a year older than me and already had his license and a super cool Jeep Renegade.  To avoid riding the school bus, I went over and introduced myself and asked him if he would take me to school.  We began dating soon after and continued to date on and off  throughout high school and college.  We married in May of 2000 and moved to Phoenix, Arizona where we’ve been ever since.  We now have two high school boys, Campbell 17 and Catcher 15.

Scott and I met in 9th grade at Bartlesville Mid-High. I had big hair, big dreams, and a notebook full of angsty poetry. He had a cute blonde mullet with perfectly french-rolled jeans, and the ability to dance to all the best hip-hop songs of the 90’s! As cute, and cool as we obviously both were (HA!), we didn’t start dating until our senior year of high school, just in time to graduate from BHS in 1993. Scott proposed 6 months later, we were married at the end of 1994, and the rest is history! 27 years later, we have 2 grown children, Hailee and Noah, who both attended Wilson Elementary, and also graduated from BHS. Scott currently works for R.K. Black, Inc., (a technology solutions company), and I have been a Special Education Teacher at BPS for 15 years now. It’s amazing to think about how long Bartlesville Public Schools have been a part of our lives!