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Legacies

The Boys of Alameda

Chris Duffey

Bonds That Bind Forever in an Exclusive Club

     Every December, on the second Saturday before Christmas, there’s a big happy class reunion of sorts for the boys of Alameda.
     These boys all went to different high schools, and they’re not really boys anymore.
     But the one thing they do have in common is that they all grew up on the Island of Alameda. In Alameda, what matters is who you grew up with, not necessarily where you went to high school. And those bonds live on forever, apparently.
     And so, this group of boys, who now call themselves old men, make their way to the Colombo Club on Claremont Avenue in Oakland every year to get together and share stories of the old days. The annual event is called the Old Alamedans Pre-Christmas Luncheon.
     Remarkably, the group has been getting together since 1936. The boyhood friendships have blossomed into a lifetime of holiday lunches, and now nearly 400 men gather every year to renew the bonds once formed on the streets and in the parks of Alameda.
     “We grew up together, and we remain a very close community,” says Jim Stonehouse, St. Joe’s Class of 1955. A lawyer, he is the current chairman of the group. Stonehouse, a tall gentleman who is partial to golf, has a good sense of humor. Those who know him say loyalty is one of his greatest attributes.
     “I remember how we used to play football together on the lot down the street from my house,” he says. “At the lunch, you see all sorts of people you don’t see all year.”
     Stonehouse is also the first chairman of the Old Alamedans who is actually younger than the organization. He was born in 1937, one year after the first luncheon.
     That first lunch was the idea of some Alameda High School graduates, all members of the high school fraternity Pi Delta Kappa. They commuted together on the ferry to work in San Francisco.
     “They decided to have a pre-Christmas lunch at a restaurant on Polk Street,” says Stonehouse. “And we’ve been doing it ever since.”
     The history of the group has been well documented by its members over the years. The luncheons moved to the Palace Hotel and then to the Bohemian Club in San Francisco as the numbers grew. Later, in 1974, the group moved to the Trident Room at the Alameda Naval Air Station, where they met every year for 22 years.
     The get-togethers have been at the Colombo Club since 1997, when the Naval Air Station closed. The club can accommodate the large group, which has a mailing list of more than 800 people. Invitations are closely guarded. There are a few qualifications, though, says Stonehouse.
     “It’s men only,” he says. “And it’s for old people. You have to be age 55 or older.”
      For a long time, the group consisted only of Alameda High School graduates. It wasn’t until the early 1980s that St. Joe’s graduates were invited. Later, in 2000, alumni of one of the Island’s newer high schools, Encinal High School, were allowed to come for lunch – when they were old enough, Stonehouse points out.
      Even though its origins are as an Alameda High group, there are surprisingly few rivalries among the gentlemen when they gather. And when there are divisions, they tend to be by neighborhood, not by high school.
     “For years and years,” recalls Stonehouse, “the West End boys all sat together. Some people sit with their class, but it’s not organized. I usually sit with a group of guys from Alameda High School.”
     The Old Alamedans roster reads like a Who’s Who of Alameda. There’s retired Alameda Municipal Court Judge George McDonald, St. Joe’s Class of 1938, for whom the Alameda Superior Court building is named. Another distinguished ex-Pilot is
Clarence Kline, also Class of 1938, who later served as Alameda’s school superintendent.
     Alameda County Superior Court Judge Jeff Allen, Alameda High Class of 1961, is also a member.
     “I go every year,” says Allen. “I wouldn’t miss it.”
     Former mayors — some living and some now gone — have belonged to the group, including Ray Kranelly, Bill Godfrey, Terry LaCroix, Chuck Corica and Bill McCall, a 1933 graduate of Alameda High School who served as mayor for three terms.
     And the commitment to the group by some of its members is quite amazing. “Most long-ago class” on the current attendance roster is the Class of 1932 from Alameda High, with just two members remaining, Ray Cooper and Eric Roby. Both would be about 95.
     Once an Alamedan, always an Alamedan, no matter how far away you may live. The old friends come from all over California, and from as far away as Alaska, Hawaii and Florida.
     George Lopes, Class of 1947, comes several thousand miles from Naples, Fla., for the luncheon, and tells a poignant story about why the Old Alamedans is so important to him. When he left Alameda to serve in World War II, he lost touch with his two best friends. Many, many years later, Lopes arrived in California for the luncheon, two weeks before Christmas. There, despite the years, the wars and the miles, he was reunited with his old friends.
    “I thought,” Lopes says, “I would never see them again. But I did.”