Kind Words from Mr. Campbell

Received this very nice email today from former teacher, Chuck Campbell

Dear Cathy,

Let me begin by saying how moved I was to review your memorial site regarding the BHS class of '67, you presented it with such tenderness and grace. I knew so many students from the classes of '66-'68, that the review of your site brought back to me so many fun and wonderful memories. I taught math, biology, and health at BHS from 1963 to 1966, when I left to assume a university position at California State University Long Beach.

Teaching at Burbank High was my first professional job and being able to teach with some of my own teachers from when I was a student at Jordan and JBHS, who became members of BHS faculty, and to teach many of my father's students, was for me, a wonderful experience. My father, James M. Campbell Jr. taught math at John Muir Junior High School for 38 years before retiring in 1967. When I retired from teaching at the University, I felt I was too young to 'go fishing', so I thought back to that period of my career where I had the most wonderful experience and felt the best about my teaching. That was at BHS in 1965-66. So, I decided, following almost thirty years of university teaching, to return to my high school teaching roots. I returned to BHS in 1993 with the intention of teaching for a year or so. I stayed 12 years teaching biology and chemistry. The long commute from my home at the beach and the changing circumstances of the climate of public school teaching put enormous pressure on my health, so I retired again. But it was the wonderful experience and, most importantly, the wonderful students that I got to know from Burbank High from your class and the class of '66, that had a most profound effect on my life.

So it was with a saddened heart that I learned of the passing of so many young people who had made such a profound impact on my life. As I prepare for the JBHS 50th Year Reunion next month and begin to learn of the passing of so many of my classmates, I can only hope that their memories will be treated with the same thoughtfulness and graciousness that I found in your memorial.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you for such a precious job and my thoughts and best wishes go to all of your classmates of the class of 1967. God Bless you.

Best wishes always,

Chuck Campbell