Chapter 5- The end of the year “Teacher Parties”

         Every academic year the Teachers Union reps were allowed to run a lottery called a 50/50 lottery every other week on pay day. If a teacher bought a lottery ticket for $2.00 they could win 50% of the entire pot of money collected. The other half of the pot of money collected went into a fund for the end of the year teacher parties. Administrators were invited to the parties but not allowed to enter into the lotteries. By the end of the year the Union had usually collected over a thousand dollars from these lotteries. They used the expenses to pay for the party room rental, the food, and the DJ or whatever entertainment was being provided. Sometimes there was an open free bar included in the catering and sometimes not. It depended on the amount of money collected and the relative cost of the room and catering.

There were three or four major teacher parties that really stand out in the three-decade period from 1970’s to the late 1990’s and here is what happened at them.  The first party started at a local hotel but had a private party at one of the teacher’s houses that had a pool and lots of room to handle 150 people or so. That party was called the Nina Art teacher party. The second party occurred in 1976 the year of the bi-centennial celebration and that party was known as the 1976 party. The third and last party took place in a Motel party room with a revolving door entrance. That party was called the revolving door party.

The Nina Party

The party at Nina’s house was a party to top all parties. After the regular teacher party was over at a local hotel all of the Cucamonga teachers, but not administrators were invited to Nina’s country estate in the northern part of Mountain High estates. Her house was beautiful and because she worked as a teacher and her husband was a lawyer they had plenty of money. One of Nina’s friends was a Music teacher who was well like but who happened to be a lesbian. Nina’s husband was an old school Italian guy who did not like lesbians. When he found out that this music teacher called Paula was bringing her lesbian lover called Pam he blew up. Nina and him had a big fight before party. Fortunately, before the party had begun he calmed down and when Paula arrived with her lover Pam he ignored them.

By the time Nina’s party started it was after 11:00 pm and almost all the teachers had several drinks at the previous party and they were all a little high. Teachers were told to bring swimsuits but few felt comfortable changing into a swimsuit with everyone else in formal dress attire. The excitement for the evening began with one male teacher fooling around with another male and pushing him into the pool. When he hit the water his swim trunks slid down his butt to his ankles. When he surfaced he had no swimsuit on and everyone laughed except his pregnant wife Sandra. Pushing and shoving everyone into the pool commenced and some still had on their dresses and suits. It was a mess but funny as hell. At least that what it seemed like after 4 or 5 whiskey sours. Some of the men grossed out the women by pissing on the bushes when they could not longer hold their urine. Everyone was drinking beers and mixing that with liquor drinks. Boilermakers were the most popular drink of the night consisting of pouring a shot of liquor into a glass of beer and chugging it down. Some of the beer was dispensed by a pressurized ½ keg with a hose which led to hosing one another with the beer and having chugging contests to see how much a guy or woman could drink of the beer without stopping to breath.

In a matter of a few hours everyone was stone drunk. Then the food was served, undercooked eggs and bacon. Teachers were throwing up on all the bushes everywhere. The two gay women were in the bathroom having sex with one another with when Nina’s husband found out he freaked out and threw them out of the party. Everyone was embarrassed for Nina due to her husband’s behavior but the party went on to 4:00 am. The next day the New York State Algebra Regents Exam was to be given at 9:30 am and some of the teachers were assigned as proctors for the test.

Two male teachers were so drunk that they had to get in the back seat of their car and have the pregnant wife drive home with the other teacher’s wife. Both of the men threw up in the back of the car. The wives were not amused. Matter of fact they were cold sober and pissed off beyond measure. The husbands would pay for this indiscretion.

The following morning Nate and Joey, the two male teachers had to get up early to go into school to proctor the NY State Regents Math test. NY State Regents tests are very strict tests that last up to 4 hours and the proctors have to sign a form that there was not cheating going on during the exam. As Nate and Joey drove down the road from their houses they stopped at each and every stop sign, opened the doors and threw up on the ground. By the time they got to Cucamonga JHS they were dry heaving out the doors. The test began at 9:00 am sharp and 230 students were in seats ready for the NY State Math regents test. Joey had to excuse himself first and went down the hall from the cafeteria where the tests were being administered to dry heave in the custodial sink. Nate was next and this went on every 30 minutes for 4 hours. Nate and Joey had never been so sick their entire lives. They made no contribution to the proctoring of the test and could not even remember what they did afterward.  They both went home for the rest of the day and went to sleep hoping the hangover would go away. Nina’s party went down in teacher folklore history and the raunchiest party in the history of Cucamonga JHS.

The 1976 Bi-centennial Teacher party.

Being that 1976 was the Bi-centennial of the liberation of the American colonies from the British the teacher party planning committee decided to order Bi-centennial Award Plates to hand out to teachers as awards. The only catch was the awards were bogus and were meant to embarrass teachers rather than award them.

When the end of the year teacher party came about on a warm summer night in June, everyone was excited to witness the Bi-centennial Award plates being awarded to undeserving teachers.

It was an open bar that night and everyone had plenty to drink. One of the teachers was planning to do an expose’ humor dialogue of talking on an imaginary phone made popular by comedian Bob Newheart.  The dialogue was all about an assistant Principal that made some questionable comments on the phone about some discipline problems that occurred during the past year. After five scotch on the rocks drinks the funny dialogue was delivered to many loud laughs and the assistant principal took it all in stride. Next came the Bi-centennial plate awards. For the teacher of the year award the Union reps gave an award to a teacher that was hated by everyone on the staff. She was a language teacher and was not present at the party. All the same it was a funny time. Various other awards were given for the most friendly to a couple suspected of carrying on a secret romance, the Triangle award for three teachers, two men and one woman romantic triangles, the Missing Truck Insurance Award to a Custodian who purposely left his Van on a Harlem street in New York city so it would be stolen and he could collect the insurance for the defective Ford Van. The custodian did not think the award was so funny however. Every imaginable way to embarrass a teacher was made up in some kind of award. The teachers laughed until they had no voices left. The alcoholic drinks helped too with the open bar for drinks.  The night ended with many of the teachers buddying up and having a designated sober driver drive them home.

The revolving Door Motel Party 1980’s

There was nothing especially special about the planning for the revolving door motel party except that the open bar was to close at 11:00 pm. When the Dee Jay announced the bar would be closing at 11:00 at 10:30pm there was a big rush to the bar to get the last of the beers and liquor drinks. The teachers drank an average of 5-8 beers in the last 30 minutes of the party. The heavier drinkers had at least 5-6 scotches or whiskey drinks in a half-hour period of time. The end result was when the party was over after 11:00 pm many of the teachers walked through the revolving door instead of pushing the door around. It was the funniest site imaginable to see everyone piling up in the revolving door and so drunk they were unable to get out of the revolving door. Some were falling down and others came back out when they entered the revolving door. Outside in the parking lot were 40 or more teachers throwing up all over the bushes and dry heaving their stomachs out from drinking so much alcohol in such a short period of time. The party committee never planned this. Parties were never again booked at that motel with the revolving door, and future commitments for parties demanded that the parties end no earlier than 12:30 or 1:00 am due to the mistake made at the revolving door motel party.