Kindergarten class reunites after 75 years

It’s a day to reminisce for 25 former students of Hanover Public School who met for the first time 75 years ago, this week.

“Amazing to see these people. Some you still recognize at first sight, others I don’t know who they were. We all change a little bit, I guess,” said former Kindergartener, Robert Lamont.

After throwing himself an 80th birthday party this spring, Larry Yack, who resides in Kitchener, starting wondering what some of his former classmates from his Hanover days were up to.

“You know what, I said to myself, ‘A 75th reunion of a kindergarten class is probably something nobody else has ever done’,” he said.

So he reached out to some former students he remembered, who started searching their contact lists and the internet to find as many of the 58 kids who were part of the 1948 kindergarten classes at Hanover Public School as possible.

Jackie Gilbank, formerly Walker, who now resides in Sarnia, helped lead the search for her former classmates.

The 75th reunion for the 1948 kindergarten class of Hanover Public School on September 7, 2023. (Scott Miller/CTV News London)

“There’s a clue there, waiting, and it leads you down a path, and you find that person you didn’t think you’d ever find,” she said.

Of the 58 kindergarteners, 35 were found. About 25 were able to make it to the reunion, which took place at the Hanover Legion, which used to be Hanover Public School.

“This very room we’re standing in was actually the room that the kindergarten class was taught in 75 years ago,” said Yack.

It wasn’t a long visit, but it was a great opportunity to reconnect with classmates that met for the first time, in this very room, more than seven decades ago.

The 75th reunion for the 1948 kindergarten class of Hanover Public School on September 7, 2023. (Scott Miller/CTV News London)

“My mother kept a scrapbook of all the crafts we did in Kindergarten, and people say, oh yeah I remember doing those things. It might be the last time we see each other, who knows, but it’s great. It’s wonderful to have them here,” said Lamont, who just returned to Hanover after living in Toronto for most of his life.

“The first people you get to know outside of your own home, and you’re still in touch and you still want to be together. That’s pretty special. There’s a saying, that everything you need to learn in order to maneuver through this world, you learn in Kindergarten,” said Gilbank.