Long-Lost Friends Can Reconnect At High School Reunions, Even When The School Is

Long-Lost Friends Can Reconnect At High School Reunions, Even When The School Is Gone

(ARA) - Ever wonder what happened to the girl you took to the sweetheart dance, the guy you always wished had asked you out or your childhood best friend? How about your high school's senior class president or the class clown? Whether it has been five years, fifty years or somewhere in between since you graduated, you can soon find out by attending a class reunion.

Just ask Lee Moorhead of South Hampton, N.Y., a reunion aficionado and planner. She attended as many of them as she could after graduating from Holy Family High, a Catholic School in Union City, N.J., in 1948. "I loved reconnecting with all my old friends and finding out what they were up to," she says.

But Moorhead didn't think she'd ever see any of her old friends again after the school shut down in 1972. "They stopped doing reunions once the school closed," she adds.

Moorhead had put the idea of ever finding any of her former school friends again until one day a banner ad flashed on her computer screen. It was from Classmates.com, an online community with more than 40 million members that has been a leader in online social networking since 1995.

"I thought to myself, what the heck and joined. Right away, I was able to reconnect with a girl who had been one of my best friends during my school days," says Moorhead. "Not only did I connect with her, but I sent e-mails to 12 other Holy Family grads who were on Classmates.com, and before I knew it, we were planning a reunion."

Each of the 13 grads involved in the original conversation contacted everyone they knew who had attended the school, and the people they told contacted others. A total of 770 Holy Family grads attended that first reunion in 2000. The 2004 reunion was just as popular and plans are in the works for another one in 2008.

Chances are good that members of your class are also in the planning stages of your next reunion right now, and if you had to venture a guess, what would you think is the most time consuming part of the job? "It's not booking the venue or planning the activities, but tracking down the whereabouts of the impending guests," says Moorhead, who points out that all you have to do to spread the word about an upcoming reunion is set up a message board on the Classmates.com Web site, let a few people know you've posted the information and word of mouth will do the rest of the work for you.

"The Internet has become so prevalent in our culture, that just about everyone has access to it these days, so what better tool could there possibly be to bring people together?" asks Classmates.com relationships expert Dennie Hughes. By logging on to www.classmates.com and signing up for a free membership, you'll have the opportunity to be informed of upcoming reunions, the ability to read message boards and review the list of people from their class who have signed up as well as RSVP. By upgrading to a Gold Membership for a nominal fee, you can actually participate in conversations, e-mail members directly and re-establish connections you thought were lost forever.

If you want to get the most benefit possible out of your upcoming reunion before it happens, here's what to do:

* Spend some time with your old yearbooks to reacquaint yourself with those old friends you'll be seeing again.

* Send an e-mail to people you care about the most so you can make plans to enjoy quality time together at the reunion. Sometimes smaller groups are better.

* And afterwards, don't just promise to stay in touch. Follow through by creating and sharing an online photo album with easy-to-use services.

For more ideas on how to find old friends and make the most of reunions, visit www.classmates.com.

Courtesy of ARAcontent