Classmate Profiles
Instructions: Hello, Classmate! Our once-in-a-lifetime GOLDEN class reunion is coming soon, and your classmates hope to see you in August! Even if you aren't able to join us, please share below about your after-high school life (~350 words), favorite high school memory/ies, and include a current photo of just you, with your face and hair - or lack thereof. And although your contact information won't be visible on this website, your classmates can contact you via email by clicking on "send [name] a message" link at the bottom of each classmate's profile. Enjoy reading the profiles!
One classmate per profile. To change your profile click Log in. Username = your email.
Kyanne Danowsky (McCarley)
| State / Province: | CO |
|---|---|
| Marital status: | Married |
| Children: | 2 |
| Occupation: | Pilates Instructor |
| Highlights of your last 50 years: | I attended Iowa State after high school where I met my husband, Phil Danowsky. We have been happily married for 47 years, have 2 children and 4 grand children. We settled in Cedar Rapids, IA where I taught dance (ballet, tap, jazz) and owned a dancewear shop. Realizing my physical limitations as I got older, I segued into teaching Pilates. I have loved my work both in dance and Pilates….still do! Phil retired 12 years ago and we moved to south central Colorado where we have 6 acres next to the Arkansas River in a canyon at the foothills of the Sangre De Cristo Mountain range. Phil manages the apple orchard and gardens and I spend time working with people in my home Pilates studio. When not working, I spend many hours hiking in the mountains, helping in the gardens, sharing meals with friends and spoiling my grand kids. Phil and I have done a little traveling here and abroad and hope to do more in the future. |
| Share a high school memory: | Ames was a wonderful place to grow up! I have many fond memories, too many to share here. I hope to be at the reunion where we can all share these memories in person. |
Dean Dass
| State / Province: | VA |
|---|---|
| Marital status: | Married |
| Children: | 2 |
| Occupation: | artist, professor emeritus |
| Highlights of your last 50 years: | After graduating from UNI in '78, we married and for our honeymoon drove to Philadelphia. With Patsy's support I graduated with an MFA degree from The Tyler School of Art, Temple University in '80. I launched my career in galleries in Philadelphia and New York. In '85 we moved to Charlottesville where I began teaching at The University of Virginia. After 35 years I retired from teaching just as the Pandemic began, and continue to maintain my studio practice and exhibition schedule. |
| Share a high school memory: | Met Patsy Maroney in American Government class. |
Patsy Dass (Maroney)
| State / Province: | VA |
|---|---|
| Marital status: | Married |
| Children: | 2 |
| Occupation: | Retired - Licensed Clinical Psychologist |
| Highlights of your last 50 years: | Dean and I married in August 1978. No honeymoon, just a drive to Philadelphia with $400 in a Datsun 610 Wagon full of houseplants. Dean started his MFA at Tyler School of Art that year. Erich, our son, was born in 1980. Followed by Adrienne in 1985. In 1985 we also moved to Charlottesville, Virginia where Dean had accepted a teaching job in the Art Dept. at UVA. In 1990, I started my graduate program in Clinical Psychology at UVA. In 1995, I did my internship at Dartmouth School of Medicine, and graduated with my PhD. We all went to New Hampshire for the year, Dean was on sabbatical and started oil painting. After returning home to Charlottesville, I opened a private practice. During free time, I enjoyed singing with the Virginia Oratorio Society for nine years, and for 20+ years at St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Ivy, the little suburb of C'ville where we live. I also started making full sized quilts with hand quilting, in about 2000. For the past 14 years I have been a student at Charlottesville Tai Chi Center, and am currently an instructor. Dean and I did a good amount of traveling, mostly in places where he either was a visiting artist or having a show. Favorite places included, Finland, Paris and Ireland. This past year we took a completely for fun trip to Sweden and Norway. We have 4 grandchildren, Graham, Remy, (Adrienne's), Haden and Lily (Erich's). |
| Share a high school memory: | I remember leaving Iowa in horrible cold and snow on the "Spring" trip and getting to Washington DC in beautiful 60 degree weather. Everything was green and the cherry blossoms were in bloom. I absolutely loved it, and claimed that I would someday live in Virginia. I have been here for 38 years. |
Mark Davis
| State / Province: | IA |
|---|---|
| Marital status: | Married |
| Highlights of your last 50 years: | Fifty years? Wow! Julie Larson and I married in 1975. We had a son the following year. I managed Dugan's Deli for three years. Julie and I parted ways in 1979 and I soon started a short stint as manager of Tork's Pub and Keg Business. The keg business was a royal pain in the ass (and back) and I couldn't wait to quit! I then went to work at ISU as a utility worker. It was about that time when I met my soul mate, Kathy McMurray. She had three children from a previous marriage so it was a very busy time in our lives! While at ISU, I took advantage of a tuition reimbursement program and began taking classes part-time during the daytime while working evenings at the utility. I eventually got my BS degree in 1988. I stayed working for ISU and was offered a job managing their industrial water treatment program. It was a job with a lot of challenges, not the least of which was managing chemical engineering interns who assisted our treatment program. They helped keep me young yet aged me at the same time! I retired from ISU in 2019 after 39 years. Kathy and I have been married 43 years and still live in Ames. We now have five grandchildren and one great-grandchild. It's so great watching them all make their way in the world and we're enormously proud of them all! Kathy and I enjoy going to Cyclone basketball games at Hilton and we sometimes attend their tournaments in other locations. We also like to go see musical artists we enjoy at some of this country's more unique venues including Madison Square Garden and Carnegie Hall in NYC, Ryman Auditorium in Nashville and Red Rocks in Colorado. If there's an artist we especially like, we're going to try to figure out how to get there! A special high school memory was getting the opportunity to compete and place in the Drake Relays as a pole vaulter. I would probably seriously hurt myself if I attempted such a thing at this stage of my life but I still enjoy watching the sport! |
Linda Deppe
| State / Province: | OR |
|---|---|
| Marital status: | Single again |
| Children: | 2 |
| Occupation: | Osteopathic Family Physician, retired |
| Highlights of your last 50 years: | I received a Biology degree from Oregon State University, then had a lab tech job at the Primate Center, and after several years I was accepted to Des Moines University for my DO degree. I finished my Family Medicine training in Duluth, MN, and worked there for a few years doing everything from delivering babies to nursing home director role. Then married, and lived in Germany, working as a contractor on the base: we traveled constantly and had excellent adventures. In 1993, we moved to Southern California and Loma Linda Family Medicine hired me, so I trained a generation of Family physicians, had babies, delivered babies, and watched my continuity practice age with me. I lived an intense, satisfying life in most of the ways. But, divorced when kids were young and did most of it on my own. Along the way there was a benign brain tumor that interfered with managing the complexity of the job in academics, so I tapered work down, and ended my career with 6 years working for the tribes in Southern California: focus on hierarchy flattening, and workflow improvement, and Patient Centered Medical Home certifications. My sons are Sam and Nate, 30 and 27 years old, who both live nearby. Sam is just starting work as a physician assistant, and Nate works for the IRS. We are all in Portland area and I enjoy this phase of parenting too. It still involves feeding people, and is more like coaching! Many of their California friends have moved up here, and some of my people are arriving too! Retirement included a second short marriage, and a horrific ankle injury in 2015. Damn these disability lessons! Right before COVID I had my ankle replaced, and I am fairly functional. I am a cyclist, and a serious traveler and this year traveled to Madagascar to see rare birds and so many lemurs!! It sort of feels now like I have made it to actual retirement. I enjoy this town with old and new friends, and can plan trips, drive to Iowa to see my folks and am finding ways to still be a physician. I facilitate a group of first year students at the medical school, as they write and process all the crazy that is our healthcare system. I lecture to clinicians, residents and osteopathic medical students about Domestic Violence, and I serve as a sort of medical navigator for family and friends. I have been lucky in so many things, and am so thankful. I will be at the reunion and hope to see you there!!! |
| Share a high school memory: | Choir: Al Wiser: making an album of Christmas music: and madrigal; much good music! I spent a fair amount of time on the piano bench accompanying, as well. Band: Milton Trexel " We go!". Marching in the cold with a row of eight disgruntled bassoon and oboe players on out-of-tune glockenspiels. Marching in the heat in black wool uniforms. Riding the centrifuge ride at Six Flags in St. Louis over and over and over. It was fun having the park almost to ourselves… Orchestra: our class had such talented musicians….. Orchestra trip to Chicago. |
Sandy Destiny (Hubbert)
| State / Province: | CA |
|---|---|
| Marital status: | Single again |
| Children: | 1 |
| Occupation: | Higher education communications |
| Highlights of your last 50 years: | I feel very fortunate that I knew when I graduated from Ames High what field I wanted to pursue. If you look in our senior yearbook, the only photos you see of me beyond my portrait — I think — are associated with the school newspaper. I dreamed of being an investigative journalist and photographer. However, I never got there. The path split and I got pulled unexpectedly into a truly satisfying career. I spent the summer after graduation as an exchange student in France. Ooo la la, what a wonderful experience! I returned to the U.S. in the fall and started Iowa State's journalism program. My dad took a job at LSU and the family moved to Baton Rouge, La., while I was in France. Summers off from ISU were spent down south working for the city's arts council. One of those summers, I met a boy and ended up transferring to LSU to finish my bachelor of journalism, and to marry him. I immediately got a job as a news editor at a local weekly newsmagazine. It was small enough that I got to do everything: write, take photos, page layout. I was in heaven, until the paper went belly up. This was in the early '80s when the economy was not doing well and jobs were hard to come by. I found one, but it wasn't as a reporter. It was working for the university affairs office at LSU as a publications editor. I took the job thinking it was a stop gap until I got a real job as a reporter, but I never looked back. It's been more than 40 years since I started working in higher education public relations and communications, and I'm still at it. I learned to do so many things during my nearly 20 years at LSU. My success as publications editor opened up promotions to news writer, alumni magazine editor-in-chief, and the university's first webmaster. I was also able to earn my master's degree in journalism with the staff discount! After my first marriage ended, I channeled my energy into doing triathlons. I met some great people, some of whom are still close friends, and saw some amazing places. My goal was to do the Ironman. Never got there either, but, hey, I still have time. I remarried in the early 1990s and had my only child, my beautiful daughter Skye. When she was quite young, it became clear things were not going to work out with her dad. The LSU chapter of my life was over. When I moved in 2000 to the beautiful town of Healdsburg, in California's Sonoma County, I planned on taking my experience with websites to land a high-paying, perk-rich tech job, and I did! Unfortunately not long after I started, I became one of the casualties of the dot-com bust. Searching for web work, I ignored all listings in higher ed - been there, done that, I told myself. Once again, the only job I could land was working for a university - Sonoma State University. I started as a communications/administrative assistant in a small department. Not long after I joined the SSU staff, the director of publications in the university strategic communications office opened up. It had my name written all over it. The universe works in mysterious ways. When I was offered the position, I laughed and shook my head, realizing that higher ed was where I thrived. I was home again. Now I am the creative services director, overseeing graphic design, photography, web design, branding - all the things that make the university look good. It's a great gig! I am so very grateful for my life today. I love life in my little town of Healdsburg, and San Francisco is so close to enjoy sports events and museums. My daughter is loving her job as an EMT in a hospital in Orange County. Every time I go down to visit and I drag her to Disneyland. I still run and swim, and fell in love with Pilates about 15 years ago. I have a boxer dog, who hikes the northern California hills with me. His name is Bruce Springstein II because, yeah, I'm a Bruce fanatic. I've seen him in concerts all over the country sooooo many times. Every year or so, I return to LSU to see my friends and catch a football or baseball game. Geaux Tigers! I've been back to Ames once since I left ISU in the late 1970s. Regardless, Ames High remains near and dear to my heart. I look forward to our 50th reunion! |
| Share a high school memory: | One of my favorite teachers was Mr. Forsman. I wasn't very excited about English class, but he had so much enthusiasm and delighted in everything we did. I remember an assignment where we selected a book to read and create a special class presentation. It was supposed to be a BIG project. I read "Tales of the South Pacific" by James Michener but had no clue what to do for the presentation, so I winged it. I painted watercolor islands to represent each of the short "tales" in the book. I showed the picture to the class and I talked a little bit about what each story was about. When I finished, Mr. Forsman jumped up with joy and gleefully gave me a standing ovation. I still feel the happiness his reaction gave me. |
ROGER DOLLING
| State / Province: | IA |
|---|---|
| Marital status: | Married |
| Children: | 0 |
| Occupation: | Short-term Purchasing Coordinator Cummins Inc. Semi Retired |
| Highlights of your last 50 years: | After graduation started in the Iowa State Fish and Wildlife Curriculum and then changed course to move to West Des Moines and worked for an Aerospace company for 35 years that changed names, from Delavan to Goodrich to UTC Aerospace. My work was as a machinist, welder and CI Coordinator. I went to get a BA from William Penn. Then I met my wonderful wife Maria who is trilingual and have been married 19 years. She is my interpreter in non-English speaking places. We didn't have children but nieces and nephews. A big sport hobby is scuba diving and traveling many times to South America, Europe and the Middle East. Being a Trekkie I adopted the Star Trek mission, "To seek out new forms of life, and boldly go where no man has gone before. I actually found an ocean creature at St Lucia that is not yet classified. 25 years ago, I made friends with the 2-term chief of the Kalinago Indigenous tribe, Charles Williams on Dominica island, who guided me to many times to vistas that few outsiders have ever seen. Over the years I've collected much reference material for my marine artwork. These are paintings and carvings replicated in thermoplastic. |
| Share a high school memory: | We bottomed out a 1962 VW Beetle stuck on a snowdrift tires spinning with Dave Frederick. We were strong enough to grab the bumper handles and drag it to pavement. This might have been April snowstorm of "73" Mark Beeman joined me on duck hunts, and much later and was first FB greeter. I did enjoy all the sports and activities that made us AIM HIGH. For Graduation remember Dr Farrar told everybody at the start to get a little more "Spaced Out" We all erupted with laughter, he meant the chairs. |
Chuck Dorr
| State / Province: | FL |
|---|---|
| Marital status: | Married |
| Children: | 2 |
| Occupation: | Retired |
| Highlights of your last 50 years: | Right after graduation , I had detached retinas in both eyes which delayed college for a year. After a year in college at Southern Illinois University, my father passed away unexpectedly at age 45 and I moved back to Ames to finish college at ISU. Following graduation, I followed classmate Ken Malaby to Oregon and landed my first job in college textbook sales. My territory included Alaska and that was a neat experience going there multiple times a year. My primary career of 33 years was in pharmaceutical sales. After marriage in 1985 to Heather, we adopted our son Justin in 1988. Unfortunately, my mother passed away from cancer shorty after our son was born. . I then transferred to a territory based in Paducah, KY to be closer to my dad’s family in St. Louis and my mom’s family in southern Illinois. We were blessed to adopt Mary Kathryn in 1992 in Louisville. After 20 years in”big” Pharma, I spent my last 13 years in pharmaceuticals sales working at 3 small bio-tech companies that specialized in Oncology products. I have had numerous health issues over the years including a chronic kidney disease diagnosis shortly after marriage that led to a kidney transplant in 2005. The transplant failed in 2017 and I have been on dialysis since. I am finally on the kidney transplant list again following numerous health issues the past 6 years. Following retirement in 2016, we followed our children to Florida and were blessed with the births of granddaughters Charlie and Winter in 2017. Unfortunately, the children have since moved to Richmond, VA and Minneapolis in career moves. We will stay in Florida and spend the summers at our oceanfront condo in Depoe Bay, Oregon as health permits. This life goes fast and I am blessed that God got ahold of me in 1998 and I have put my faith in my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. This physical life is rapidly fleeting, but my soul awaits eternal life with Christ! Due to dialysis or hopefully a kidney transplant, I probably will not be able to attend the reunion. Blessings to all! |
Gregor Dougal
| State / Province: | MN |
|---|---|
| Marital status: | Married |
| Children: | 2 |
| Occupation: | Electrical Engineer, Retired |
| Highlights of your last 50 years: | Busy and fun ten years since the last classmate profile. I started the next phase by retiring in 2016. First project was to downsize from our home of 30 years in Minneapolis to a condo with a wonderful view of St. Anthony Falls and downtown. Being able to turn the key and leave without worrying, Connie and I continue to enjoy traveling abroad as our list of countries keeps growing. Since retiring we added Portugal, New Zealand, Costa Rica, Thailand, Vietnam, Netherlands, Kenya, Tanzania, Sicily, Argentina, Chile, Ireland, Turkey, Peru and Morocco. We’re looking forward to Ecuador and the Galapagos before the reunion this summer, then … Our children Michael and Laura are both now married, work in data science and program management and are settled in the Bay Area. Part of our travels now include visits to them and Michael’s son of 19 months, John. We enjoyed our first grandparent trip taking care of him for six weeks his first winter and will have had another six weeks this spring before the reunion. I’ve picked up skiing again after those fun introductory trips arranged by John Hansen in college. I also continue biking and golfing for recreation. Previous 40 year update: At Iowa State in Electrical Engineering and Physics. The first year I shared a room with fellow alums John Hanson and Dan Lambert for some fun and crazy times. I also met my wife, now of 45 years, Connie Howard. I was able to spend a wonderful year in Germany with a Rotary Scholarship. Connie and I were able to start our life traveling abroad from there as well as from London where Connie’s folks were. We then settled in Minneapolis. Connie attended the U of M Law School and I pursued and enjoyed a career in microelectronic process and device development. I worked characterizing semiconductor devices and directing the development of numerous generations of technologies for aerospace electronic products, last at Honeywell for 27 years. Chips manufactured with these processes were used in satellite systems as well as on space missions. Some orbited Saturn for a time and some are still on the rovers on Mars. |
| Share a high school memory: | Junior band trip to St. Louis - climbing the Arch by the stairs and the only ones in the amusement park for an hour or two after early close racing between the best rides. Poker nights with the gang. |
Dennis Dubberke
| State / Province: | IA |
|---|---|
| Marital status: | Married |
| Occupation: | Laborer |
| Highlights of your last 50 years: | Looking forward to celebrate all who return, while embracing memories we shared. For instance a seminal trip via bus, sleeping on a train station bench, "training" across the country and back: to meet a best pal, Jim Asp and his wonderful partner Perry in DC. Then ensconced with Perry's family's Seder-the finest and sincerest meal in my life. Then, that wonderful YMCA in NYC. Another bus trip, with my backpack stuffed between the seat ahead and my knees, to hike Mt. Long in Colorado with Bruce Robb. Ahh, experiences! |
| Share a high school memory: | Amazing friends, seared into memory. "The Ides of March..." Band, Marching Band, the Fine Arts Wing (Hank Hall!) But the best of it was the friendships, the camaraderie. Building a perpetual motion machine with Brian Perry in electrical shop and out perpetual knock-down drag-out dialectical debates. Lybeck's Latin class with Bruce Robb. |