Saratoga News

Saratoga Sampler

Mary Ann Cook

Shower, citizenship made for special Fourth of July

Three generations and three reasons to celebrate for John and Dorothy Terrill earlier this month. Daughter-in-law Mhel Terrill, native of the Philippines and wife of Peter, had just earned her U.S. citizenship papers, so the party for 45 friends and family members featured the traditional Fourth of July barbecue fare, as well as pancit (a rice noodle dish), lumpia (egg roll) and fried rice.

Besides celebrating the new citizen and the birthday of our country, the event also served as a baby shower for Mhel, who is expecting in October.

Attendees included the Terrill offspring: Jack and Catherine of Tacoma and Kathy (Terrill) and Steve Wahl of Campbell. The fourth sibling, Eric, was on his way to a conference in Italy. He's working on his doctorate in applied ocean science. Peter's work is also unusual: He's an explosives-ordinance demolition expert and diver, serving with NATO troops' mobile unit. Jack, too, has lived and traveled all over the world and is now with a shipping agency. Closer to home, Kathy is a registered dietitian, taking a page from her mother's cookbook, and her husband, Steve Wahl, is a Los Gatos police officer.

Olympic medalist Chris von Saltza, who grew up in Saratoga, is one of seven 1997 inductees into the San Jose Sports Hall of Fame. Von Saltza, you may recall, won three gold medals and one silver in the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome. Upon her return the entire population of Los Gatos High School welcomed her home on the front lawn of the school. Later she swam for Stanford.

She won five gold medals at the '58 Pan-American games, was the first woman to break the five-minute barrier in the 400-meter freestyle with a world record of 4:44.5. She's held five world records in backstroke and freestyle and 36 American records in freestyle, backstroke and medley.

She was elected to the Olympic Hall of Fame and the Swimming Hall of Fame. Today she lives in Sacramento, is married to English professor Robert Taft Olmstead Jr., who teaches at Cal State Sacramento, and is the mother of Robert Taft III, 19, and Philip Keith, 18.

She's a senior systems engineer at IBM and continues to win awards: eight times has won the annual National Achievement Forum award from IBM and five times the regional Manager Award of Merit.

Letís Look at Art: Toby Fernald was re-elected secretary of the San Jose Museum of Art board of trustees. This is her sixth year on the executive board, but she's been working for 12 years for its Let's Look at Art program, which takes a 50-minute art lesson to any school in the county whose teacher requests it.

Fernald taught at a Sunnyvale elementary school for five years, and "giving children the excitement of art, increasing their knowledge and appreciation, as well as pride in their own culture," is what she finds most fascinating about Let's Look at Art.

When she went to the Osborne School, where juvenile offenders are taught, she found those 13- to 15-year-olds "bright and perceptive." When their teacher explained that the docents were all volunteers, it was a graphic indication that people really cared about them. "That makes you feel good," Fernald says. Of the 45 volunteer members of Let's Look at Art, 11 of them are from Saratoga.

Mayor Gillian Moran, pinned against her own car in a San Francisco parking garage, sustained a broken leg but gamely appeared, nevertheless, at the next City Council meeting in wheelchair and cast. From fellow mayor Willie Brown came a letter shortly thereafter citing her "marvelous spirit and courage."

Megan Empey is serving 18 months as an LDS missionary in Buenos Aires. After that stint she'll complete nurses' training at the University of Utah. A '94 graduate of Saratoga High School, she was active in soccer, diving and student government.

Megan has water-skied competitively for the past five years, first with the Santa Clara County Water Ski Club and then with the Utah club. She studied at Brigham Young University for two years and at the BYU Center for Near Eastern Studies in Jerusalem.

In other LSD news, the Saratoga Stake Pioneer Sesquicentennial will be celebrated July 26 from 4 to 7 p.m. at 19100 Allendale. More information: Teri Jones, 867-0233.

Laurie Espinoza, librarian of the Odd Fellows retirement home and a member of the Palo Alto Rebekah Lodge of IOOF (Independent Order of Odd Fellows), was elected warden of the Rebekah Assembly of California. In 1999 she'll be named president and preside over the state convention in the year 2000 in Modesto. The main philanthropy of the P.A. lodge is the Children's Home in Gilroy for abused children.

REMEMBER WHEN stories will be shared Saturday, Aug. 2, as Saratoga Grammar School alumni gather at Wildwood Park for a reunion. Barbecue pits will be fired up--those attending are encouraged to bring a picnic lunch--the $10 fee covers soda, beer and grounds. Call Patti for information, 356-8660. Noon picnic is preceded by tours of the alma mater from 10am. to noon.

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