Willow Glen Resident

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One man's ranch seeded knowledge

By Alicia Upano

Cambrian School District Superintendent D.M. "Ace" Bagby stood with state planners at the corner of Leigh and Harris avenues in 1953, envisioning the future.

Prune and apricot trees stretched into the horizon, and the land was a veritable fruit bowl. Frank L. Steindorf, Cambrian board president, raised experimental raspberries there, hoping to find a berry that would remain intact on its way to consumers in New York. His plentiful strawberries were being shipped to major U. S. markets, and his luscious black cherries hung heavy on trees. Soon Steindorf would turn his Royal Anns into maraschino cherries.

Yet the area was changing, slowly transitioning into the growth boon that would define the region. Ranches made way for subdivisions, and Bagby knew Cambrian was next.

"They sensed what I sensed, that we're going to have an awful lot of homes coming in," says Bagby, sitting near the site 50 years later. "Pretty soon, you have children coming out of your ears."

Bagby and the planners decided to place a school on the corner of what is now Leigh and Harris avenues. However, the land belonged to Steindorf, who wasn't too keen on giving the district 12.5 acres. Bagby says eventually he came around.

But the decision turned out to be politically awkward for Steindorf, Bagby says. He didn't want to donate the land without compensation, but selling the land would look as if the school board president was profiting at the district's expense.

So Steindorf and Bagby devised a plan. Bagby picked up Steindorf, who didn't have a car, and the two drove to the courthouse in San Jose.

Fifty-three years later, Bagby remembers that day clearly. Bagby says he told the judge he wanted to use eminent domain to procure Steindorf's property for the sake of public education. The judge agreed, and said the district could buy the property for fair market value.

The men celebrated by going out to lunch, Bagby says. In two years, the district would open Steindorf School and the following year, Bagby Elementary School. Steindorf died after opening of Bagby.

"He was a good man," Bagby says, "a real good man."

The district would open seven more schools before 1966. The district's population peaked during the 1967-68 school year with 5,777 students.

Bagby tells his tale as he waits for Bagby Elementary School's 50th anniversary celebration to begin Sept. 29. Bagby, the district's first superintendent and one of the youngest superintendents of his time, is 88.

People pass and say hello, and Bagby offers a handshake and a hug to each. They are politicians, former principals and teachers. His former staff still remembers their first job interviews with Bagby, and how he used to do handstands on the desks. They remember he was football star at San José State College, where he studied to become a physical education teacher and received an administrator's credential.

After three years of teaching, Bagby applied in 1944 for an administrative and teaching job in Cambrian. Back then the district had only 179 students. It was a one-school district established in 1863.

The job interview was casual, Bagby recalls. After picking up Bagby and his wife, Barbara, several board members took him to one of their homes on a hog farm. They asked him about what he had done in college and whether he could handle a budget. The smell was terrible, he says, but he got the job and soon was named the district's first superintendent.

"Naturally, I did everything I could to please the people here," Bagby says.

His work paid off, and the community recommended a school be named after him--Bagby Elementary School, which opened on Valentine's Day in 1956. It had 10 classrooms. During the next decade it would add 14 classrooms, a library and a multi-use room.

The school's opening was viewed as a vast improvement over the conditions at the Cambrian school, which was described in a 1955 newspaper article as suffering from severe overcrowding. The article depicted a young Bagby teaching an eighth-grade class in the hallway. The school operated on double sessions, the first group attending classes in the morning, and the second during the afternoons.

This explosion in growth was attributed to families who settled in the Cambrian area to work for such high-tech companies as IBM.

Ted Jones, the school's first principal, came down from Lake Tahoe for the golden anniversary. In Bagby's early days, Jones remembers having to rent a mower on Saturdays to keep the weeds down. He says cherry orchards still covered two-thirds of school grounds, and Harris Avenue wasn't paved.

"When the school buses would go on Harris, I'd get a call about the dust," he says.

Jones watched as Cambrian added Fammatre, Farnham and Sartorette elementary schools and Ida Price Middle School to its list.

"When I was here, it was growing very fast," Jones says. "It was like a family, and the chief was Ace Bagby."

Jones was also there when Hal Fonda began teaching in 1957. Fonda retired in 1989 but continues as a substitute teacher in the district.

Fonda recalls Bagby's multitude of carnivals, strawberry shortcakes for the school-children, made with produce from the neighboring strawberry patch, and sixth-grade picnics at Blackberry Farm. For the staff, there was camaraderie and an environment where academics and innovation flourished.

Then came the downturn in the population. In the 1970s, enrollment began to decline as the baby boomer children who filled the schools entered their teen years. It was toward the end of the decade, in 1977, that Bagby retired.

With a declining student population, the district closed five of its schools. Recently, under the guidance of former Superintendent Barry Groves, the district converted four schools to charter school status, which has kept enrollment high. The district currently has about 3,000 students.

Bagby Elementary School remains the only non-charter school in the district. Sue Pyne, the Cambrian board president who organized the anniversary gala, says the longevity of teachers and administrators gives the school as sense of continuity. Today, it is a common sight to see former Bagby students sending their children to the school that was once surrounded by a dusty road and cherry orchards.

"One of the things that makes it special is that parents are so involved. Almost every teacher, if they wanted, could have a parent in their classroom," Pyne says. "It binds the community together."

For Bagby, the deal he consummated with Steindorf to procure the land is as important today as it was back then, and Cambrian's goal has always been the same, he says.

"Cambrian has never forgotten its children," Bagby says. "Regardless of who came in here as superintendent, principal or teacher, they always think about our children."