Introduction
Reunion 82 was the first of these WHS 75-80 gatherings.
It all started when Laura Pasek, '79, and I gathered with mutual friends from Wagner at a bar in Austin, TX. I, Myrna Nickelsen, '78, was a senior at UT-Austin, when Laura and I decided that if we were ever going to ever attend a Wagner Reunion, we'd have to organize one. Did we have any idea what we were doing? Of course not. In fact, we signed a contract with the Hyatt Regency at Reunion Square in Dallas because it had the word "reunion" in its name.
One week prior to the reunion, we realized that we didn't have enough money for the reunion. We grossly miscalculated the cost. After we exhausted ourselves from crying (literally) and panicking, we drove to Dallas in the middle of the night during a thunderstorm with the sole purpose of finding an alternate hotel. We were too stupid to know that a signed contract meant that we would remain liable to the Hyatt if we changed hotels! Fortunately, the hotels within our budget were depressing when compared to the Hyatt, so we had no choice but to meet with our contact; Laura and I agreed to get down on our hands and knees if necessary. I no longer remember exactly how we pulled it off, but we did.
That first reunion was attended by about 100 alumni. It set the tone for the others that have followed, including the quality of the hotels. We've just gotten better at contract negotiations!
How we originally decided on the grouping was simple and completely arbitrary: we based it around 1978, my class. The 75ers were seniors when I was a freshman, and the class of 1980 were freshmen during my last year at Wagner. And the grouping has stuck.
