Past Lives And True Confessions -- A Look Back At Local Luminaries' Days Of Angst And Acne

Open the yearbook, talk to an old friend, peruse the newspaper clippings, sit down, brace yourself, it's time to play: "Past Lives and True Confessions."

You there in the stylish braces and Armani tie, you thought your days of angst and acne were over. And you, Ms. Corporate Climber with your attache case, do your constituents know your middle name is "Maybelle," and that you once were Queen of the Summer Sidewalk Sizzle Days?

These tidbits from the past and present cover all subject matter. If you tap-dance the pounds off, you've been sighted. If you thought everyone forgot that embarrassing moment, that you've got a firm grasp on your image of public perfection, well, aren't you in for a surprise . . .

TRUE CONFESSIONS AND . . .

Well, well, well . . . let's look back to the college days of attorney Sim Osborn (think the S.O. of Monica Hart). He was a Whitman College Phi Delta Theta frat member, otherwise known as the brotherhood of partygoers.

He lived up to his reputation last spring at a Leukemia Society Celebrity Waiter Luncheon when a friend agreed to contribute $400 if Osborn would kiss the cotton tail of someone wearing a rabbit suit - as in Playboy, not Bugs.

Osborne did his duty for charity.

Then there is KPLZ's Alan Budwill, who worked in a grocery store during his high-school years in Portland, the crowning point being when he fell through the ceiling onto the display of canned beets.

(Really, Alan! Canned vegetables!)

KOMO-TV's Dana Middleton went down in history at Sequoia Junior High in Redding, Calif., for singing "Love is Blue," the orchestral version, in the eighth-grade talent show.

David Evans, Westin Hotel vice president and general sales manager, back in the, uh, flush of youth, went down in the Trader Vic's hall of fame for eating, whole, the gardenias garnishing scorpion cocktails.

He says it's all urban legend.

A friend says he ate all but the stem.

KIRO-TV anchor Gary Justice, when asked by a college class to talk about his having been a student at Centralia College, answered: "That's where I discovered beer."

Oh, Gary!

THE PURSUIT OF HOBBIES AND HAPPINESS . . .

Whether it's on Capitol Hill or in a studio in West Seattle, lots of folks you'd never dream of have tap-danced their way to fun and fitness, reenacting scenes from "All that Jazz."

Among them, at some time or another: gallery owner Linda Farris, Althea Stroum, Jeanne Nordstrom, Ruth Gerberding, Cindi Rinehart, Betty Balcon (who's involved in the Market Foundation and arts boards), Vasilika Dwyer (the judge's wife), and Roberta Sherman (Market Foundation, arts boards).

Also into music is Gene Juarez, a wonderful tenor. "I used to be asked to sing solo. So low no one could hear me."

From the Land of Ungaro, Jeri Rice, Helens Of Course darling of those into clothes, was a folk singer during her student years at the University of California at Berkeley.

And then there are the offspring of the late Katherine White, well-known collector of African art. The Ohio son, Ben Merkel, collects Checker cabs and has the "Amish build enclosures for them." Son Tom Merkel collects antique American cars that he "arrays on a hillside" at his 80-acre Santa Barbara ranch.

NAMES, FOR BETTER OR WORSE . . .

Call it cruel and unusual punishment, but University of Washington president William Gerberding's middle name is Passavant. He's also a preacher's kid from Minnesota.

KIRO-TV "Inside Line" co-host Monica Hart was formerly Monica Hard (no jokes, please). She changed her name for TV purposes.

So you all thought Seattle Times publisher Frank Blethen's nickname, "Dusty," had something to do with his hair. Ha! The name stems from horseback-riding lessons at Lake Chelan when he was very young - and riding the last horse in line along the DUSTY trail.

He says: "I consider Frank a stage name."

And then there's former KING-TV commentator Don McGaffin's nickname from the days of yore: "True Blue Harry McFuntzlehower." He longed for something short like "Bill or Bud."

SCHOOL DAYS AND OTHER DAYS OF HUMILIATION . . .

They're chic; they're generous; they're mainstays of Seattle Symphony support, gala-going BPs in tux and evening gown. But did you know that Costco senior vice president Bob Craves spent nine years in seminary studying to be a priest, and his wife, Gerri, once studied to become a nun?

"I don't know if he'd want all the guys at the WAC to know this as they're all standing around in their towels saying, `Here comes Father Bob,' " Gerri says, adding that Bob "didn't have any problems with vows of poverty or chastity."

KOMO-TV's Cindi Rinehart, a Texas native, was the school "schmoo," responsible for lying on the floor under a sheet, shaking and rising at appropriate moments during football games.

Flight attendant Sandy Lucas, a pillar of the Seattle Repertory Organization, once wrote a women's athletic column called "Gym Shorts" for her Minneapolis high school.

Interior designer Leslie Lee Nelson, who did the interiors for cottages at Hedgebrook Farm (Nancy Nordhoff's retreat for women writers) and other top design projects, was voted "Most Absent Minded" at Holy Names Academy.

POLITICALLY CORRECT, THEN AND NOW . . .

KPLZ-FM disc jockey Kent Phillips longed for facial hair as a junior-high kid. Imagination served the purpose, so he took hair "from other parts of the body" and glued it to his upper lip.

Or that's what he'd like you to believe.

In real life - say those who knew him from his Whitman College years as a member of a "good-boy fraternity" - he's as straight as Jim French or Larry Nelson. In fact, call Kent the Prince of PC.

Political correctness, of course, breeds overachieving. You know the type. They're the ones who have written their first symphony at 3, speak four languages at 4.

They're the ones like Seattle Symphony conductor Gerard Schwarz, president of his senior class at the High School for the Performing Arts in New York, yearbook editor, voted the school's equivalent of "Most Likely to Succeed," a member of the basketball, football and tennis teams, first baseman on the baseball team, a competitive swimmer from the age of 5 . . .

Stop! Stop, or we will have to collectively haul our inferiority complexes in for maintenance.

BEAUTY QUEENS, "SCHOLARSHIP" QUEENS AND ASSORTED ROYALTY . . .

KING-TV's Lori Matsukawa was Miss Teenage America 1974. She traveled around the country and, as a result, decided to become a journalist rather than a piano teacher.

Ruth Walsh, former KOMO-TV anchor, was the National College Queen, Miss Football U.S.A., and winner of the sweepstakes in swimsuit and evening gown in the Miss South Carolina pageant.

KIRO-TV's Monica "it's not a beauty pageant" Hart was Miss Washington 1982.

Colleen Patrick, The Seattle Times' Reader Advocate, won several beauty contests: Miss Armed Forces Day Princess and Miss Hancock Field, 1963 and 1965, and runner-up to Miss Syracuse.

Me? How rude of you to ask! This gives me great angst to admit, but since you begged me . . . I was a tiara-wearing, horse-riding, interstate horse-show queen.

Now you know.