Tom Davenport

At Hill Cumora pagent.

Ton's of stories, but here is one: The first big freeze of the year was forecast, and word got out that Mr. Hatch had a field of watermelons that would be lost because of the freeze, and it was OK for us to go pick them. Us in this case was most of the members of the Junior Varsity football team. I was invited to go along to take pictures. I never knew if the permission was real, and suspected it was not because the guys were pretty quiet when raiding the field. However, every time I took a picture, all of the kids in the field were suddenly visible in stop motion! If the Hatches had been looking out their window, they would have caught us for sure!

Sadly none of the pictures worked. That was the era when cameras were switching from flash bulb to electronic flash, so the camera had an "x synch" which had to be set properly: If flashbulbs were used there was a slight pause before the shutter tripped to allow the bulb to reach its peak brightness, whereas electronic flashes were instantaneous. It the lever was set in the wrong position, the electronic flash would go off before the shutter opened. In the dark that lever was bump to the wrong setting, so every picture was blank.

Of all the pictures i took, those were the ones I most wish i had!

I joined the LDS church, and a year later served a mission to Austria. Afterwards I attended Weber State with a English Major, Photography minor. I was hired as an unmarried seminary teacher, with the understanding I would marry within three years. I bailed after two years, and spent a year starting my own Freelance Photography business in SLC. Eventually was hired at CHS, and because of my minor and professional experience was able to take over the "hobby" photo classes taught by Clayton Holt (he financed them himself) and turn them into a full blown Trade and Industrial photo program. I taught English and Photography for the next 35 years, also doing the yearbook the last three. I retired in 2010, and that year I was the yearbook advisor for the 50th volume of the CHS yearbook "Eyre". Since I started attending CHS in 1962 as a 9th grader, graduated in 1966. then returned as a teacher in 1975, I have personally witnessed 39 of Clearfields first 50 years.

Austria (two years)

Fly fishing in Alaska

The faces of the students