A long time ago, high school-ers were forcibly bussed from a small, idyllic area to an old facility in a neighboring city, Richmond or Lafayette. The result of desegregation? No! The lack of a high school to call their own. The areas known as Orinda, Moraga, Canyon and Rheem had no high school. But the 50’s were a time of building and the first graduating class, 1959, set the standards both in track and field and in academics. By 1970 those standards were completely in the dustbin, but the area did have two high schools, Miramonte and Campolindo, one good drive-in, one bowling alley, two movie theaters and the memory of a reasonable drag strip.
For the purposes of our party in 2025, all persons who attended Miramonte or Campolindo High Schools*** and were in (or should have been in) the graduating classes between 1959 and 1975 or maybe ’76 (we ‘re really too old to care) are included as ORINDA PEOPLE.
You did not have to graduate from Miramonte or Campolinda, you just had to feel like you belonged there. The actual Post Office Address of any person attending one of the high schools is not considered for inclusion as an Orinda person. A person may have resided in Canyon, the unincorporated environs of Bollinger Canyon, the care takers houses for the Upper or Lower San Pablo Reservoirs, Oakland or Berkeley.
The “All Orinda Reunion 2025” committee means no disrespect to any past or current resident of MORAGA.
In a blinding flash of the obvious, the reunion committee realized that Orinda people did exist before the first graduating class from Miramonte High School. With sincere apologies to those that graduated from Acalanes High School prior to 1959, those that rode the “Toonerville Trolley” to Mount Diablo High School prior to 1942 , those hardy Orindans that rode a school bus to Richmond High School during the dark days of World War II and those that meet the other criteria to be defined as Orinda People…You are invited to the party.