Famous local high school graduates

It was just by chance I discovered that Holdren was a Hillsdale graduate. Don Leydig, former Hillsdale principal and a Hillsdale grad himself, mentioned it some time ago. Then, last month, The New York Times published an article about Holdren’s important role: “Obama Adviser on Front Lines of Climate Fight.” Leydig reports he couldn’t provide more information, other then that Holdren was very smart, because he was a lowly sophomore when Holdren was a senior. Instead, he suggested I contact Holdren’s closest high school friend, Allan Prager. Prager wrote as follows:

“John and I met in first grade at Beresford Park School and were good friends through high school and right up to the present. John’s interest in science manifested itself early. When we were in fourth- or fifth-grade, John’s parents bought an encyclopedia set. I often rode my bike over to his house — just off the Alameda — and would find John seated cross-legged on the living room floor, reading an encyclopedia article on aeronautics, the solar system, biology or some other scientific topic.

“One of John’s lifelong avocations is fishing; these days it’s catch and release. One of our English teachers at Hillsdale gave our class an assignment to write an essay to convince. John salivated at the prospect of fishing in Crystal Springs Reservoir and wrote a passionate essay advocating that Crystal Springs be opened to fishing. In his adolescent enthusiasm, the prospect of hooking large fish right in our own backyard overshadowed the need for pure drinking water. Of course, John has gone on to become one of the nation’s experts at balancing competing needs for natural resources, but the passion for fishing remains.

“Prager, ’61, was editor of the student newspaper and student body president, while Holdren was on the tennis team and a member of the student council. Now, Prager is a volunteer board member at NatureBridge, which brings 30,000 youth and their classroom teachers to Yosemite, Golden Gate, Olympic and several other national parks each year for outdoor environmental education. His current project is to build a new sustainable, universally accessible, LEED-platinum environmental education campus in Yosemite that will be the National Park Service’s flagship for environmental education.

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Holdren earned a bachelor’s degree from MIT in 1965 and a Ph.D. from Stanford University in 1970. He taught at Harvard University for 13 years and at the University of California at Berkeley for more than two decades. He is known for his work on the causes and consequences of global climate change and on U.S. energy policies. He delivered the Nobel Peace Prize acceptance lecture on behalf of the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs in December 1995. He has also chaired the Committee on International Security and Arms Control for the National Academy of Sciences and was president of the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences.

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According to the New York Times, Holdren has had one of the more prominent careers in academia and policy making of any scientist in the land. “He has spearheaded the most recent National Climate Assessment report which painted a stark picture of the impact climate change is having on the nation.” It seems he deserves listing as a famous alum.

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No column on famous local high school grads would be complete without mentioning Serra, a private parochial school, which has a long list of famous athletes topped by Patriots quarterback Tom Brady, the Pittsburgh Steelers’ Lynn Swann, and the San Francisco Giants’ Barry Bonds. And of course there is journalist Bill Keller, former executive editor of the New York Times and Pulitzer Prize winner.

Sue Lempert is the former mayor of San Mateo. Her column runs every Monday. She can be reached at sue@smdailyjournal.com.