When Bellevue High School’s class of 1964 saw the floating bridge open on Aug. 28, 1963, the last thing on their minds was where they would be in 53 years.
And yet, several dozen of them used last weekend’s grand opening of the new Governor Albert D. Rosellini Bridge (better known as the State Route 520 bridge) to relive a bit of their past by gathering and crossing the bridge.
“We used to be able to drive on the bridge when there was a huge hole between the two sides,” said Kathy Rozzini, Class of ’64. “You couldn’t do that today.”
Many of those Wolverines’ bridge memories involved some teenage rebellion, but they assume the statue of limitations has run its course.
Like Pete Holbrook, who used to race on the incomplete bridge and who drove to the edge in a Corvair Spyder and went swimming from open end to open end with friend Dean Albertson just because they could.
The “world’s longest floating bridge” opened Saturday, April 2 for a 10-kilometer race. More than 13,000 people participated.
In 1964, the entire population of Bellevue was somewhere near 13,000.
“Some people had come back for the first time almost since they graduated,” Rozzini said. “Nothing is recognizable anymore.”
Rozzini remains a Bellevue resident and said the downtown looks so different, she can get turned around.
The old bridge had many fond memories for people like Katherine Reed Carlyle, who lived on Evergreen Point Road and used to walk to the bridge with her father to see the progress, or Bette Blackie, who — pregnant with her son in January 1969 as a University of Washington student — had to get a police escort across the snow-covered and closed bridge to give birth at the University hospital (for the sum of $200).
More than 40 Wolverines of ’64 crossed the bridge, a somewhat difficult task for some of the 70-year-olds.
“I’d never done anything like this before,” Rozzini said. “I wasn’t sure I could make it. By the time we got back, it took a whole minute just to bend our stiff knees to get back in the car.”
Organization of the event was hit-or-miss, she said, but with her crew near the rear, the traffic jam at the front of the race was never an issue.
The Class of ’64 was the largest at that time in Bellevue High School’s history, with 355 students marking the first wave of the Baby Boomers.
This generation of risk takers included Jim Clodfelter, who had received a 1962 Chevy SS from his parents for his 18th birthday. After graduation he decided to see how fast that thing could go. A hair-raising 106-mph later, he finally backed off the gas pedal on the empty bridge.
Or Lee Griffing, who learned to barefoot water ski next to the bridge and once ran out of gas while crossing “when I was young and irresponsible, unlike today when I’m old and irresponsible.”
And after the many reminiscing tales of teenage wildness, there was only one place for the Bellevue High School Class of ’64 to go.
The Bellevue Dairy Queen was a landmark for decades until it was torn down to make way for the Bravern in Downtown, so Bellevue’s Burgermaster — serving Seattle-area residents since the 1950s — was an easy choice, Rozzini said.
Even if — much like the rest of Bellevue — the art on the walls is a little different.
