Below are a few stories, photos, and interesting facts for your stroll down memory lane.

Choctawhatchee originally opened its doors in Shalimar, Florida, on September 22, 1952. It was filled over its capacity of 500 students, enrolling 625 students in grades 7 through 12. The $600,000 building was designed to hold 500 students, and was considered to be the most modern school in Northwest Florida at that time.

The school combined students from Niceville, Ft. Walton Beach, Wright, Ocean City, Shalimar and Destin.

According to Mr. Jim Leonard, Choctaw's first band director, the original site planned for the school is where the current US Air Force Armament Museum is located. Mr. Clifford Meigs, however, released the land where the school was actually built.

In the fall of 1953, Pop began wearing a headdress to football games. The following year, booster club parents purchased Pop a complete Indian outfit which he wore to pep rallies and to games. Often, his wife would join him.

As Pop grew older and had difficulty standing throughout the games, students in the wood shop made him a throne-like chair to sit in on the sidelines. Even as he grew older, Pop attended pep rallies and made a speech each time. He always ended with,"And God bless each and every one of you."

Mr. Bill Martin, a 1975 grad who is currently an art teacher and coach at Choctaw, has fond memories of Pop when Martin was a member of the football team.

â "He was a terrific guy. He made everyone feel up and happy when he was around. One special thing he did was to give all the senior cheerleaders and players bibles at the end of the season," Martin said.

Unfortunately, current students have not had the pleasure of knowing Pop. He died in 1981, but his memory and the important role he played at Choctaw will continue through the years.

The floppy disc first appeared in 1970, and the next year Intel introduced the microprocessor, the "computer on a chip." Apollo 17, the last manned craft to the moon, brought back 250 samples of rock and soil. Unmanned space probes explored the moon, Jupiter, Mars, Saturn, Uranus, and Venus. The U.S. Apollo 18 and the USSR's Soyuz 19 linked up in space to conduct joint experiments. Atari produced the first low-priced integrated circuit TV games, and the videocassette recorder (VCR) changed home entertainment forever. Jumbo jets revolutionized commercial flight, doubling passenger capacity and increasing flight range to 6,000 miles. The neutron bomb, which destroys living beings but leaves buildings intact, was developed. In medicine, ultrasound diagnostic techniques were developed. The sites of DNA production on genes were discovered, and the fledging research in genetic engineering was halted pending development of safer techniques. The first test tube baby, Louise Brown, was born, developed from an artificially inseminated egg implanted in the mother's womb.

During the 1970's the United States underwent some profound changes. First a Vice President and then a President resigned under threat of impeachment. The Vietnam War continued to divide the country even after the Paris Peace Accords in January 1973 put an end to U.S. military participation in the war. Roe v. Wade legalized abortion. Crime increased despite Nixon's pledge to make law and order a top priority of his presidency. Increased immigration followed passage of the Immigration Act of 1965, which reformed an earlier policy that favored western Europeans. People from Third World countries came to this country in search of economic betterment or to escape political repression. Women, minorities, and gays increasingly demanded full legal equality and privileges in society. Women expanded their involvement in politics. The proportion of women in state legislatures tripled. Women surpassed men in college enrollment in 1979. However, the rising divorce rate left an increasing number of women as sole breadwinners and forced more and more of them into poverty. African-Americans also made their presence felt as the number of black members in Congress increased, and cities such as Los Angeles, Detroit, and Atlanta elected their first African-American mayors. Affirmative action became a controversial policy as minorities and women asserted their rights to jobs and quality education. Native Americans began to demand attention to their plight. In 1975 the Indian Self-Determination Act encouraged Indians to take control of their own education and promote their tribal customs.

News Highlights of 1970:

• President Nixon sends combat units into Cambodia.
• At Kent State University, National Guardsmen fire into a crowd protesting the Vietnam War, killing four and wounding eight.
• Homosexuals march from New York's Greenwich Village to Central Park demonstrating for gay rights.
• In New York, the nation's most liberal abortion law goes into effect.
• A parade of 10,000 women in New York celebrate the 50th anniversary of the passing of the 19th Amendment.
• FBI agents arrest American Communist Angela Davis at a midtown Manhattan motel.
• Anwar Sadat is elected president of the United Arab Republic (Egypt).
• One million cans of tuna are recalled by the FDA because of mercury contamination.

By the 1970's, the term "rock & roll" had become nearly meaningless. This decade saw the breakup of the Beatles and the death of Elvis Presley, robbing rock of two major influences. Pop music splintered into a multitude of styles: soft-rock, hard rock, country rock, folk rock, punk rock, shock rock - and the dance craze of the decade, disco! But whatever sub-genre(s) you preferred, rock music was big business. Among the top names in popular music were Aerosmith, the Bee Gees, David Bowie, Jackson Browne, Alice Cooper, Eagles, Electric Light Orchestra, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Fleetwood Mac, Billy Joel, Elton John, Led Zeppelin, John Lennon, Pink Floyd, Bob Seger, Bruce Springsteen, Rod Stewart,Three Dog Night, and The Who. "Easy listening" regained popularity with groups such as the Carpenters, and Bob Marley gained a huge core of fans in the U.S. performing Jamaican reggae music.

Other Music Highlights of 1970:

• Religious themes start to appear in songs like "Spirit In The Sky" by Norman Greenbaum, "Let It Be" by the Beatles, "My Sweet Lord" by George Harrison, and the play Jesus Christ Superstar.
• Rumors begin to circulate that the Beatles will be breaking up because of differences between Paul and John. Paul releases a homemade album titled McCartney that goes on to become a number one hit.
• Rod Stewart and Ron Wood leave the disintegrating Jeff Beck Group to join the Small Faces, now simply called the Faces.
• Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young record "Ohio" to draw attention to the wasteful killing of four young students of the Ohio National Guard at a Kent State University war protest rally.
• American Top 40, a syndicated radio show counting down the Top 40 singles each week as ranked by Billboard magazine, debuts. Host Casey Kasem will remain with the show for 18 years.
• On Wednesday, May 20, the Beatles' last film, Let It Be, premieres in London at the Palladium.
• The Rolling Stones leave London Records to form their own label, Rolling Stones Records.

On September 25, 1970, ABC premiered The Partridge Family, a half-hour sitcom about five kids and their mother who decided to form a rock 'n' roll band (the premise, of course, was stolen directly from the real-life story of a sixties family act, the Cowsills). As in another Screen Gems production, The Monkees, an integral part of each episode was the performance of new songs, released concurrently by Bell Records. The first Partridge Family single, "I Think I Love You," sold over four million copies, and there were ten more hits before the series was cancelled in 1974.

The Top 20 Television Shows of 1970:

1 Marcus Welby, M.D.
2 The Flip Wilson Show
3 Here's Lucy
4 Ironside
5 Gunsmoke
6 The ABC Movie of the Week
7 Hawaii Five-O
8 Medical Center
9 Bonanza
10 The F.B.I.
11 The Mod Squad
12 Adam 12
13 Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In
14 The Wonderful World of Disney
15 Mayberry R.F.D.
16 Hee Haw
17 Mannix
18 The Men from Shiloh
19 My Three Sons
20 The Doris Day Show