Oakdale HS
The Oakdale High School (Oakdale, CA) student newspaper was known as the Arcadet. Traditionally, a normal, newsprint tabloid, my Senior year a funny thing happened; we couldn’t afford anything in the way of production values.
This meant we were left with whatever we could do on an idiosyncratic offset press. Given low expectations for the product, and our impish new faculty advisor, Eugene Conrotto, thus began one of the oddest years of newspapers you can imagine. It was a hoot, in the end, for me as Editor. Given the crises of deadlines and empty space, I was able (forced, really) to try most everything. Mr. Conrotto taught me a lot…and I’m forever disappointed I didn’t end up at the New Yorker.
More production notes to follow, if you’re interested (or not). Suffice to say, this was just before all the computer stuff turned printing on its head. We did our best with what we had….
As I find issues, I’ll add here, in case you want to frighten your grandkids. If you have some I don’t, let me know. I you want an original, I may have a few extras of some. NOTE: files can be 3mb or more.
 Arcadet 9-20-74 No. 1--Football "centerfold," new teachers & exchange students. |
 Arcadet 10-1-74 No. 3 |
 Arcadet 10-8-74 No. 4 -- Rah-rah royalty "centerfold" |
 Arcadet 10-20-74 No. 6 -- Featuring "centerfold", editorial |
 Arcadet 10-29-74 No. 7 -- Space-filling editorial... |
 Arcadet 11-5-74 No. 8 -- Letters! & Conrotto waxes poetic |
 Arcadet 11-12-74 No. 9 -- Format explained |
 Arcadet 12-13-74 -- Program for the 'non-rally' |
 Arcadet 12-20-74 No. 12 -- The ol' 'continued' gag, re-rebuttals |
 Arcadet 10-15-74 No. 5 -- Faculty test; more letters... |
 Arcadet 11-19-74 No. 10 -- Faculty test; more letters... |
 Program for "Wizard of Oz" play. |
 Arcadet 11-26-74 No. 11 -- History of "The Slab" (not sure issue's complete). |
 Arcadet 1-21-75 No. 13 -- Re-re-rebuttal; letters. |
 Arcadet 2-5-75 No. 14 -- More Zane; entertainment page. |
 Arcadet 2-14-75 No. 15 -- Valentines; L. Brown; budget woes. |
 Arcadet 2-25-75 No. 16 -- FAA special. |
 Arcadet 03-75 No. 17 -- CSF, Don Viss, cartoons, and more. |
 Arcadet 04-75 No. 18 -- Creative filler (and there WAS a "Borax Kid" movie...) |
 Program for Art Show (was there a "2nd annual"?) |
 Arcadet 05-75 No. 19 -- Senior wills, parting shots from Zane and me.... |
 Asilomar Girls' campaign piece (see issue 17) |
 Pete Viss campaign brochure |
Dan: I have some duplicate OHS annuals that you are welcome to. Give me a call–523-5907…
The Arcadet assignment was a pain in the ass–no equipment, no budget…
The one thing I was proud of was our “silent rally” (your printed-in-red “Non Rally”) in which we had a special issue of the Arcadet with canned dialog by the numbers. It was the usual stuff: Coach: “We’re going to kill our opponents tonight. What do you think X?” X: “Ah, gee, er, I guess so…” I recall the highlight (for me) was when one of our kids came out with a sign that read: “Come On Oakdale, Show them you can read!!!” I grew to have a profound distaste for high school athletics, especially grown men playing teenager roles.
Aha! But do you know what happened to that epic “The Borax Kid”?