Ann+Karasek

Interview with Ann Karasek Class of ‘73

Ann Karasek graduated from Belleville West High School in 1973. She married her high school sweetheart, Gary Karasek, in 1980. Together they had one child named Aynanna. Ann received her degree in Early Childhood Education but currently works as a Visiting Angel for people, usually the elderly, in need of care. Ann as a senior in 1973
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media type="file" key="interview part 1.mp3"interview part 1 media type="file" key="interview part 2.mp3"interview part 2 media type="file" key="intervie part 3.mp3"interview part 3 Toi: What was your favorite memory of high school? Ann: Theater Toi: Theater? Ann: Theater Toi: That’s awesome. Toi: Did you have a high school sweetheart? Ann: Well Gary and I met in high school. And so we dated, it was like we didn’t meet until the play started we started working on the play so we did date. He took me to the prom, I was only a sophomore. Toi: Really, that’s awesome. Ann: We dated for the summer and then, um, he went off to the U of I and I was this big junior so I thought I’ll date other people. Nobody. (laughs) But, so I did have a high school sweetheart and, after high school dated a couple other guys so… Toi: Ok. Awesome, and what clubs did you participate in? Ann: I did theater. They pulled me in my sophomore year. One of the seniors did to do, I got to usher for, it was the sophomore play was the children’s play in the winter and then I worked really hard and got assigned on multiple committees for the spring musical which was still the senior musical (laughs). Back then and I also did student council my senior year. We had, back then for ages there had been something called the Junior Jam it was in the fall and just the juniors, the juniors worked all summer on it. And then you performed it, I think it was in October, and that was to make money for our, juniors did the prom in the spring then so that was really fun. I got very involved with that, and um, I don’t know if Mrs. Mueth, Jane Mueth anywhere in the theater records anymore Amanda: Yeah I’ve found that name a lot Ann: Jane and I became really good friends, I actually was in that freshman class she student taught in when I was a freshman. Toi: Really? Ann: Which was really special and then she worked with us on our Junior Jam and there was also a senior finale back in the late 60s that was called the hootenanny. And it was just, it was a talent show, not for competition but just the seniors getting to give back, no scenery type thing, and we changed it to the senior finale and a, or just finale and Jane worked on that with us too. So just a really special lady, I’d forget she had crutches and polio and you know so, “Oh come ride my new bike!” and which she took as a, it wasn’t a, it was with great respect that I forgot that she couldn’t she was such a great person Toi: Right, yeah, she was that great of a person. Ann: I worked on Bellevinois Amanda: Do you remember what your first show was, with theater? Ann: Yes, I remember going to see the shows my freshman year. That was //Anne Frank//, and then //Finnia//n. Toi: Really, //Anne Frank//?//,// I love that Ann: Oh that was, they did such a good job, it was in the fall and then I worked on //South Pacific,// and, well I ushered like I said, for um, //Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs// and that was just sophomores when it was a sophomore play, the children’s play now. And then I worked on, I wasn’t into anything in between at that point, and then I did work a lot on //South Pacific// so which was the senior musical Toi: Really, so what was that about, //South Pacific?// Ann: That’s um, Rogers and Hammerstein, and it’s about during World War Two, mostly Air Force, but um, this one man goes over to help um, to help them win the war. And there’s a French gentlemen, and one of the nurses falls in, one of the American nurses, falls in love with the French planter who had left France because he had killed a man. The man was one of those people who was making life very difficult for everybody, not that killing is ever justified but it was more of a self defense but still, at that time he needed to run. So he had been there for a long time, he had children with his first wife, who was one of the Tonkaneesee, ladies, so that was a bit, well prejudice back then, predjudice back then? And um, I mean uh, I mean that, Toi: No, I know what you mean Ann: I imagine you understand and hopefully its, its, well um, I always say the audacity of the Caucasian race! Toi: Yeah Ann: But anyway, um, she had to deal with his daughter and his son being more Tonkaneessee than the Caucasian Frenchman and she overcame that and she and the, um, American, who was her friend that came over to help. I forgot who all was who as far as branches of the service but they talked about, there’s a song about you have to be carefully taught to have prejudice. And then there’s the whole Luther Bella stuff and he’s, he’s the funny guy and um, so just a really, just check out even, its on DVD, and most recently Glenn Close made it on one for television and you can check that out of the library. But even just to listen to the music. Toi: Oh really, a lot of good music? Ann: You will, you will. Across a crowded room and, oh now I’m blanking (laughs), part of my personality. But did that give you a bit of a story line? Toi: Yeah that’s really good. So like how many theatre plays were you in, just altogether, can you remember that? Ann: Backstage, they did get me up on stage for one little scene in that Junior Jam and then Jane got me up there, we finished our finale with, somebody read the poem, or we had to memorize, //The Box//, by John Denver, about war, and she wore black and stood on the one side of the stage and then they had me counterpointed afterwards with um, most of first Kurrenthians thirteen. And they had me in white then, and then we sang, the whole cast came out and sang our finale song, Toi: Really? So you were more of backstage? Ann: Absolutely! In fact, all of my, all of my thespian hours were backstage Toi: Oh really? Amanda: Oh so you are a thespian? Ann: Yes m’am. Fall of ’72, no fall of ’71 cause I was a junior. So have you made thespian yet? Amanda: Yes I did Ann: Congradulations Amanda: Last spring Ann: Oh so you made it as a freshmen, as a.. Amanda: sophomore Toi: So what is thespian? Ann: She did it with far more hours than I did Amanda: Yeah, you guys only had to do 200? Ann: 200 Toi: Now you have to do? Amanda: We have to do 300 now Toi: Oh wow Ann: And definitely still the backstage, has to be a component and its just hours that, they keep track of all the hours. I suppose you still do, tally those up, and then the thespian troupe does a vote even still if the hours are adequate, and then they announce in the fall and in the spring after the plays. Toi: Ok, that’s wonderful, that’s awesome. Who was your favorite teacher and why? Ann: Probably Jane. Dr., oh, Mrs. Mueth, I also liked Dr. Huntsaker very much. And he directed till ’95 I think, was his last show and he also did the debate team, coached debate, and, I know he’s way back in yearbooks, farther back, so he was there for several, several decades. Amanda: I think he started in ’58 or 9 maybe Ann: oh my goodness! Ok, ok, and I got there in ’69 for my freshman show. I got to student direct then, a couple of his contest plays. So we got really well aquatinted and I actually, by the odd of the draw, I ended up with him both for my, the communications class that we take when were sophomores, which started when I was there. He wrote the book. And they use it all over, what was that called? Something comm. Amanda: Oral Comm Ann: Oral Comm. He wrote the book and my daughter recognized his name cause I talked about him and then she got to meet him. Toi: The Oral Communications Book? Ann: Mmm-hmm. He was one of the authors and then I had him for that and then I had him my senior year for speech so we had gotten well aquatinted over time but so Ayanna got to meet him, we came to see the last show. ’03, it was //Hello Dolly//. And brought my daughter and her friend out at East and they were sophomores and so she got to meet Dr. Huntsaker. But it gets better, when she was doing shows out at Looking Glass Playhouse in Lebanon, she got to be in a show with Dr. Huntsaker and his wife, Pat. They did //Your Town// and he was the villain. And she was in the chorus with them and I had gone out for tryouts, um, just to watch, worked on set and things too, but during the, they had a break during tryouts and Dr. comes over and he goes, “I knew just who that one belonged to when she got up on the stage.” She looks a lot like I did when I was a teenager. His wife and Ayanna were both in the chorus which, if your, //Your in Town// sounds awful but it is a wonderful show, just, I don’t even know how to explain it but the messages in it and music from all kinds of musicals and if you heard the music all over, just all kinds. You’ll go, oh that ones from Le Mis oh that ones in the style of and a gentlemen from Belleville East who graduated I think in the ‘80s wrote it. So 201, we’re good. Pat and Ayanna, Mrs. Huntsaker and Ayanna, just bonded and had the best time and that was a, a lot of people who usually have the leads just wanted to be in the chorus because the chorus has the most fun in that show and one gal, well the director, out at Signal Hill, Liz Murphy, she said, you know, we would have done this show, 8 performances, if nobody was in the audience. It was just that much fun to do together. There’s even a gospel number where they get them all up there like a choir and they sing so anyway that was not what we’re doing here but that was just a really fun connection. So probably, it would be my theatre teachers. Toi: That’s awesome. Did they teach you anything in particular that was really special or really touched you? Ann: Dr., was always one to push. To push you to do better, you know, there are no small parts, just small actors, and suffer for your art!, was always a comment if anybody complained. When we did, we also did shows with cathedral players in downtown Belleville at the McCormick Center there. Some of the gals came back who had been Belleville West graduates, a couple decades after I was and always, she had gone to collage out in New York and she said it was amazing what little theatre taught, that she got out there and, students had no idea of that work ethic, or that, what was appropriate, so very much theater trained. And then I know thespians went on to do workshops and things even more than, we just had Dr. and all of them telling us to be in line, but I know when Zach Rogers was in the thespian troupe and he’s one of the directors at East now, they would have workshops. I remember, Ayanna and Zach got to be in //The Wizard of Oz// together. He was a teenage Ozian and she was one of the munchkins, somebody, ’05 at West, two of them were munchkins, but anyway, I can’t think of his name. He always had the small roles, when you all did //Finian// he had the little Puck role or whatever, not Puck, that’s Shakespeare. I’ve rambled and lost my place Toi. Toi: That’s ok. What was your favorite subject in school? Ann: Did I have a favorite, I liked the extra-curricular things. Toi: Who didn’t? Ann: Math and science, I avoided the hard sciences, confession. I didn’t go too far with math. What did I enjoy? I don’t know that there was, I did my work, I worked hard Toi: To get good grades, I understand Ann: Yeah, I don’t know that I was a big fan of what I was doing. I actually went through the twelve years on the memorize and forget and that wasn’t smart so when I got to college I decided, well I guess I went through fourteen years on that, when I finally realized what I wanted to do at the time and went to SIU it was like, and I was two years deciding so I was twenty-one before I even got to the university, and it was like, ok I’m doing this for me this time and I’m gonna learn what I need to learn and get it so… Toi: What was your favorite clothing and hairstyle to wear? Ann: I had a weird one, but I wore it proudly. I like to braid my hair down on each side and then cinch them together on the top of my head. There was also the wide pants, we got to wear pants my freshmen year, that changed over in the winter. The bell bottom pants were wonderful. I wasn’t allowed to wear jeans, my family didn’t allow me to wear jeans. I don’t know why but they didn’t. I had to borrow jeans from my neighbors to wear backstage for theatre. I had a really fun pair of plaid pants and my mother had made me a knit vest, vest were in style back then. Toi: Who was your favorite celebrity back then? Ann: Robert Redford and Barbra Strisand were good in things, so probably then. Toi: What were the latest movies and television shows? Ann: I think we were still watching //Laughing,// and shows like //Roda//, my whole family got dressed up for the wedding. The string came out, that was a good one. Toi: So what was your best year of high school? Ann: Junior year, I think its gotten worse now days, but that’s the year I really got involved with things. Toi: What was your hardest year? Ann: Our senior class president died our senior year the week of the musical, //Hello Dolly//. She had had cancer since sophomore year. We dedicated the show to her then. Robbie Shott. I took a summer typing class and got a below average grade which kept me out of National Honor Society, so that disappointed me. Then I took it again my senior year with an audit and aced it. So that was disappointing. Toi: What were some of your goals and achievements in high school? Ann: I guess it was always doing my best at things. I got to work on the bellevinois as a senior. Toi: What was your plan when you graduated high school? Ann: I was headed for Eastern at one point. Then they offered me a job at SWIC so I ended up going there. Toi: So what did your career end up being? Ann: Well I was working with the little kids at church so I thought, Early Childhood! I never really gained the skills of how to control the masses though. I use those skills now because I’m a visiting angel now that says with seniors in need of help. Toi: How old were you when you got married? Ann: 25 It was 1980. He was two years ahead of me in school. Toi: Any regrets during your whole high school experience? Ann: That typing class. I probably should have challenged myself to some of the harder classes. There are some people I would have liked to know better. Toi: Do you have any advice for students about to graduate high school? Ann: Study for yourself. You have to do what’s expected to get the grade but you should really be doing what you like by then so just do it for yourself. Toi: What was some beneficial advice given to you while in high school? Ann: Remember what its like as a freshmen so when you’re an upperclassmen you can be kind to those below you. Also, just get involved. Toi: Did you continue theatre in high school? Ann: No, I did some stuff at Looking Glass Theatre. That’s when I got back into it. Toi: How did you feel when your principal called your name to receive your diploma? Ann: They were reseeding the stadium the year we graduated so we sat in the endzone and when they called our names we walked on plywood up to get our diplomas. I think they took down the goal posts. I actually got to give the benediction at graduation so that was neat. I got to write my own prayer.

Toi: So you guys tended to be more of free spirit type thing? Ann: Maybe that was the wrong term. When I found out about a friend doing drugs it would just break my heart. I was very fortuned that my friends were never really into that. Drinking happened but that still happened now. The long hair was in. One boy actually got in trouble for shaving his head bald on a dare and got in trouble for causing a disturbance. We weren’t really into the sleeping around part of free love or free spirit though. Toi: What can you say you learned from your entire high school experience? Ann: I really enjoyed it. I think I was set up to enjoy it because my parents graduated in the 40’s. I was set up to respect high school and enjoy it. Toi: There was a lot going on with politics at the time. How did you and your family feel about Nixon as president? Ann: We didn’t really talk about it much. I remember ironing the day he resigned and watching it on the television. We had neighbors in Vietnam. I think it mostly just hurt that they had lied, but everyone lied. We didn’t really talk about it interestingly enough. Toi: What was your feeling on Vietnam and foreign policy? Ann: it was just really hard. It was really sad losing all those lives and it wasn’t really our war to be there. It was the first war that was on the news so we were living it in our living room. The worst was when they came back and people rejected them.