The following is from the February 10, 2008 edition of “The Gloucester County Times“:

Sunday, February 10, 2008

By Jessica Beym

jbeym@sjnewsco.com

MONROE TWP. Class reunions are hard enough to organize as it is, but Diane and Ron Allen are taking it up a couple notches, as they plan a multi-year high school reunion that celebrates the 50th anniversary of Williamstown High School.

The celebration, scheduled for March 28 at the Centerton Country Club in Pittsgrove, will span 17 years worth of Williamstown graduates, from 1958 to 1975.

Between those years, more than 5,000 students departed from the high school, and the Allens have tried to contact as many of them as possible. Only about 750 tickets will be available for the event.

Diane and Ron former high school sweethearts who now live in Vineland said they started thinking about planning a party of this scale about a year ago.

“It’s taken that long to find people,” said Diane Allen, class of 1965. “My husband spends day and night on the phone calling people, and I spend day and night on the computer searching.”

They’ve poured over old yearbooks from dozens of former classmates, searched through the high school alumni guide, and also relied on a bit of networking and word of mouth to track down their guests.

“We believe this is the first time that a multi-year high school event spanning 17 years has ever come together in this area,” said Diane Allen, formerly Mead. “It’s different because it engulfs a lot of people.”

And one of the only places large enough to hold them all is the Centerton Country Club. The March 28 event will begin at 6:30 p.m., and the $45 ticket includes a four-hour buffet and entertainment from Atlantic City a cappella band 45 RPM, as well as radio personality (and former graduate) “Lou Costello” of 92.1 FM. The music will be from the ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s. Allen said there will be a cash bar and also a few other surprises.

“Everybody’s getting old, so many people are passing away,” she said. “And class reunions are few and far between, and that’s usually just one class. We wanted to have an all out party.”

The Williamstown High School opened in September 1958 as the building that is now the Williamstown Middle School. The middle school has since undergone major renovations and a brand new high school was built in 1997 right behind the middle school.

For any additional information, please feel free to call Diane or Ronnie at (856) 794-8357, or e-mail WHSparty@comcast.net.To make a reservation, call the Centerton Country Club at (856) 358-3325.