Phoenix, Arizona / Wednesday, December 25, 2024
Founded AD 1968 / $10.00

©  2024 by JPB Publishing Ltd.

Avenue Weather: Partly cloudy with possible late afternoon showers. High 63 / Low 48

On the INSIDE: Editorials A2 / Fun & Games A3 / Christmas Nostalgia A4 / Crossword A5

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Sahuaro’s annual Christmas fete endures

(BP) - Christmas tradition is alive and well at Sahuaro Elementary School as the venerable neighborhood educational institution held its annual “Winter Wonderland” festivities on December 13.
     Christmas celebrations enjoy a long and rich history at Sahuaro dating back to the school’s inception in 1960. The first holiday program held on December 20, 1960 featured choir and band performances by 5^th, 6^th and 7^th grade students in the school cafeteria and was curiously preceded by a brief PTA meeting, after which refreshments were served. Versions of the annual Sahuaro Christmas fest are believed to have been held every year of the school’s existence with the single exception of 2020.
     This year’s well-attended event featured an eclectic variety of holiday activities that included cafeteria performances by the Sahuaro Cheer Squad and Band and Strings Ensemble as volunteers busily served up hot chocolate and cookies to attendees. The school library hosted a Penguin Patch Holiday Shop with a variety of kitschy merchandise available for purchase, while just outside a snow machine generated a flurry of icy particles that did somewhat resemble actual snow.
     Room 700 was the scene for an ambitious “Wax Museum” exhibit in which students portrayed historical wax figures who come to life and answer questions about their storied backgrounds. Such illustrious luminaries as Thomas Jefferson, Harriet Tubman and Shirley Temple were among the distinguished personalities participating in the event.
     Meanwhile a lively holiday musical chairs tournament was held in the auxiliary classroom that once housed the school’s industrial arts classes. “It was a little surreal to witness a joyful and carefree game of musical chairs in that same space where Mr. Pearson once ruled his shop class with an iron fist,” noted Sahuaro School historian John Bueker.
     Mr. Bueker was on hand at the event to present Sahuaro Principal Crystal Bustamante with a copy of the flyer from that very first Sahuaro Christmas program back in 1960. “Awesome, this is so amazing,” pronounced Ms. Bustamante as she examined the document from Sahuaro’s distant past.
     Principal Bustamante, now in her fourth year at the school’s helm, took the opportunity to announce that Sahuaro is considering an event next year to mark the school’s 65^th anniversary.

 The bittersweet return of the Razzy

By J. Beaver

     A legendary Joan De Arc snack cake favorite from the distant past suddenly and unexpectedly reappeared on store shelves this past summer, igniting a rush of junk food nostalgia amongst certain former residents of the street.
     In May, Hostess Brands resurrected the old Razzys cupcakes in the form of a new hybrid snack cake they have christened “Zinger Dingers.” The new product was conceived as a “mashup” of two existing Hostess cake treats: the raspberry variety of Zingers and the Ding Dong. The resulting snack cake is essentially identical in shape and substance to the fondly remembered Razzys of yore: a cream-filled white cupcake with a raspberry jelly coating.
     Razzys hold a special place in the storied history of Joan De Arc Avenue snack foods. The artificially flavored raspberry cakes were first introduced by Dolly Madison in the late 1960s alongside two other long-forgotten cupcake-style treats: Googles and Koo Koos. The new snack cakes were initially a big hit, thanks in no small part to the popular Peanuts characters that were licensed by Dolly Madison and plastered all over the product packaging.
     Joan De Arc historian and Razzys enthusiast John Bueker notes the longstanding cultural impact of the Razzys snack cake upon street history: “The things were so popular back in the early ‘70s that my father renamed the traditional shoot-around basketball game of “HORSE” to “RAZZY.” We even had a small RAZZY trophy to award to the reigning RAZZY champ. Razzys were a memorably celebrated snack food at 3219 during those years.”
     Whether Hostess is even aware they have reintroduced the Razzy is very unclear. The company’s institutional memory may not extend to products produced as far back as the 1970s, particularly since Razzys were made by the Hostess subsidiary Dolly Madison. There is absolutely no mention of the historic Razzys brand anywhere on the new product packaging, advertising, or promotional materials, and it seems quite possible that no one at Hostess even realizes they are currently producing a product that already existed at one time in the distant past.
     Sadly, the epic nostalgia fest effected by the momentous return of Razzys has not been matched by a corresponding enthusiasm for the actual caliber of the new product. “I don’t think the quality is quite the same as it was back in 1971,” remarked John Bueker, with his trademark hint of crushingly cynical understatement. “I mean they are apparently edible, but the ingredients and execution are clearly inferior to the original Razzys. Of course, that reality applies pretty much to all snack foods and just about everything else these days.”
     Former resident Charles Bueker sampled the new snack cake in July and expressed similar misgivings: “Well there’s really no difference in the texture of the coating, the cake, and the filling. It’s all just one big mushy wad,” he concluded. “A sad reunion today."
     On a slightly more upbeat note, the misbegotten return of the Razzy has apparently not been entirely devoid of value. “I suppose there is one genuine upside to this whole sad episode,” observed John Bueker with his well-practiced sigh of wistful resignation. “It did summon up a few nice memories.”

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________JDA

On the INSIDE: Editorials A2 / Fun & Games A3 / Christmas Nostalgia A4 / Crossword A5

Moon Phases:           Last Quarter: December 30   New: January 6   First Quarter: January 13   Full: January 21