Newsletter for the Alumni and Friends of
Hicksville High School Hicksville, New York

The Editors:
Buffalo Bob Casale '61	Linda (Piccerelli) Hayden '60
Pat (Koziuk) Driscoll '56	Bob (Gleason) Wesley '61

Contributing Editors: Bob Gillette & Walter Schmidt

Webmaster: Roger Whitaker

To contact the editors, email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

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HICKSVILLE VIETNAM WAR ERA MEMORIAL - PROJECT UPDATE

Good progress is being made on starting Memorial construction, under the leadership of John Tranchina, HHS 1964 and we remain on target for an initial dedication of the Memorial's Center Stone and it's plaques, mounted on the Memorial's footers, for late spring and the final dedication of the completed Memorial with all names listed in early fall of this year. You have all seen the Center Stone Plaque in earlier HixNews updates. Below it, will now appear the recently completed plaque honoring our 17 KIA's (killed in action). Below this brief intro is a photo of the completed KIA Plaque.

Please visit the Honoring Our Veterans tab of this issue to find the full report on all Project activity, to include construction status, donations, the full list of donors to date, plus the new link mentioned above, showing the entire Confirmed List of Names, organized by class year, as it will appear on the completed Memorial.

Should you wish to make any comments on the Project's status, please email me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

On behalf of the Project Team,
Joe Carfora, HHS 1962

Pat Koziuk Driscoll: 1938-2009

In May of 2009, Hicksville Newsletter, and the community lost a true friend who worked diligently on providing former alumni with much sought after nostalgia. Pat, who graduated Hicksville High in 1956, was affectionately known as an editor of the Hicksville Newsletter. She compiled most of the material that was included in each issue of HixNews and spent countless hours copying and pasting information on multiple pages.

HixNews started out as a two or three page email that was sent to some 100 or so readers. Eventually, it evolved into a multi-page newsletter that placed onto its own website and was supported with many special features. It was fortunate that Pat saw many of the changes that surfaced over the years.

Most probably never knew Pat was not in the best of health because she was never looking for sympathy or an "attaboy!" She didn't complain but just kept going like the energizer bunny. Pat shared time with her Florida pals shopping and fraternizing despite needing special consideration over the years. Pat spent most of her last year on oxygen 24/7.

She loved her portable transportation (a golf cart) that provided the mobility she lacked because of her dependence on oxygen. Her death created a void that exists today.

Pat's efforts brought many hours of joy to HixNews readers who waited patiently each month for tidbits of information. Pat, along with Linda Piccerelli Hayden, a 1960 graduate, were the pioneers of HixNews. They spent many hours scouring through emails from former students gathering information that was typed into an email and sent out the beginning of each month.

Pat was surrounded by family when she was summoned by a higher authority. This was not at all unusual because family was her life. She spent many hours enjoying those she loved most.

The Newsletter

Photo Gallery

Birthdays & Anniversaries

Memory Lane

A Trip Down Fast Food Memory Lane

FAST FOOD RESTAURANTS back to their beginnings. White Castle was the forerunner of all of them.

I know you could not enjoy this day without knowing this trivia, but it is interesting to learn how long some of these places have been in existence. The cars are as interesting as the restaurants. Enjoy another page of history.

A&W - Opened 1919 in Lodi, California

A&W began in June 1919, at 13 Pine Street in Lodi, California, when Roy W. Allen opened his first root beer stand. Two years later, Allen began franchising the drink, arguably the first successful food-franchising operation. His profits came from a small franchise fee and sales. The following year, Allen partnered with Frank Wright to help Wright with the root beer business he had started that year. They branded their product A&W Root Beer.

Some historians and secondary school textbooks concur that A&W, which opened in 1919 and began franchising in 1921, was the first fast food restaurant (E. Tavares). Thus, the American company White Castle is generally credited with opening the second fast-food outlet in Wichita, Kansas in 1921, selling hamburgers for five cents apiece from its inception and spawning numerous competitors and emulators. What is certain, however, is that White Castle made the first significant effort to standardize the food production in, looks, and the operation of fast-food hamburger restaurants.

Burger King - Opened 1953 in Jacksonville, FloridaThe predecessor to Burger King was founded in 1953 in Jacksonville, Florida, as Insta-Burger King. After visiting the McDonald brothers' original store location in San Bernardino, California, the founders and owners (Keith J. Kramer and his wife's uncle Matthew Burns), who had purchased the rights to two pieces of equipment called "Insta" machines, opened their first restaurants. Their production model was based on one of the machines they had acquired, an oven called the "Insta-Broiler". This strategy proved so successful that they later required all of their franchises to use the device. After the company faltered in 1959, it was purchased by its Miami, Florida franchisees, James McLamore and David R. Edgerton. They initiated a corporate restructuring of the chain, first renaming the company Burger King. They ran the company as an independent entity for eight years (eventually expanding to over 250 locations in the United States ), before selling it to the Pillsbury Company in 1967.

Kentucky Fried Chicken - Opened 1930 in North Corbin, KentuckyBefore it was called KFC, Harland Sanders, began selling fried chicken from his roadside restaurant in Corbin, Kentucky, called Sanders Court & Cafe. The first "Kentucky Fried Chicken" franchise opened in Utah in 1952.

McDonald's - Opened 1937 in Monrovia, CaliforniaThe McDonald family moved from Manchester, New Hampshire to Hollywood in the late 1930s, where brothers Richard and Maurice McDonald began working as set movers and handymen at Motion-Picture studios. In 1937, their father Patrick McDonald opened "The Airdrome", a food stand, on Huntington Drive (Route 66) near the Monrovia Airport in Monrovia, California with hot dogs being one of the first items sold. Then Hamburgers came along and were ten cents with an all-you-can-drink orange juice at five cents. In 1940, Maurice and Richard ("Mac" and "Dick") moved the entire building 40 miles (64 km) east, to West 14th and 1398 North E Streets in San Bernardino, California. The restaurant was renamed "McDonald's Bar-B-Que" and had twenty-five menu items, mostly barbecue.

White Castle - Opened 1921 in Wichita, KansasWilliam Ingram's and Walter Anderson's White Castle System created the first fast food supply chain to provide meat, buns, paper goods, and other supplies to their restaurants, pioneered the concept of the multistate hamburger restaurant chain, standardized the look and construction of the restaurants themselves, and even developed a construction division that manufactured and built the chain's prefabricated restaurant buildings. The McDonalds' Speedee Service System and, much later, Ray Kroc's McDonald's outlets and Hamburger University all built on the principles, systems, and practices that White Castle had already established between 1923 and 1932.

Casale's Corner

Some good things to consider and know, coming from a retired Los Angeles County Sheriff's Deputy

Not All Thieves Are Stupid - READ these lessons

1. LONG - TERM PARKING

Some people left their car in the long-term parking at San Jose while away, and someone broke into the car. Using the information on the car's registration in the glove compartment, they drove the car to the people's home in Pebble Beach and robbed it.  So, I guess if we are going to leave the car in long-term parking, we should NOT leave the registration/insurance cards in it, nor your remote garage door opener. This gives us something to think about with all our new electronic technology.

2. GPS:

Someone had their car broken into while they were at a football game. Their car was parked on the green which was adjacent to the football stadium and specially allotted to football fans. Things stolen from the car included a garage door remote control, some money and a GPS which had been prominently mounted on the dashboard. When the victims got home, they found that their house had been ransacked and just about everything worth anything had been stolen. The thieves had used the GPS to guide them to the house.  They then used the garage remote control to open the garage door and gain entry to the house. The thieves knew the owners were at the football game, they knew what time the game was scheduled to finish and so they knew how much time they had to clean out the house. It would appear that they had brought a truck to empty the house of its contents. Something to consider if you have a GPS- don't put your home address in it.  Put a nearby address (like a store or gas station) so you can still find your way home if you need to, but no one else would know where you live if your GPS were stolen.

3. CELL PHONES:

I never thought of this! This lady has now changed her habit of how she lists her names on her cell phone after her handbag was stolen. Her handbag, which contained her cell phone, credit card, wallet, etc., was stolen. Twenty minutes later when she called her hubby, from a pay phone telling him what had happened, hubby says, "I received your text asking about our Pin number and I've replied a little while ago." When they rushed down to the bank, the bank staff told them all the money was already withdrawn. The thief had actually used the stolen cell phone to text" hubby" in the contact list and got hold of the pin number. Within 20 minutes he had withdrawn all the money from their bank account.

Moral lesson:

a. Do not disclose the relationship between you and the people in your contact list. Avoid using names like Home, Honey, Hubby, Sweetheart, Dad, Mom, etc.

b. And very importantly, when sensitive info is being asked through texts, CONFIRM by calling back.

c. Also, when you're being texted by friends or family to meet them somewhere, be sure to call back to confirm that the message came from them. If you don't reach them, be very careful about going places to meet "family and friends" who text you.

4. PURSE IN THE GROCERY CART SCAM:

A lady went grocery-shopping at a local mall and left her purse sitting in the children's seat of the cart while she reached something off a shelf/

Wait till you read the WHOLE story! Her wallet was stolen, and she reported it to the store personnel. After returning home, she received a phone call from the Mall Security to say that they had her wallet and that although there was no money in it, it did still hold her personal papers. She immediately went to pick up her wallet, only to be told by Mall Security that they had not called her. By the time she returned home again, her house had been broken into and burglarized. The thieves knew that by calling and saying they were Mall Security, they could lure her out of her house long enough for them to burglarize it.

*PLEASE PASS THIS ON*

Even if this does not pertain to you, please let your family and friends know so they don't get caught in a scam.