The 85-year-old Palo Alto High School gym — home to state championship sports teams, hundreds of school dances and fond memories of youthful misadventures — is scheduled to meet the wrecking ball this summer.

In a multimedia retrospective on the gym’s rich history, read about sports highlights throughout the years, the gym’s parallel history as a venue for non-athletic events, historic and current photographs, audio clips of graduates’ memories, a timeline detailing the gym’s history and more.

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21 Comments

  1. I attended Paly in the 1980’s. I would have attended Gunn, but moved across town. I was new to school and knew only a few students from summer in Children’s Theater. My very first impression of Paly was standing in front of the gym to register. There were long lines, but beautiful weather and friendly people. We had most of our dances in the gym, too. As I recall, the last dance was usually Stairway to Heaven or something like that and the lights would slowly turn on, getting brighter. That was a very quick way to kill the mood.

  2. watching my boy peter dipenbrock coach and yelling “WHAT ARE YOU DOOOOOOOOOOING!” OR “GET ON THE GROUND” or my favorite “VERYYYYYYYYYYYYYY NIIIIIIIIIIIICE!!! BRRRRRRRRRRRRRA

  4. We have many fond memories of the Paly Gym but the one that will be with us forever will be the memorial service for our son, Travis Brewer. He loved everything about Paly sports. It meant so much to our family that we could celebrate his life at the gym with all of the people that he loved and loved him. Thank you, The Brewer Family

  6. How about Oregon’s Senior Senator Ron Wyden and the late Charlie Johnson (NBA and Cal star) of Sequoia’s epic back and forth battle in the let 60’s – packed house, league title, scoring championship. One of the greatest Bay Area high school games!

  7. It’s fitting in what will probably be the final basketball game in the Paly Gym will feature two teams who played in the gym when it first opened as Paly will host Sequoia tonight in the CCS Playoffs.

  8. I HAVE DONE THE SHOTCLOCK FOR MORE THAN 10 YEARS IN THE GYM. I DID THE SHOTCLOCK FOR JEREMY LIN AND THE 20005-06 BOYS BASKETBALL STATE TITLE TEAM. I HAVE WORKED IN THE GYM FOR MORE THAN 10 YEARS. I WILL MISS THE GYM A LOT. I ALSO WENT TO PALY.

  9. I always feared this day would come. Nursing the same sick feeling as when the Stanford stadium came down. The sentimental in me wishes we could somehow save the shell, the wooden bleachers, and the original hardwood floors and build around it. Suppose though in the end, its demise aligns with Earl’s retirement, and alas a new chapter @ Paly begins.

  10. The reality is that the old gym needs so much retrofitting (infrastructure, earthquake, etc.) that the costs are just too high compared to what can be built new.

  11. I was a choir person, not a sports person. I was in charge of the Winter Dance in 1976. We decorated the gym and it looked lovely. Sorry to see it go.

  12. The Weekly should get a cliche checker. Works like spellcheck but it detects worn out phrases like “end of an era.”

  13. I think it stinks that yet another building that is unique and special to the community is being destroyed instead of enhanced and protected. I hate the generic quality of Palo Alto these days. Ostentatious shows of wealth are the norm now. Who cares about the history and character of this building? So much being destroyed. Like the gorgeous California Craftsman on Churchill that was hollowed out to be made into a GARAGE. That home had been well cared for, had beautiful aspects right down to the parquet floor. Change, when it makes our identity generic, isn’t always good. Maybe they should have put in solar paneled parking structures before wasting money on the gym. That is actually useful.

  14. A couple of memories…

    I graduated in 1972 and played basketball in the old gym (Clem Wiser and Ken White were the coaches back then with Jon White one of our star players). We had those gut-wrenching “line drills” where you sprinted back-and-forth between the baselines and the free-throw and mid-court lines. Many of us thought that the puke-green colors of the gym came from the after-effects of these line drills…

    Mark Soltau and Tom Stienstra were also on the team and in a bizarre look-back, all three of us ended up working in the media/newspaper profession (I was the only one who couldn’t make the grade in an editorial capacity).

    During my first year as a sophomore (don’t meant to suggest that I was a sophomore more than one year but remember back then Paly was a three-year school and did not have a freshmen class), the KEY club (Kiwanis Educates Youth) sponsored a 24-hour marathon basketball game fund-raiser. We had an announcer and several of us spent the night in those famed bleachers. As daybreak came, I remember waking up to hear the announcer playing the son g “Here Comes The Sun” over the loudspeaker.

    Gonna miss that gym but not the line drills…

  15. The main thing most of us remember is Earl Hansen acting like an entitled jerk. You’re a measly gym teacher, get over yourself and start treating others with some respect.

  16. I visited that gym once back in 1967 and had a great time. After attempting but failing to sneak into the Stanford/UCLA basketball game (Lew Alcindor’s first year) we headed to Paly to watch the two top teams of the PAL – Paly and Sequoia. Actually it was a game featuring a very good and big Paly team versus the best player in the league – Charles Johnson. The place was rocking – full of Paly and Sequoia fans along with a few of us from Gunn. Regulation ended in a tie and in overtime Paly outscored Johnson 10-8, so Paly won the game. That was the best high school basketball games I ever watched.

  17. I spent one year at Paly (80) after Cubberley closed. I have fond memories of basketball games in the gym, dances and our team locker rooms, It will be missed,

  19. I DID THE SHOT CLOCK FOR SO MANY YEARS AT PALY AND STILL DO IT FOR PALY AND I DID THE SHOT CLOCK WHEN JEREMY LIN, WHEN HE PLAYED BASKETBALL AT PALY AND I DID THE SHOT CLOCK FOR THE PALY BOYS STATE BASKETBALL CHAMPS IN 2005/2006 SEASON. WENT TO PALY IN THE 90’S

  20. I DID THE SHOT CLOCK FOR SO MANY YEARS AT PALY AND STILL DO IT FOR PALY AND I DID THE SHOT CLOCK WHEN JEREMY LIN, WHEN HE PLAYED BASKETBALL AT PALY AND I DID THE SHOT CLOCK FOR THE PALY BOYS STATE BASKETBALL CHAMPS IN 2005/2006 SEASON. WENT TO PALY IN THE 90’S

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