What is 57Ripple?

For many years now in early December my sister, Lorraine Sheffield, has been hosting a Christmas party (aka extravaganza, aka debauchery) at her house in Toronto. Some of the attendees include our other siblings and high school friends who now live in the GTA.  Inevitably, after a few glasses of wine, Lorraine's high school year books come out and the idea of having a party in Collingwood and inviting all of our old friends gets tossed around.  But, noobody has actually ever followed up on the idea.

In early 2007 some well known childhood and high school friends of the Sheffield kids turned 50, the Fish twins, Dennis and Dave, and the Murray twins, Ronny and Donny. They hosted a joint party at the Legion in Collingwood on January 6, 2007 and it was on that night that the concept of having a big 50th birthday party for all of us born around 1957 began to take shape. Kim Brown (Jowett) & her better half Roy, Tom Murray, Mike Laughlin, Bill Owens and I were sitting together at a table at around 2:00 a.m. when the name 57Ripple was hatched. "For those born around 1957 and those sucked into our void by the ripple effect."

Once again the idea was put on the back burner, that is until Thanksgiving Sunday, October 8, 2007.  As usual the Sheffield clan had gathered at the old homestead in Collingwood and, as you may recall, the weather was unusually warm for that time of year.  A few of us were sitting outside watching the kids play in the leaves when a friend of ours, Julie Weldon, happened to drive by and stopped to chat.  Well, one thing lead to another and an hour or two later the topic of having a get-together with the people we grew up with reared its persistent head yet again.  Julie was very enthused about the idea and she gave us the kick in the pants that we needed to bring this thing to fruition.

It was decided that day to hold the party during the high school reunion week in the summer of 2008 and the following week Lorraine made the first real commitment to the party by booking the 380-person-capacity hall at the Legion for the night of June 27, 2008. We have been tossing around ideas and working on the logistics since that time.

More recently, our sister Eunice came up with the idea of using this event as a vehicle to make a donation to the high school that we all went to, specifically to the Athletic Department.  Since all of the Sheffield kids played on at least one of the sports teams at CCI and the party is taking place during the high school reunion weekend, in hindsight Eunice's idea seems like such a no-brainer.  So, now we have a cause.

This party is open to ANYONE we've ever met, their friends and their friends too.  We do hope that you will try to join us. Don't worry about the 1957 thing as that's just the name we chose for lack of a better one.

Should be a HOOT.  Get it?

As Kurt Vonnegut Jr. would say ... "And so on."