- December 4, 2025
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Are you Ocoee or Lakeview?
It’s a question the students in the West Orange High School Class of 1976 often asked in the first days of school as the high school opened its doors for the first time.
The question garnered feelings of contempt, no matter which side a student fell on, as Ocoee and Lakeview high schools were crosstown rivals.
In the 50 years since the opening of West Orange High School, both original Ocoee and Lakeview high school buildings have become middle schools.
Now, as the West Orange High School Class of 1976 prepares for its 50th reunion and the celebration of the school’s 50th anniversary, the sentiment of rivalry has changed.
Today, “Are you Ocoee or Lakeview?” no longer represents a bitter rivalry. Rather, it’s a question that comes from a place of genuine curiosity of their former classmates’ background to gain familiarity as they reunite, sometimes for the first time since they turned their tassels.
The merging of students from Lakeview and Ocoee high schools to form the student body of the new West Orange High wasn’t smooth.
Because the construction of West Orange was not complete until the middle of the 1975-1976 school year, the students of this new high school had to remain on Lakeview High’s campus for the first semester.
“If we had all started at West Orange Day One, within two or three months, we would have been a lot more meshed, but because of starting at Lakeview and the fights and because every day we didn’t want to be at Lakeview, I think that put us behind,” Mari (Underwood) Van Dyke said.
Even the football games were played at Lakeview High, because West Orange’s stadium had not yet been built, which fueled the tension, football player Greg Kannon said.
Gloria (Arabia) Hardee had moved from New Jersey the summer before her senior year in 1975. She said she immediately could sense the tension among students coming from the rival schools, but she took it upon herself to become friends with everyone. She was asked to be a member of the yearbook club, and that’s where she was able to meet so many different people.
“I never felt alienated or anything like that,” she said. “It was just that I didn’t come from one of the cliques.”
Some students in groups such as chorus, band and the football team were able to come together before the school year started, which Dinah (Tompkins) Carboneau said helped to unify the student body.
Coming together during rehearsals and practices before school started allowed the students to get to know one another.
“Teams that play together stay together,” Kannon said. “That helped for the athletes, and it also helped that West Orange’s first football team went to the state playoffs and lost to the eventual No. 1 high school team in the nation. That there was a unifying factor.”
Kannon said he had mixed feelings about being on the West Orange football team. Both his parents and all his aunts and uncles attended Lakeview.
“So, there was this long connection and tradition there, but it was just something new, fresh and there was no animosity between the schools that you attended,” he said. “It was West Orange and us against the world. We won a lot, and for both schools, that was unusual. … Even the football team had a mixture of coaches from both schools, and so it was the first football team. There was pride there, but winning helps everything.”
Students moved to West Orange High School for second semester. Finally being in their new home allowed students to mesh more and become a more unified senior class.
As the new school, the senior class was the largest in the county with at least 250 graduates. Although they had at least five months on their new campus, by graduation, students still didn’t know some of the classmates standing next to them.
Hardee recalled meeting Randy Anderson on graduation day as they were seated next to each other.
“To this day, he still says every time he sees me, ‘I still can’t believe that the first time I met you was when we were sitting in graduation,’” she said. “What a memory.”
A new school meant everything was new.
Van Dyke said it was fun to have a new campus, although all the students had a hard time navigating it as the classrooms were in a pod system of three circles and there were no windows in the building.
“It was total confusion; it was crazy,” she said. “We didn’t know where we were going. We didn’t know what we were doing. … I kept looking at something up top, maybe the lockers or something that helped me try and figure out which circle I was in. Then I was like ‘Wait, where’s the library?’ Because the library was in the center, so if I could find the library, I could find my way. I don’t think we got any work done until after the first week.”
Kannon recalled being amazed at the size of the cafeteria. There were two “gigantic rooms” with four lunch lines and round tables compared to Lakeview’s small room, oblong tables and one lunch line.
He also recalled carpeting going up to the ceiling on the walls, which he said was bizarre.
There were temporary partition walls to allow for a classroom to be made bigger, but Hardee said it was terrible for sound as students could hear the teacher next door.
Backpacks weren’t used, so they had to carry multiple textbooks at once, because there only were five minutes in the passing periods and finding their lockers was a challenge.
“We all have neck and shoulder problems now,” Kannon joked.
As the first graduating class, the Class of 1976 took part in building a foundation and starting a legacy for thousands of students to come.
As Carboneau looked at a copy of the original school crest, she recalled sitting in English class at Lakeview High voting on the school colors and the mascot. They also helped to write the school’s fight song and alma mater.
“It was like alliteration, West Orange Warrior,” she said of figuring out the mascot. “I think wolverine or something was one of the other names. It went along with the alliteration thing. It still would have been the West Orange Wolverines.”
She laughed after Kannon pointed out that the warrior image that serves as the school’s current logo was on the shield of the warrior on the crest. She had never noticed the detail before.
Carboneau and Walker said helping to choose the various elements of the school was thrilling.
“We were the first class, and we got to pick the mascot and the colors, and I think, ‘How many people get that opportunity?’” Carboneau said. “It was just such a neat thing.”
Van Dyke said she appreciated that after the Class of 1976 graduated, the school started creating its own traditions — some of which still are done today — such as seniors painting their parking spaces and Senior Walkout.
“It’s just fun to know that they’re still going and growing and doing what high-schoolers do,” she said.
