OSMOND — After 33 years at Osmond Community School, Larry McKenna is looking forward to retirement.
Larry, who came to Osmond in 1992, grew up in McCook and graduated high school there in 1979. He then attended college at McCook Community College, transferring to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln after two years. He received a degree in geology, and actually worked in the oil fields for about 10 years.
He then decided to go back to college at UNK to get his teaching degree, and began his first teaching job in Osmond during the 1992-93 school year. He started out teaching all the sciences: physics, physical science, chemistry, biology, life science, earth science. About a year later, the school hired another science teacher, so he switched to teaching only physical sciences like chemistry, physics, physical science.
Several years later, he went back and took some math courses, and then was teaching both science and math, including junior high math and algebra. He joked that he is endorsed in science, but "highly qualified" in math.
For the last couple of years, he said, a weight-lifting class has also been added to his schedule.
Larry shared that, in his first year of teaching, "I wasn't real sure what I was doing, to be honest."
But he said he has always liked Osmond, and thought it was a great community. The teachers the first sev eral years, he said, always got along great and they had good students, so he always thought it was a good place to work and teach.
The first couple years, the teachers would do the football concessions, and would also do concessions during volleyball or basketball, so they spent
a lot of time together, both in school and outside of school.
His first year at Osmond Commu - nity School, Larry coached varsity wrestling. He was then assistant coach for about five years before returning to the head coach position. He has also coached junior high wrestling and junior high track, and assisted Randy Jochum with the golf program.
He shared special memories of the many wrestlers who had gone to state, including two state finalists, and there were a couple years where Osmond
finished in the top 10.
"So that was a highlight," he said.
“One year we were eighth, and the other year we were sixth. So we had a couple really good years there." In his first years coaching wrestling, there were more kids in school to begin with, so the team was bigger then. There were also years where there were still plenty of students, but not a lot of wrestlers.
"So over the years, it has just fluctu -
ated up and down," he said.
Asked his thoughts on the girls wrestling, Larry said, "I think it's good. I'm glad they've got girls wrestling just for the girls, because it's really taking off — a lot of girls doing it. They all seem to like it. We've had several here that really want to do it." When Larry first started teaching in Osmond, Bill Mowinkel was coaching the little kids' wrestling - the Wres tling Wizards of Oz, or WWO. He had been doing that for several years and continued for five or six years, and then Larry began coaching them.
“We always had the tournament we'd run, and that was always a big undertaking."
As far as changes in the classroom, McKENNA RETIRING AS TEACHER AND COACH Larry said when he first started teaching, they didn’t have computers. Even televisions were not in all the classrooms.
“There were two TVs in the school. They were in the library, so you had to check them out if you wanted to watch videos. Then everybody got their own television in their room, and later we all got computers, and now smart boards — so it’s really changed that way.”
Larry commented on some of the things that have happened in the science lab over the years. “We haven’t had any accidents, but back in the 90s, girls wore their hair kinda big and one girl set her hair on fire - just briefly!" he laughed.
“We’ve done some things where we’ve said, ‘well, should we do this?’ Like the last several years we’ve had a potato launcher, so we’ve done that and we always hope that doesn’t go wrong. But nothing too bad, really.”
Speaking of his decision to retire, Larry said he's just getting older and he just thought it was a good time. He has no specific plans for what he wants to do in retirement.
He and wife Lea have talked about traveling - going on cruises - or just travel around the state. He says he still has family back in western Nebraska and in Kansas, so they might go see them. Mainly just two to four-day trips, nothing big.
He likes to golf, so he might do that during the summer, and he and Lea used to go birding so they might take that up again.
Otherwise it's just "golf, and what ever Lea wants to do,” he laughed.
Larry said he could definitely see some substitute teaching in his future, laughing, “Because like I said, I don’t really have any hobbies!"
Asked what he’ll miss, he said, "I'll miss the kids, definitely, and the teachers, talking to everybody. I’ve really enjoyed teaching at Osmond for 33 years. When I first started, I didn’t know how long I was going to make it, because the first couple years were kinda rough. But after four or five years, I settled in, and then I re - ally enjoyed it. The first couple years I didn’t know if I liked the coaching, but that turned into something that I really enjoyed - the wrestling over the years and the junior high track and junior high wrestling. I've always thought Osmond was a great town, a great school to work at.
"When I first started working at the school, I had the feeling with the other teachers and everything, that people there truly believed that this was the best school in the whole state. And I got that feeling too, because the teachers were all good to work with; they got along. And the kids were good. I really enjoyed it."
