Stylin' teacher dons same '70s outfit for 40 years of school photos

http://www.dallasnews.com ^ | 7/2/13 | Steve Blow

[Lucky9teen]

After a good long career in education, Dale Irby has retired. And so have his groovy shirt and sweater vest.

In every school picture for the past 40 years, Dale wore the same 1970s-era polyester shirt and coffee-colored sweater.

And let me just say he aged a whole lot better than his clothes did.

It began as an accident — a product of his sparse wardrobe back in the day.

“I was so embarrassed when I got the school pictures back that second year and realized I had worn the very same thing as the first year,” said Dale, 63.

But his wife, Cathy, dared him to do it a third year. Then Dale thought five would be funny. “After five pictures,” he said, “it was like: ‘Why stop?’”

So he just never did, right on through this, his final year as every kid’s favorite physical education teacher at Prestonwood Elementary in the Richardson school district.

[DManA]

Why did his head change shape?

[cuban leaf]

Is it just me, or is their a photoshopped head:

[GreenHornet]

I think he looks a little like Dick Smothers in some of the earlier photos.

[Eepsy]

The ruthlessly entropic confluence of gravity and Twinkies....

[DManA]

Or

[trisham]

And let me just say he aged a whole lot better than his clothes did.

*************************

I would have to disagree. He looks much older than my father did at that age. I'd say about twenty years older.

[ErnBatavia]

Same thang with wedding duds...

[Buckeye McFrog]

How many people even remember Wally??

I dunno, but photo #2 is his long-lost identical twin.

[PLMerite]

Wally Cox when he wasn't dead:

[Tucker39]

I remember “Mr. Peepers” very well. But then, I AM older than dirt.

[FrdmLvr]

He probably realized after the yearbook came out the second year that he was wearing the same thing as last year, so he just kept it up like he planned it. LOL!

[P.O.E.]

Awesome cool.

[Veggie Todd]

How many people even remember Wally?

I do. Wasn't he on Hollywood Squares a lot?

[higgmeister]

How many people even remember Wally?

Probably the same people that remember Stanley Myron Handelman ("I just got up from a sick bed. I don't know what's wrong with it—it just lies there") or Arnold Stang (Chunky - "What a chunk a chocolate!").

[american_ranger]

Two tales:
1. One year I gave my wife a very romantic and loving birthday card. She opened it up, read it, dropped it on the kitchen table and then walked over to the coffee table. She opened the drawer and rummaged through the old cards in it until she came to an identical birthday card. She was sure that I had just reused the previous year’s birthday card.
2. My youngest son had his freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior yearbook picture taken with the same shirt.

[hattend]

Yeah, they probably replaced the original member shortly after the photo was taken.

[jocon307]

What a cute story, thank for posting it.

[higgmeister]

As for the first one, isn't that just the thing?! Women remember every minuscule moment. They don't even consider that men are busy scanning the horizon for any threat and scoping out a room for every exit or suspicious individual. If the wife hadn't wanted to count coup on you in the battle of the sexes, she would have thanked you for the moment and been privately secure that you are the same stalwart person as ever, time after time.

[William Tell]

svcw said: "How many people even remember Wally?"

Wally had a good part in one of my favorite old movies, "Fate is the Hunter (1964)".

[Some Fat Guy in L.A.]

That’s impressive right there - I couldn’t get one arm through one of my shirts from 40 years ago even if I had one.