Nico Vanderhorst by Olivia Tinsley
Nico VanderHorst (1980-1984)
Nico VanderHorst, a 1984 graduate of Cascade High School, is now working in the civil engineering field for OTAC. After he graduated high school, he was unsure on where he would go. Fittingly, his strengths were math and science. After his first two years at UW, he applied for engineering school and got his degree in 4 years and then moved on to get his masters degree immediately after. He is now happily married to Deidra, who he met after his senior year, and they have one daughter, Sydney. They live on an acre in south Snohomish. Once he got settled in with his family, he worked for a small consulting firm until he took a few weeks off for his daughter’s birth. He then realized he needed to find a better job for his family and still currently works for OTAC.
As far as he could remember, life at Cascade was a lot of fun. It was a lot different than it was today, though. At that time, they didn’t have cell phones, computers, or Facebook, so in order to communicate, they actually had to sit across the table and talk to each other. They had started building, so there was a computer called a Commodore 64 that just played a couple of games. Then IBM invented their first PC that just did a few things. In his senior year, Apple came out with their first Macintosh, but it only did a few things too. There wasn’t Internet or anything like that yet.
The area around Cascade and the campus itself didn’t feel unsafe. It wasn’t really a very nice campus. They built an addition to the gym, got a new weight room, and new locker rooms, so it got a lot better. The neighborhood was closing in on the school when he was there. He hated having to take the bus to school and having to take the activity bus home. There were about 2,000 people a CHS back then and his senior class was about 500, so it was pretty big. In Everett back then, lots of housing was added. It’s a lot denser now; he liked it better back then.
A lot of good memories of friends and just hanging out were created and that’s completely different than the times are now. The class sizes were only twenty to thirty people. The teachers were okay back then. He had some favorite teachers. Mr. Curnut, his calculus teacher, was one of his favorites. There were some good, bad, and in-between teachers. They were a lot older back when he was in school. He had one younger teacher, a student teacher named Mr. Bertrand, in his English class.
At that time, Cascade had this big aura about it because it had a reputation of being a big time athletic factory. They were very good at every sport, especially football and soccer, which won state titles year after year. If you were to walk around Everett with Cascade gear on, people would respect you for the simple fact that you attend Cascade. Back then, the rivalry was between Everett and Cascade and Mariner and Snohomish. The traditions at CHS back then were basically the same as they are now. They had the traditional daces like Junior Prom, Senior Ball, Homecoming, and Sadie Hawkins. Everyone had good spirit and pep assemblies took places almost every week. The bear statue looked pretty good and it had been painted over a few times. When they would have big games against Everett or Mariner, they would come and spray paint the bear and do stuff to the campus. There had a senior prank his senior year when they took a motorcycle apart, carried it up to the roof of the gym, and put it back together again.
Jackson wasn’t open yet, so many people that lived in Mill Creek went to Cascade. They had just started building Mill Creek and putting houses in. After school during his free time, he would play sports, do homework, and study. He was a really good student and took a lot of AP classes. His dad was a contractor so he would help him on the weekends building houses. Usually, you would just hang out with your friends on Friday and Saturday nights and play games, like pool, because you couldn’t cruise Colby anymore and malls were just being built.
A big event that happened during his high school career was the Seahawks made playoffs for the first time. They had been a team for 7 or 8 years. The Huskies were always really good. They went to the Rose Bowl every year. Michael Jackson came out with his “Thriller” album and all the girls were crazy about him. If you wanted to go out on a date with a girl, you had to listen to Michael Jackson. At the same time, they started coming out with heavy metal music. There were some kids that really liked it and wore all the weird clothes. There was a summer Olympics in 1984, the year he graduated in Los Angeles, which was significant because the Soviets boycotted the Olympics.
Ronald Reagan was President and he really liked him, but he couldn’t vote for him during high school, so he waited for the next election to vote for him again. There was tension between the United States and the Soviet Union, called the Cold War. The two countries didn’t get along, so Ronald Reagan was putting all this money into what he called “Star Wars.” “Star Wars” was a program that tried to invent a protective bubble that he could put around the United States to prevent it from getting blown up. Also, President Reagan was assassinated when he was either a freshman or a sophomore by John Hinckley, but he survived. It was just a few years after John Lennon was assassinated. There was a big recession that happened in the 80s. It was where interest rates were really high and to borrow money from the bank was 15% or 20%, which was really high. That made it difficult for his dad because he was a builder. He had built all these houses that he couldn’t sell because nobody could afford to borrow money from the bank, which causes a big recession and tough time for his family.
In the future, he wants to see the traditions of Cascade keep growing off his time there.
Nico VanderHorst, a 1984 graduate of Cascade High School, is now working in the civil engineering field for OTAC. After he graduated high school, he was unsure on where he would go. Fittingly, his strengths were math and science. After his first two years at UW, he applied for engineering school and got his degree in 4 years and then moved on to get his masters degree immediately after. He is now happily married to Deidra, who he met after his senior year, and they have one daughter, Sydney. They live on an acre in south Snohomish. Once he got settled in with his family, he worked for a small consulting firm until he took a few weeks off for his daughter’s birth. He then realized he needed to find a better job for his family and still currently works for OTAC.
As far as he could remember, life at Cascade was a lot of fun. It was a lot different than it was today, though. At that time, they didn’t have cell phones, computers, or Facebook, so in order to communicate, they actually had to sit across the table and talk to each other. They had started building, so there was a computer called a Commodore 64 that just played a couple of games. Then IBM invented their first PC that just did a few things. In his senior year, Apple came out with their first Macintosh, but it only did a few things too. There wasn’t Internet or anything like that yet.
The area around Cascade and the campus itself didn’t feel unsafe. It wasn’t really a very nice campus. They built an addition to the gym, got a new weight room, and new locker rooms, so it got a lot better. The neighborhood was closing in on the school when he was there. He hated having to take the bus to school and having to take the activity bus home. There were about 2,000 people a CHS back then and his senior class was about 500, so it was pretty big. In Everett back then, lots of housing was added. It’s a lot denser now; he liked it better back then.
A lot of good memories of friends and just hanging out were created and that’s completely different than the times are now. The class sizes were only twenty to thirty people. The teachers were okay back then. He had some favorite teachers. Mr. Curnut, his calculus teacher, was one of his favorites. There were some good, bad, and in-between teachers. They were a lot older back when he was in school. He had one younger teacher, a student teacher named Mr. Bertrand, in his English class.
At that time, Cascade had this big aura about it because it had a reputation of being a big time athletic factory. They were very good at every sport, especially football and soccer, which won state titles year after year. If you were to walk around Everett with Cascade gear on, people would respect you for the simple fact that you attend Cascade. Back then, the rivalry was between Everett and Cascade and Mariner and Snohomish. The traditions at CHS back then were basically the same as they are now. They had the traditional daces like Junior Prom, Senior Ball, Homecoming, and Sadie Hawkins. Everyone had good spirit and pep assemblies took places almost every week. The bear statue looked pretty good and it had been painted over a few times. When they would have big games against Everett or Mariner, they would come and spray paint the bear and do stuff to the campus. There had a senior prank his senior year when they took a motorcycle apart, carried it up to the roof of the gym, and put it back together again.
Jackson wasn’t open yet, so many people that lived in Mill Creek went to Cascade. They had just started building Mill Creek and putting houses in. After school during his free time, he would play sports, do homework, and study. He was a really good student and took a lot of AP classes. His dad was a contractor so he would help him on the weekends building houses. Usually, you would just hang out with your friends on Friday and Saturday nights and play games, like pool, because you couldn’t cruise Colby anymore and malls were just being built.
A big event that happened during his high school career was the Seahawks made playoffs for the first time. They had been a team for 7 or 8 years. The Huskies were always really good. They went to the Rose Bowl every year. Michael Jackson came out with his “Thriller” album and all the girls were crazy about him. If you wanted to go out on a date with a girl, you had to listen to Michael Jackson. At the same time, they started coming out with heavy metal music. There were some kids that really liked it and wore all the weird clothes. There was a summer Olympics in 1984, the year he graduated in Los Angeles, which was significant because the Soviets boycotted the Olympics.
Ronald Reagan was President and he really liked him, but he couldn’t vote for him during high school, so he waited for the next election to vote for him again. There was tension between the United States and the Soviet Union, called the Cold War. The two countries didn’t get along, so Ronald Reagan was putting all this money into what he called “Star Wars.” “Star Wars” was a program that tried to invent a protective bubble that he could put around the United States to prevent it from getting blown up. Also, President Reagan was assassinated when he was either a freshman or a sophomore by John Hinckley, but he survived. It was just a few years after John Lennon was assassinated. There was a big recession that happened in the 80s. It was where interest rates were really high and to borrow money from the bank was 15% or 20%, which was really high. That made it difficult for his dad because he was a builder. He had built all these houses that he couldn’t sell because nobody could afford to borrow money from the bank, which causes a big recession and tough time for his family.
In the future, he wants to see the traditions of Cascade keep growing off his time there.