Official site of Tribune News serving Tomball, Magnolia and Waller

During my growing up years here in the Tomball area, I was privileged to be under many fine educators. I was always the class angel and all of my teachers had been told time and time again by my parents and all of our adult family friends how calm I was and how I never caused anybody any trouble. I was simply a sweet, little, timid boy who never caused trouble, never played practical jokes on anybody and never got into any trouble at all. (Precious Lord, I ask you to forgive me right now for lying……).
In time I will share many stories of happiness and sadness about my teachers, but for this article, I wish to relate a story about the oldest teacher I knew, Mr. Herbert Buescher. Now don't misunderstand me when I say he was the oldest teacher I knew. It's no disrespect to a fine man, it's simply fact! Mr. Buescher did turn one century old before he left this earth. Yes, that’s a one with two zeros behind it!
I have a memory of Mr. Buescher I will never forget and a respect for his stern, tender education he provided me. I really cannot remember a particular lesson in the classroom, but I do remember a lesson of life he taught me while on the playground at Tomball Lutheran School.
During the late fifties and early sixties we participated in a program called recess. I don't know if recess is still called recess today, or if it's some politically correct statement like "opportunity to participate in social activities" or "social skill development," but for us it was recess.
I was always a well behaved young man. I was always orderly and never disruptive in class. During recess I was always the quiet child sitting on the side of the playground under the shade tree, studying my English or math. (If you believe this please call me, I have a bridge in the desert for sale!)
One day during recess, teacher Buescher had gathered all of us little crumb crunchers around him, as he was attempting to put some order to the chaos of our softball game. He was standing in the middle of our group and I was holding the softball. For no reason whatsoever, I threw the ball straight into the air while standing in the middle of this crowd, not thinking of the fact what goes up, must come down! Well, it came down all right! It came down on the side of the head of teacher Buescher.
The ball grazed the side of his head and knocked his glasses lopsided. My initial reaction was to laugh at the humorous way teacher Buescher looked when his glasses were sitting on the end of his nose and crooked across his eyes, but my laughter immediately turned to one of those childhood fears of "Uh Oh, I messed up and I'm in big trouble!"
I froze in my spot expecting teacher Buescher to soon advance toward me and take me to the woodshed, but he didn't.
Teacher Buescher simply turned toward me with a long silent, stern stare. He pointed his index finger at me and, even though he was standing several feet away, I felt as if his finger was reaching into my very soul. The power of his stare and the strength of his pointed finger struck a fear in me only felt before when my dad would give me a spanking! I was cooked! I was a goner I thought!
Through the glasses on the end of his nose and the sternness in his voice, teacher Buescher had to speak only once.
He pointed and said, "Don't you ever do that to anyone again!"
The impact of his words brought embarrassment to my being. His voice and the correction in front of my many friends on the playground did more to grab my attention than any spanking could have ever accomplished. His words have been with me all my life. He didn't get mad, he didn't scream, he didn't lose his self control. He simply accomplished, with his words, a lesson learned and remembered for all my life and to this day I have never thrown another ball randomly into the air.


- Clifford

The Greater Magnolia Chamber of Commerce will host a public forum, to discuss the Lone Star College System (LSCS) bond election, at 7 p.m., Monday, April 29, at the West County Community Development Center, 31355 Friendship Dr. This forum is open to the public.

LSCS Vice Chancellor Ray Laughter and LSC-Tomball President Dr. Susan Karr will make a presentation followed by a Question & Answer session. Questions from the public will be accepted at the forum. LSCS has called for a $497.7 million bond referendum, which will help accommodate student enrollment that is projected to exceed 100,000 by 2018.

Last February members of the LSCS Board responded to a committee of citizen leaders by voting unanimously to put a bond referendum in front of area voters for approval. The citizens' committee, representing area businesses, education, government and civic sectors, recommended the college system build new learning facilities and infrastructure to accommodate the historical growth the system is experiencing.

The bond referendum that goes before voters on May 11 includes a Magnolia satellite campus.

For more information please call the Chamber at 281-356-1488 or email, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

Six athletes from Magnolia High School recently signed national letters of intent to play college athletics. Pictured are (from left) Cole Williams, Stephen F. Austin State University baseball; Kyle Black, Panola Junior College baseball; Garrett Luna, Texas A&M University baseball; Allison Woods, University of Maryland at Eastern Shore volleyball; Tori Frederick, University of St. Thomas basketball and Chris Barnett, Midland University soccer.

The Magnolia High School girls soccer team finished an amazing run through the Texas state playoffs with a disappointing, but hard fought loss in the state semifinals April 18, in Georgetown.

The Bulldogs lost to top-ranked Denton Guyer 4-2, ending their season with a 19-6-2 record.

Magnolia fell behind late in the first half, giving up three goals within a span of six minutes, before Allison Abendschein headed a goal in after Zoe Bauerschmidt launched a corner kick her way.

They were down 4-1 with about three minutes to play in the contest, before senior Valerie Turner kicked a bullet, from about 20 yards away, past the Guyer goalie, for the final 4-2 score.

Some of the players and Magnolia head coach April Cleveland talked with the Tribune before traveling to the state tournament, after taking home the regional title.

"This experience has been awesome," Cleveland said. "Just being around the girls and the way they know how to have fun, but can turn it on when they have to. It's been an amazing experience."

"We've been an underdog for awhile now, but we like that," said senior Bauerschmidt. "We don't put a lot of pressure on ourselves. We just play for each other."

With a team loaded with 14 seniors, Cleveland expected a good showing this year.

"Did we expect (the final four)? No," Cleveland said. "But one of our goals was to make it to regionals and once we did that we reset them and expected to get to state."

Magnolia reached the regionals and then won the region three title. They fell behind several times during their playoff run, but always bounced back in the second half. They defeated Huntsville (3-0), Lumberton (3-1), Port Neches-Groves (1-0), Waco University (2-1), Kingwood Park in overtime (2-1) and Stratford (2-1).

Against Stratford, the Bulldogs fell behind 1-0 at the end of the first half; before senior Abendschein scored two second half goals to help bring the region three trophy back to Magnolia High School.

"No one expected us to get here," Abendschein said.

Bauerschmidt, Abden-schein and Turner have played together since they were in fifth grade.

"Since we were little babies," Bauerschmidt said.

"Knowing it's going to be our last games together makes us want to play hard," Abendschein said.

'We've never made it past the second round before and we wanted to make history," Turner said.

They did exactly that.

Firefighters were able to safe the outside of a home gutted by fire in Tomball last week. The home, located at the intersection of Carrell and Peach streets, was ravaged by a fire that started in the garage.

"We were able to stop it as it got into the kitchen," said Tomball Fire Marshal Doug Sanguedolce. "The living room was completely destroyed."

Fire officials said that up to four people were inside the home, as well as two dogs, but all were able to get out safely.

Sanguedolce believes that about 80 percent of the home was damaged and that many of the bedrooms received some heat and smoke damage. Firefighters from Tomball, Spring, Klein and Magnolia spent about four hours at the scene.

Sanguedolce said heavy wind gusts played havoc with firefighters, as they scrambled to put the fire out.

"The wind just blew the fire right into the living room from the garage," he said.

He said that initial investigations point to an electrical fire.

"We are probably looking at some type of electrical short at this point," he said.

Sanguedolce said that he believes at this point that the short might have been caused by the garage door opener, which he said was at least 10-15 years old.

The residents of the home had insurance and fire officials will assist them in getting help if they need it.

"We referred them to several local resources," Sanguedolce said.