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Memories of Brush at the Turn of the Century

Original Release: 11/24/2025

Memories of Brush at the Turn of the Century

For most of us reading this newsletter, reference to the “turn of the century” means something different than it means to our younger alumni. When someone says “turn of the century” they are typically referencing the period around 1900, reflecting the shift from the 1800's to the 1900's. The period is often associated with significant social, technological, and cultural changes, including the rise of industrialization, new forms of entertainment, and evolving social norms. We think of horse-drawn carriages, Stanley Model R Roadsters, bathing costumes, corsets, sack suits, and waistcoats. While the turn of the 20th century is the most common reference, the term can apply to any transition between centuries. To the Brush alumni that graduated after 2000, the phrase refers to a completely different time.

Natalie DiLillo Lynch, '04 reflects on Brush High School at the “turn of the century” as she sees it.

I walked the halls of Charles F. Brush High School from 2000 to 2004, right at the turn of the century, a strange and special window in time. Looking back now, it feels like we went to high school during a golden era, perched between two worlds: the one where childhood was still analog and present, and the one that would soon become defined by constant digital connection.

When I started at Brush, the internet was still something you waited to connect to, AOL dial-up whirring and buzzing like a machine clearing its throat, AIM away messages coded in song lyrics and teenage angst, and retrospectively embarrassing screen names like SassyChic029. If you wanted to talk to a classmate, you dialed their landline and risked a parent picking up. I didn't even get my first cell phone until junior year, and even then, it was for emergencies and the occasional T9 text (that prehistoric predictive typing where one number key had three letters, and your phone just guessed what word you meant, sometimes hilariously wrong). Social media hadn't yet swallowed our attention. Thank goodness for that.

Brush in those years had its own magic. Kids still walked or biked to school. Columbine had happened the year before we entered, but active-shooter drills weren't a part of our reality. The world felt safer, even if in hindsight it probably wasn't.

What made Brush especially golden was the way people mixed. Yes, everyone had their own friend groups, athletes, theater kids, band members, skaters, AP students, but there was an unusual fluidity. Most people got along with most people. It was normal to see a football player joking with a kid from the art wing, or someone from the jazz band hanging out with cheerleaders. It wasn't cliqueless, but it was connected. Socially, economically, racially, Brush was diverse, and that diversity felt like strength.

We had classmates who went off to Yale and classmates who went straight into trades, and both paths were respected. That sense of acceptance, that wide net of possibility, gave our class a certain ease. It carried into our reunion last year: two decades later, the same congenial spirit was still there, as if time had only deepened it.

I know my own experience was shaped by the roles I held: three-sport athlete, artist, homecoming queen, VP of student council, bouncing between AP and college prep classes. My memories might be painted in rose-colored hues that not everyone shares. Still, even with the full awareness that high school is never perfect for anyone, I remember a genuine sense of community at Brush.

There are snapshots burned into my memory: the day the TVs flicked on in classrooms and we all watched in stunned silence as the events of 9/11 unfolded. The crowded cafeteria, where laughter always seemed louder than the food was edible. The teachers who demanded we write five-paragraph essays until it was muscle memory, so much so that I later found myself better prepared at college than many peers from elite private schools.

Mostly, I remember Brush as a place that held us during a fleeting but remarkable time in history. We were the last generation of kids to grow up playing outside until the streetlights came on, yet the first to step into a world where everyone would carry a tiny computer in their pocket. That cusp shaped us, made us both connected and present in ways that feel rare now.

I will always look back fondly on my years at Brush. For me, it was a golden time, a community that prepared us socially, intellectually, and maybe even spiritually for the world beyond those halls. My hope is that others from our class feel the same warmth when they remember those years, that sense of belonging, possibility, and shared history that can only come from being a Brush graduate at the turn of the century.

Natalie DiLillo Lynch (Senior Class VP)

Lindsay Betz Peck (Senior Class Secretary)

HOMECOMING QUEEN AND KING

Natalie DiLillo Lynch

Stanley Ball