Paterson Eastside High School alumni seeking student stories for Principal Joe Clark book – NorthJersey.com

PATERSON — Monique Davis and Leila Renee Grubbs — graduates of Eastside High School in the 1980s — were working on a book of student stories about the legacy of their recently-deceased principal, Joe Clark.

They were looking for a way to give the project momentum, when Grubbs came up with an idea. Why not donate the proceeds from the book to a nonprofit group that promotes research and awareness about an obscure neurological disorder known as Chiari Malformation?

That was when Davis learned that Grubbs — the girl from her kindergarten class at Paterson School 13 — suffered all her life from Chiari.

“I had no idea,” Davis said. “I didn’t know what Chiari was.”

The two of them quickly decided to dedicate the money from the Joe Clark book to an organization named Conquer Chiari.

“We could kill two birds with one stone,” Grubbs said.

Grubbs and Davis already have collected Joe Clark stories from high school classmates. Their goal is 50 for the self-published book they plan to call, “Ghost Stories: The Legend of Principal Joe Clark.”

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Grubbs said that in her travels people always become fascinated when they learn she attended Eastside while Clark was principal — an experience captured in the 1989 film, “Lean on Me,” starring Morgan Freeman.

“People always want to know what happened to the kids who went to Eastside then,” said Grubbs, who now lives in Essex County.

Davis said she liked Clark, but acknowledged that the baseball-wielding principal has detractors as well as fans. She said the book will include accounts critical of Clark along with tributes.

“We’re looking for stories that are good bad or indifferent,” Davis said. “We were there. We know how it was. We know it wasn’t all roses and perfume.”

Prior to Clark’s death, Grubbs had been working on a fund-raiser for Conquer Chiari that got detailed because of the coronavirus. The national nonprofit group, based in Pennsylvania, raised more than $465,000 for Chiari services in 2020, according to its tax records. A significant portion of that money comes from about 80 walkathons in 40 different states, said the group’s events coordinator, Heather Nebel.

Nebel said the organization has embraced the Joe Clark book fund-raiser. The group said about 300,000 Americans have the disorder, a congenital neurological problem in which part of the brain bulges out of the skull into the spinal cord.

“Most people don’t know about Chiari,” Nebel said. “They can’t relate to it because they don’t know someone who has it.”

Grubbs said she didn’t learn she had Chiari until her 30s, after suffering from the disorder for decades. She attributed her unawareness to what she called her family’s “southern culture” about ailments. “If you’re not bleeding from an orifice, they don’t believe anything is wrong,” she said.

Grubbs said she endured severe headaches and other symptoms from children into her adult years. She said she got through her early years on toughness. “I could fight and I could curse you out like a sailor,” she said.

Grubbs said she was working at Blue Cross and Blue Shield in 2005 when she nearly had a seizure in the office. She said she tried to play it off, but her bosses insisted she get checked by a doctor. She went for an MRI and was diagnosed with Chiari, she said.

She underwent Chiari decompression surgery, the removal of skull bone to allow the brain more space. “They cut through the center of my head down to the back of my neck,” she said.

Even after the surgery, Chiari still afflicts Grubbs’ life, causing her to pass out or have vertigo, she said. At least once a year, she said, she ends up in an emergency room after a Chiari-caused episode.

Still, her life is much better than it had been before the surgery. The Joe Clark book fund-raiser is her way of repaying Conquer Chiari for the help she has gotten, she said.

Want to contribute?

Anyone interested in submitting a Joe Clark story for the book may contact Grubbs at Leloventures2@gmail.com or 862-347-8878.

Joe Malinconico is editor of Paterson Press. Email: editor@patersonpress.com