Thanks to @Guy Fawkes, @E.T.Bass and @TruthBTold for answering the questions posed by @Larstrup.
Like @Charlie, I had a new start later in high school in a new town and later still in college, grad school and the military. I was in college during the Kennedy and Johnson White House years.
And it was wonderful to no longer be bullied again, as I had been as a freshman in high school. The 9 the grade was the world time in my life, far worse than spending two years in the Army from 1967 to 1969 during the Vietnam War.