The images from 1979 show a grinning 17-year-old Obama in a white suit with his arm around his date, Megan Hughes, before they headed to the party at Punahou School in Honolulu, Hawaii. Obama never became terribly close with the children of the new school--this time a predominantly Muslim one--where he was enrolled. Zulfan Adi was one of the neighborhood kids who teased Obama most mercilessly. His love for Michelle and Sasha and Malia is outstanding. On this visit alone, Obama has spent more than 22 hours with the group on the lush golf courses that dot the island of Oahu. This is the Barry I remember.. Obama, too, was about to journey far from these familiar shores. Life without a father It was a complicated time. I hope we can keep in touch this summer, even though Greg will be gone.'. Back then, Punahou was a completely open campus, with several basketball courts where 20-something men from Honolulu would come in the late afternoon for what often turned into flashy, highly competitive pickup sessions. Dan Hale, the 6-foot-7-inch star center of the 1979 Punahou basketball team, said Obamas depiction of Hawaii as a place where race really mattered hardly resonates with him. In its reissue after he gave the keynote address at the Democratic convention in 2004, "Dreams from My Father" joined a long tradition of political memoirs that candidates have used to introduce themselves to the American people. "He was just one of those perfect [ethnic] mixes of everything you see in Hawaii." Teachers, former playmates and friends recall a boy who never fully grasped their language and who was very quiet as a result. For the president to be able to be with a group where he can be absolutely relaxed a group that knows him from his youth on, and who he knows are friends with him not because of what he became, but because of who he is is a really comforting and warm thing, said David Axelrod, Mr. Obamas longtime strategist. We didnt aim high enough., Every time I see him on television its surreal, said Topolinski. He always made time to see his old coach I didnt play him as much as I should have and he had every right to say 'Ill show you coach.' He posed in lifeguard stands. 18:47 GMT 23 May 2013. He said he does recall long, soulful talks with the young Obama and that his friend confided his longing and loneliness. But Orme is a hard man to find. The photos appear in the new issue of TIME, which hits news stands Friday. 'We had great vibes between us.'. Bendix said he and Obama stayed in touch and he was at his 2008 inauguration. Even though Trump is a loose cannon at least he will stick up for what he believes.. The three men - Mike Ramos, Bobby Titcomb and Greg Orme - are among the few people still in Obama's life who knew him long before he was famous. The same as in Washington, Orme said. His partners matched Monday's team of Greg Orme, Darrell Harrington and Bobby Titcomb, and the foursome spent more than five hours on the course. Mr. Obama and the others often would visit family members there at Christmas and on occasion the men would meet, but it was not until 2004 that they agreed to gather annually. "If this story is eight paragraphs, seven of them go to Greg. To them, the characteristics Obama displayed on the hardwood as one of the Sons of Oahu were evident in the way he handled the daunting responsibilities as leader of the free world. I cant tell if someone is Fijian or black.. "Luckily he could swim. Darin Maurer and then-presidential candidate Barack Obama. I think hes done great with all the stuff he inherited, like the recession and the two wars. "He was very intelligent and witty. Some of these discrepancies are typical of childhood memories -- fuzzy in specifics, warped by age, shaped by writerly license. Most of his teachers and friends express sorrow that they did not know of Obamas racial anguish or inner demons. In 2006, Mr. Obama used the family Christmas holiday there to decide whether to run for president. But generally, said the presidential biographer Doris Kearns Goodwin, It does seem like these presidents need to find a sanctuary whether its a place or a group of people where they can just be themselves and feel the connection from the present to the past. High school friends who predate adulthood and professional attainments often know each others siblings, parents, even grandparents and know each other in a way that later friends often cannot. Orme recalled that years later, at Obama's wedding reception in Chicago, Obama brought the crowd to tears when he spoke of his recently deceased maternal grandfather and how he made a little boy with an absent father feel as though he was never alone. And he clearly didn't appreciate that," Orme said. In his day, he was a better basketball player than a golfer. One day while visiting his mother, who was working at the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta, Obama passed time by looking through several issues of Life magazine. Their new neighborhood was only 3 miles to the west, but a world away. It took about five hours for the president and his playing partners Bobby Titcomb, Greg Orme, and Darrell . The teacher, who still lives in Obama's old neighborhood, remembers that he always sat in the back corner of her classroom. One of his incredible legacies will be how he modeled being a family man. And when Obama came back for Christmas, he got invited to join the new president at a pickup basketball game. Obama wrote in the lengthy yearbook note. But twice that year the group gathered in Hawaii in August before the Democratic National Convention and in December after Mr. Obamas election. For much of their childhoods, Orme and Obama were more like brothers than buddies, constant companions both on and off the basketball court who even double-dated on senior prom night. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. In April 2011, Mr. Titcomb was arrested on a charge of soliciting prostitution in a Honolulu sting operation, but the reunions with the president never stopped. But spokesman Bill Burton said Obama "stands by his recollections of these events as related in his book." He would carry his books in one hand and his ball in the other," he said. He took out (Osama) Bin Laden. ", We would be like, Hey lets go to the beach, Bendix recalled. As he listened, McLachlin never dreamed that one day this determined young man, who had spent most of that season warming the bench while the Punahou High School varsity basketball team was marching on to win the Hawaii state championship, would grow up to be Barack Obama, the 44th President of the United States. Cook, who was 25, and Obama, then 22, dated for 18 months, passing their time discussing books and cooking. He's lived in Colorado, but was listed as a North Carolina resident when in 2012 he attended a state dinner at the White House that Obama held for British Prime Minister David Cameron. So just get the f--- outta my face." Here is how some of Obamas former teammates and coaches remember those years: To understand President Obama, you have to understand his Hawaiian roots, Maurer said. Since arriving more than a week ago, Obama has been out in public with one of his daughters only once, briefly, during a hike. Obama, who has talked and written so much about struggling to find a sense of belonging due to his mixed race, brushes over this time of his life in "Dreams." "We were champions and I think it helped him become the man he is today. Some seem to make Obama look better in the retelling, others appear to exaggerate his outward struggles over issues of race, or simply skim over some of the most painful, private moments of his life. But absent from those discussions, they say, was another student then known as Barry Obama. They're not his wife and daughters, who came with him, but a trio of pals whose friendship dates back to Obama's high school days in Hawaii. ---------- Kirsten Scharnberg reported from Honolulu and Kim Barker from Jakarta, Indonesia; Tribune staff reporter Ray Gibson contributed to this report. Asked Saturday about Kakugawa's recollections, the Obama campaign declined to make the senator available. Whatever misgivings Obama had about Punahou, attending the school was largely his decision. The first family has attended Titcomb's annual luaus in the past. "I imagine other black children, then and now, undergoing similar moments of revelation," Obama wrote of the magazine photos in "Dreams." Tucked away in someone elses shoe box of adolescent artifacts, there might be a picture of you in garish clothes and with an outdated do, your arm around a high school squeeze. He said Obama may have come across as easy going, but he was no pushover. Increasingly, the reunions have become the focal point of Obama's family vacation in his second term as his teenage daughters spend less and less time at their father's side. The three men Mike Ramos, Bobby Titcomb and Greg. The White House says President Obama has been updated on progress made by Iraqi force against the Islamic State group in Ramadi. One of those kids was Orme, a smart, respectful teenager from a white, middle-class family. Bailey, who coached Obama during his junior year and now runs an ambulance service, said young Barry was a "gym rat. And having a Hawaiian in the White House made them all proud. It was pretty typical from there out as far as what happens at prom: the dinner and the dancing and the photos.. Bailey, who owes his nickname to his quickness on a court, said he's been "impressed by the way Obama handled himself as president." Journalistic excavations of a presidential candidates past often turn ugly. The images from 1979 show a grinning 17-year-old Obama in a white suit with his arm around his date, Megan Hughes, before they headed to the party at Punahou School in Honolulu, Hawaii. 14:27 GMT 23 May 2013 He played several rounds on the nine-hole course with Bobby Titcomb and Greg Orme, childhood friends from Hawaii who flew in to meet the president. Sheriff: Cleveland man shot after attacking man with hatchet at Morgan County campground Basketball was a refuge, a place where I made a lot of my closest friends, and picked up a lot of my sense of competition and fair play, he said. Left: Kelli Allmans OAHUAN 1979 Yearbook. Since January, more than a dozen news organizations from around the globe, from the BBC to TV Asahi to People magazine, have dispatched reporters to Oahu. Instead we are producing Richard Nixons." But Obama did get to play in the game when the school clinched the state title. "I never knew, until reading the book later, how much that night had upset him." Ann and the boy lived with the Dunhams in Honolulu until Obama was 6. These have been the stories told about the first two character-shaping decades of U.S. Sen. Barack Obama's life, a story line largely shaped by his own best-selling memoir, political speeches and interviews. Kelli Allman is the pretty redhead pictured in the photo. We played a lot of playground ball.. He was probably studying them and learning from them. Bendix said he and Obama learned most of their basketball moves on the playground. 'He and I really clicked,' she told TIME. Having their back. "He would protect the smaller ones." There are, however, chapters in Obamas high school narrative that are not subject to dispute. In a newly unearthed photo published Thursday in TIME magazine, a 17-year-old Barack Obama is seen wearing a white dinner jacket as he poses with friends on the night of their senior prom in Hawaii. With rain drizzling over Oahu, Obama's motorcade whisked Obama across the island to Titcomb's beachside home in Waialua, about an hour outside of Honolulu on the North Shore. kscharnberg@tribune.com kbarker@tribune.com, Column: For the Chicago Blackhawks remodel to work, their new house had better be built on a strong foundation, Merrillville food and beverage tax edging closer to reality, Remains found in Rockdale more than 25 years ago identified as Aurora woman, Do Not Sell/Share My Personal Information. Some, like Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan, counted later acquaintances among political donors as friends. Kakugawa explained that he had meant they were playing in the world of the elite people who populated and ran Punahou--famous Hawaiian families like the Doles, owners of the pineapple fortune, or the original developers of Waikiki, the tourist mecca. When kids teased him, Obama yelled back, "Curang, curang!" These previously unpublished photos, obtained exclusively by TIME from Obamas schoolmate Kelli Allman (ne McCormack), show a 17-year-old Barack Obama on the night of his senior prom. And on Tuesday, in what's become a yearly tradition, the men and their families gathered for a luau hosted by Titcomb. He was a younger black man looking for guidance." Among U.S. presidents, Obama is not alone in carving out time regularly to reconnect with his roots. Every time out hed come over and chat with me about my stroke, my health, he said. In the spring of 1979, Obama's mother and Maya, Barack's younger half sister by almost nine years, flew to Hawaii for his high school graduation. Barry did a good job but I think we needed a change," he said. TIME Exclusive: President Obamas 1979 Prom Photos. "It is a shame we have to worry so much about [grade point], but you know what the college entrance competition is these days," she wrote. He showed leadership and caring for his teammates, McLachlin said. IE 11 is not supported. "He was a very provocative thinker. The attention on Obamas time at Punahou -- a country club campus with nine tennis courts, an Olympic-size pool and an endowment of $180 million -- represents the next important challenge for a celebrity politician who leapt onto the national stage with a few swift strides. "All of them were imperfect but all of them loved him fiercely, and I believe he took the best qualities from each of them." They have a different level of affection for you than friends you meet later in life. Anyone can read what you share. "Barry liked to draw heroes." They agreed to rendezvous in Hawaii every year for the holidays, and their reunions became regular even as Mr. Obama was busy climbing to senator and president, a path none of them imagined nearly four decades ago and 5,000 miles from Washington. Mr. Orme was unable to travel to Hawaii for the recent holiday, but the others called him twice. Obama, his mother and new baby sister, Maya, moved into a small apartment near the school's sprawling, lush campus. But such solitude has become less and less attainable for presidents in modern times. Bobby Titcomb Photos Photos - US President Barack Obama repares to putt on the 18th green as friend Greg Orme retrieves his ball and Darell Harrington (2nd R) and Bobby Titcomb (R) look on at the . Ramos is most often referred to in stories about his relations with the president as a businessman. Obama and his family have been in his native Hawaii since December 20 for the Christmas holiday. Bendix added that he was not shocked when Obama was elected president. One of the neatest things is that he has promoted family, he said. Many of the men were black. Chris McLachlin is seen at his house on Jan. 4 in Honolulu, Hawaii. You had three part-Hawaiians, one Filipino and me., But Hale said he is still enjoying the novelty of a famous classmate. We are no longer accepting comments on this article. But the foursome rarely goes more than a few months without reconvening in one arrangement or another. "And we were told he had already moved away." "They were like brothers," says Allman. "Not even close," he said, adding that Obama was dealing with "some inner turmoil" in those days. Greg Orme, a fellow varsity basketball player, was Obamas constant companion. Orme would stay for the games. If you look at our teams, that year I was the only white guy on the starting five. So neither of us ever started and that was hard, he said. He made an appointment to see me one day and he brought along a couple other guys who wanted more playing time, Chris McLachlin recalled. Magazines, Digital Last year, a book delved into his teenage years and claimed that Obama and his friends formed The Choom Gang - slang for smoking marijuana - in which he invented inhaling techniques and rode a car called the Choomwagon. Among his supporters, his likability and credibility have only been boosted by his stories of being an outsider trying to fight his way in. And a young, iconoclastic white woman who had defied the social mores of the day by marrying a dashing black man from Kenya was coping with the fact that her new husband essentially had abandoned her and their young child in 1963 to study at Harvard. These previously unpublished photos, obtained exclusively by TIME from Obama's schoolmate Kelli Allman (ne McCormack), show a 17-year-old Barack Obama on the night of his senior prom.. In one family photo before the mother and son moved to Indonesia, Obama walks barefoot on Waikiki Beach, arms outstretched as though embracing the entire beautiful life around him. As a result, the handful of black students at Punahou informally banded together. From left: Greg Orme, Kelli Allman, Barack Obama and Megan Hughes at Allmans parents house in Honolulu. Israella Pareira Darmawan, Obama's 1st-grade teacher, said she attempted to help him learn the Indonesian language by going over pronunciation and vowel sounds. He rode a bright blue tricycle with red, white and blue streamers dangling from the handlebars. On prom night, the pair double-dated. I was certainly oblivious to a lot of what he references, Hale said in an interview. Obama spent the weekend in California after meeting Friday at a resort with Jordan's king. I know that was hard for him.". Although the Choom Gang has come to define Mr. Obamas high school circle owing partly to the presidents memoir, Dreams From My Father, and a notation that Mr. Obama made in his senior yearbook thanking the group for good times Mr. Ramos said in an interview after leaving Oahu this week that the phrase does not describe their circle. Elite Dutch colonists once lived there; the Japanese moved in during their occupation of Indonesia in World War II. But we never talked race." In 2011, he pleaded no contest to soliciting a prostitute, but Obama has stayed fiercely loyal to his childhood friend. "I brood," Mr. Obama's friend Mr. Ramos said a few years ago. There was his mother, Ann, a brilliant but impulsive woman; his grandmother Madelyn, a deeply private and stoically pragmatic Midwesterner; his grandfather Stanley, a loving soul inclined toward tall tales and unrealistic dreams. Now lots of people are interested in helping graduates of Punahou School jog their foggy memories, trolling for revelations about a young man who spent much of his time that season riding the bench. On page 271 of the 1979 Oahuan, Obama's entry reflects the crossroads he found himself at as he prepared for life beyond Hawaii. We had great vibes between us, she told TIME. And from the first day of 5th grade right up until his graduation in 1979, the young man was one of only a small number of black students at a school heavily populated by the children of Hawaii's wealthy, most of them white and Asian. Then his young mother, now divorced, met and married an Indonesian student studying at the University of Hawaii. If this story is eight paragraphs, seven of them go to Greg. While Obama got saddled with the nickname Barry OBomber, Maurer said he also "got teased a lot for taking hard to make shots.". The three men - Mike Ramos (right), Bobby Titcomb (not pictured) and Greg Orme (left) - are among the few people still in Obama's life who knew him long before he was famous. A close friend and track teammate of Kakugawa, John Hagar, also said he was surprised by Obama's description of the character representing Kakugawa as an angry young black man. We were all cracking up, and everyone was smiling, says Allman. "It just wasn't a race thing," he reiterated again and again. He struggled greatly with the foreign language, she said, and with his studies as a result. Im incredibly proud of my friend. Greg? KAILUA, HI - DECEMBER 29: (AFP OUT) U.S. President-elect Barack Obama and friend Greg Orme (R) wait to warm up on the driving range to play golf with friends December 29, 2008 in Kailua, Hawaii. 'You are extremely sweet and foxy, I don't know why Greg would want to spend any time with me at all!' But I was pretty wrapped up in my own world back then.. Barry spent his days at the Punahou School in Hawaii studying, shooting hoops and goofing off with his friends. The idea that his biggest struggle was race is [bull]." You have reached your limit of 4 free articles. They're not his wife and daughters, who came with him, but a trio of pals whose friendship dates back to Obama's high school days in Hawaii. Cook wrote that she saw his perfect woman as 'very strong, very upright, a fighter, a laugher, experienced - a black woman I keep seeing her as'. The Hawaii holidays became more and more appealing, he said in an interview just after he began his run for president. After their relationship, she went on to marry a Serbian Boxer named Bob Bozic who once tried to rob $60,000 from a bank. And while they did enjoy marijuana, Mr. Ramos acknowledged, we played a lot more basketball than we smoked pot.. Aging photos show Obama and Orme decked out in 1970s fashion with their dates before attending a high school prom. Some of that crew has stayed in Hawaii, but others have moved off island. The race to track them down and coax them to open up likely will include reporters as well as opposition research experts for political rivals. Mr. Titcomb was golfing with the president within hours of the Obamas Dec. 21 arrival on Oahu. They divorced after seven years of marriage and have a daughter. His wife and daughters are skiing in Colorado. Hopefully now that hes done well get to see each other more, he said. All say he was teased more than any other kid in the neighborhood--primarily because he was bigger and had black features. The Obamas did skip Hawaii in 2007 and instead the friends joined Mr. Obama in wintry Iowa for the January 2008 presidential caucuses. Yearbook note Obama left for classmate Tom Topolinski when they graduated in 1979 from the Punahou school. Arkansas is filled with people still burned from their interactions with the national news media, which descended on the state during Bill Clintons 1992 campaign and stayed for his presidency, continuing to poke and prod at his business and personal dealings. "In the absence of his father, there was not a kinder, more understanding man than Stanley Dunham. Her date was Greg Orme, Obama's best friend. By It was very important to me all the way through my teenage years.. He knew the really small apartment that Mr. Obama lived in with his grandparents and what a talker Gramps was. He describes making friends easily, becoming fluent in Indonesian in just six months and melding quite easily into the very foreign fabric of Jakarta. If only I had saved that Nerf hoop we used to dunk on. Murdaugh is heckled as he leaves court, Two Russian tanks annihilated with bombs by Ukrainian armed forces, Ukraine soldiers shoot down enemy drones with drones of their own, Dozens stuck in car park as staff refuses to open gate for woman, Missing hiker buried under snow forces arm out to wave to helicopter, Insane moment river of rocks falls onto Malibu Canyon in CA, Fleet-footed cop chases an offender riding a scooter, Isabel Oakeshott clashes with Nick Robinson over Hancock texts. HONOLULU (AP) The Latest on President Barack Obama's annual two-week vacation in Hawaii (all times local): 4 p.m. Once content to join their parents for outings to the aquarium or to get shave ice, Sasha and Malia are now more independent. "Barry's biggest struggles then were missing his parents. Maurer, who played ball with Obama from the seventh grade through their senior year, said Julius Erving, better known as Dr. J, was their basketball hero. Furushima said that many of her classmates have expressed dismay at Obamas rendering of the past. "The brothers," as Lewis Anthony Jr., an African-American in the class of 1977 put it, hung out together, often talking about issues involving race and civil rights. Corky Siemaszko is a senior reporter for NBC News Digital. But he wanted to make everybody happy." The other kids would scrap with him sometimes, but because Obama was bigger and better-fed than many of them, he was hard to defeat. As it made its way over the mountain pass, he took in views of the lush, green and misty Koolau mountains. In his poem, An Old Man, there are glimpses of a tortured adolescent as well as a budding orator. Topolinski, who now lives in Washington state, said he lost touch with Obama after high school and they moved into different political camps. He was the only foreign child in the neighborhood. Daily Mail Reporter, Images show Obama ahead of his prom night in Honolulu in 1979, The Obamas to return to Martha's Vineyard? "They own it and we in it. Known as Ann throughout her adult life, she kept to herself. Obama was also known on campus for his basketball skills, and was sometimes called 'Barry O'bomber' for his jump shot. As the president's motorcade left the golf course at 3:58 p.m . When youre on a school team, theres more discipline involved, he said. Their photos are more likely to be stored on Facebook than in a shoe box. 'It was a really fun, happy time,' she said. I am not giving any interviews, Obamas grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, curtly interjected when a reporter phoned. I would never say, ah, that didnt happen, said Hale. In snapshots, the boy is a portrait of childhood bliss. Adept at nailing long jump shots, Obama was called "Barry O'Bomber" by teammates. In fact, it is surprising, based on interviews with more than two dozen people who knew Obama during his nearly four years in Indonesia, that it would take a photograph in a magazine to make him conscious of the fact that some people might treat him differently in part because of the color of his skin. Mr Obama has remained close to Mr Orme over the years. Maurer, who mostly played guard, said he and Obama were no slouches but they were on teams with some really strong jocks. (AFP OUT) U.S. President-elect Barack Obama and friend Greg Orme (R) wait to warm up on the driving range to play golf with friends December 29, 2008 in Kailua, Hawaii.
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