When it comes to helping Stagg, it would be a shorter list to ask what Joe Gatz didn’t do. He appeared to have a hand in everything that went on, even beyond his own department. As president of the Booster Club, Gatz’s role dealt primarily with athletics. And yet, it seems that a person in any given department could provide an instance in which Gatz did what he did best – go above and beyond to help his alma mater.
Science teacher and coach Marcus Sherman recalled a time in which the Science Department was nearly $400 short for a field trip to Monterey Bay. Gatz had no problem assisting the club, making up the gap, regardless of the fact that there was no athletic purpose to the trip.“He would just make it happen,” Sherman said.
But with all the lives he touched at Stagg, it was perhaps the students he worked with that he affected the most. Senior Sarah McLaughlin and her family worked closely with Gatz and the Booster Club.
With all the banquets and crab feeds Gatz helped organize, there’s one memory that McLaughlin doesn’t have. “I don’t think I ever saw him sit down and eat crab,” McLaughlin said. “You could tell that he was really tired at the events, but he would never stop working.”
Ryan McLaughlin, sophomore, remembers Gatz’s dedication even in the face of health issues. “When he got out of the hospital, they told him to take it easy for a couple days,” he said. But the wrestling tournament was only a few days later, and, true to his hardworking character, he for days, arriving at 7 a.m. and not leaving until 8 at night.
Beyond giving students volunteer positions at athletic events, Gatz also imparted upon his volunteers life lessons. “He’d quiz kids to make sure they knew how to calculate the correct change,” Sarah McLaughlin said. “He didn’t want them to be taken advantage of.”
“He taught me a lot about respect,” said senior Samantha Wang, whose family was a friend to Gatz. From Gatz, Wang says she learned “to be generous. He always thought about Stagg students before he thought about himself.”
And now, even in his passing, members of the Stagg community will always think of him. As the person who filled in the gaps, who worked hard and laughed even harder, and whose impact at Stagg will last forever.