News

Barbara Blaine retirement leaves a big void

Barbara Blaine grins about the School Board's retirement gift. The board "retired" her electric typewriter, superintendent David Jones said, like law enforcement agencies retire an officer's sidearm.

By Bill Moss, Published: June 11, 2012

They come and they go — superintendents, school board members, elections, bond issues, county commission fights, angry parents, scholarship winners, state champions. Barbara Blaine has been there for all of it, and will be there on Monday night, steady as ever.

As always, she was seated at a table, behind and to the right of the School Board members and schools superintendent.
As always, she had answered questions and organized a thick agenda package and made sure everyone knew where to be and when to be there.
As always, she took meticulous minutes, and as always she commited the School Board action to memory, ready to call up that memory, a human Google search inside her head, and report it to a School Board member or a principal or an assistant superintendent or a parent who asked for it.
But the meeting on Monday wasn't the same as always. It was Barbara Blaine's last meeting as executive assistant to the schools superintendent and to the Henderson County Board of Public Education. Be careful if you say Blaine is indispensable. She will mildly correct anyone who suggests such a thing. And yet, it is safe to say, that another Barbara Case Blaine will not pass this way again.
Asked about her value to the board and her school system, longtime chairman Ervin Bazzle said, "I don't know if you can put that in words."

The Central Office honored her with a reception on Monday and the School Board honored her Monday night with praise and by "retiring" the old electric typewriter she used for many years.

"She pretty well was involved in just about everything that occurs from the Central Office. She's a tremendous worker, puts in long hours, always making sure that everything runs smoothly and is done well, and that everyone is informed about everything that is going on."
The only time he could remember Blaine missing a meeting was when she had a car wreck in bad weather on her way to a School Board meeting at the old Tuxedo school.
Blaine typically arrives for school board meetings "long before us," he said. "Most of the time she packed up after we left, and those were the days we had meetings until midnight."
The daughter of C.E. "Doc" and Betty Frances Corn Case, Barbara graduated from East Henderson High School. As offspring of a Case and a Corn, she is deeply rooted in the Blue Ridge of Henderson County, and steeped in its proud history of education. She and her husband, Paul, who, coincidentally was a West Point classmate of Bazzle, have a daughter, Alison. Alison could not help excelling in school, being Barbara Blaine's daughter. A graduate of Hendersonville High School, Alison earned a bachelor's degree from Duke and master's from Harvard. She is now a teacher at the N.C. School of Science and Math, the highly respected school for gifted students in Durham.
When they're asked about Blaine, the descriptions that come up over and again are professional, classy, tenacious about detail, compassionate toward people, passionate about Henderson County schools.
"We would have to run her out of the office," said Stephen Page, one of five schools superintendents that Blaine served. "She worked around the clock and she came in on weekends. Her attention to detail is second to none, and she would never compromise on that. You couldn't get her to do something hastily and just get it done."

Headed off problems
Sometimes the angriest people show up at the school headquarters on Fourth Avenue and when they do Blaine is the first person they have a chance to chew out. She took it in stride, steady as Paul and Silas.
"She was good about heading problems off," said Page. "Somebody would come in and wanted to see the superintendent. She had a great way of finding out what the problem was and getting them to the person that could handle their issue."
Just the way some rare people do, Barbara Blaine has away of sending a positive spirit that lets other people know that maybe they could do better.
"She was one of the most gracious people," Page said. "She made everybody that came in that office feel like they were important," Page said. "I never heard her gossip or say a disparaging comment about another person. I always told her she just made me a better person just being around her. She never missed recognizing somebody's birthday or somebody's accomplishment. If she thought I was overlooking somebody she let me know."

A human library
School board member Melissa Maurer said Blaine's ability to pull ancient facts from the archives proved invaluable.
"We needed some history on the merger and how Hendersonville Elementary School came into being," she said. "She'd go back and can find in the minutes how we got from where we were to where we are. Anytime there's been something that we needed to refer to — when did this sewer go in at such and such a school — she'd find it. She's just conscientious about detail."
Tom Orr, a retired teacher and former School Board member, has known Blaine a long time. But when he began working on preserving Henderson County's education history he gained a new appreciation for her.
"The detail she puts in the minutes has left an accurate record of a very key segment of time in the history of the Henderson County public schools," Orr said. "If she did nothing else, she's made a tremendous contribution."
Aside from that, Orr admires her style.
"I wonder how many ways she can wear a scarf," he said. "She has a flair to her that is just outstanding ... She's calmed angry people, she's doctored hurt feelings. She's done all these things that come with the job and done it with such skill and professionalism."

Covered family and job
The people close to Barbara Blaine will congratulate her and wish her the best, and jokingly talk about putting her feet up. They know it won't be so.
"She is a very family oriented," Page said. "She did not sacrifice her family for her job but she just worked doubly hard. There were times when she would be up all night (looking after one of her parents) and then come into work."
Her dad passed away but she's still the caregiver for her elderly mother and her brother, who has M.S.
Blaine would not submit to an interview about her career. That didn't surprise those who know her.
"She is humble and doesn't understand how important she is to us all," said Maurer, the School Board member.
Someone else will sit in the outer office outside the superintendent's office, answer the phone and take notes on School Board meetings.
"I have to honestly say, I've had some really great people support me that were as loyal and kind and everything but Barbara really takes the cake," Page said. "She has been the all-purpose person and she will be missed; there are not many people in the world that can do all the things she could do."

Barbara Case Blaine does not plan a cruise or a trip to the beach or a visit to a spa when she retires. Her brother reserved a campsite in the mountains and wanted Barbara and her husband to accompany him.When she told about it she smiled and laughed in the way that lights up her entire being. So she will go on vacation, tent camping for a week.