News

The Last Kraus: One family, 10 HHS grads over 22 years

Meredith Kraus, right, shown at sister Judith's wedding, graduates from Hendersonville High School on June 9.

By Bill Moss, Published: June 9, 2017

On a Tuesday afternoon in late May, Meredith Kraus walks into Walt Cottingham’s human geography class in a corner room on the third floor of Hendersonville High School.

The students had taken the Advanced Placement test the week before so Mr. Cottingham has planned a different lesson for today, “Saving the Best for Last.” Students have to present funny profiles of their classmates. Harper Swing drew Meredith’s name. Her slide show opens with a photograph of Meredith as a baby, which sends her classmates into gales of laughter. It continues with Meredith’s head Photoshopped onto a dancer, Rosie the Riveter and a Wall Street executive.
The end of the year is near for the seniors. You can feel it in the hallways of the beloved building that will soon be replaced. Graduation is 17 days away.
On that Friday, June 9, Meredith Hope Kraus will cross the stage in the sweltering Jim Pardue Gymnasium to receive her diploma. She will shake hands with principal Bobby Wilkins and — in another of the many HHS senior traditions — hand him a small token, a trinket of some kind. She will step down from the the left side. High school will be over. She will be one senior among 138.
Meredith makes 10 Kraus children to graduate from Hendersonville High School. The end of an era.
She doesn’t remember it but Meredith was first in this building, on the ground floor in another corner room 18 years ago. She was an infant, a prop really.
Her oldest sister, Ellen, sang in chorus.
“I was a sophomore in high school when she was born,” Ellen said. “Leslie Zarnowski was our chorus teacher at the time and we did this song called ‘Jennie Rebecca.’ It’s about a baby.”
The chorus teacher told the students to think about a baby when they sang the lullaby. Ellen thought immediately of little Meredith, the youngest of her nine siblings.
“I’m like, ‘Hey, I have a baby.’ I mean, most people thought she was my baby. She looked like me. I held her all the time. I was 15 when she was born. They just automatically assumed she was mine. I loved showing her off to my friends.
“So my mom brought her in and we sang to her. I still remember that song. It’s so crazy. I forget what I ate for lunch yesterday but I can remember that. And now she’s way taller than me and graduating high school. Oh my gosh, my baby.”

Next Friday night, the Kraus family will congregate at Hendersonville High School graduation for the last time — at least for this generation. They plan to hoot and holler. Yet their story starts years before this final high school celebration. It begins with an unplanned pregnancy. It comes full circle with Meredith’s graduation day next Friday. In between, there’s noise, music, love, laughter and challenges.