Final Curtain
Gillhouse bids farewell to teaching career
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When the curtain dropped on Cabaret Saturday, it dropped on three decades of Ronan High School Show Choir performances under the direction of Cathy Gillhouse.
After putting on nearly 90 Cabaret performances and 35 years of teaching choir in Ronan schools, Gillhouse will retire in June.
She came to Charlo in January 40 years ago, a new college graduate from St. Louis, Mo. Music has always been a part of her life, from when she and her five siblings sang or played classical songs on tuned pop bottles, to when she made the decision to become a music teacher while working the summer of her junior year of high school at a church camp. However, when she graduated college in the winter, she couldn’t find a job in Missouri or Illinois. Then someone showed her an ad for an immediate opening in Charlo.
“Oh, I don’t think I’d ever move to Montana,” Gillhouse remembers saying. “That’s like the end of the world.”
But her now-husband, Jim, said, “Take it,” and she did, though she didn’t intend to stay long.
“But people were so kind to me, and it’s like they just adopted me,” she said.
Now, Gillhouse and Cabaret are community traditions.
“Start at the second verse,” she called to students Friday as the group worked out kinks from Thursday’s opening night performance.
“Put some life in your steps;” “Everyone line up;” “Come on, girls;” Gillhouse interjected as students sang numbers on the stage.
Cabaret began 30 years ago when she had a particularly good group of students, she said.
“And I’m thinking, ‘The community needs to see this.’”
So they set up 20 card tables, served cherries jubilee and performed in the K. William Harvey Elementary School gym. Later, the show moved to the high school gym, where the number of card tables quadrupled. This is the fourth year students have performed on the auditorium stage.
Regardless of the venue, students have come through each year to put on a show the community always enjoys, Gillhouse said.
“To see the professionalism and confidence that they have performing in ‘Cabaret’ is probably my biggest joy.”
Often, students return and seek her out to tell her that choir made their high school careers and lives richer, she added.
One of the students Gillhouse directed is Andrew Holmlund, Ronan schools’ superintendent.
“She’s done an amazing job over the years,” Holmlund said, adding he has nothing but praise for Gillhouse.
What he appreciates most about her now as a colleague is: “her passion and her ability to continue to give at a high level to kids.”
Gillhouse said she hadn’t allowed herself to think too hard about what it would be like when the show ended or when students are no longer a part of her day. Already on Friday, she had cried twice.
“The second time, I totally had to redo my makeup,” she said, laughing.
If this is the last year of Cabaret, though, that’s OK, she said.
A new teacher needs to create his or her own program, she said, adding she hopes the district hires a teacher who is able to grow the middle and high school choir program.
While the new teacher is busy at school, Gillhouse will join Jim, who also taught and was a principal with Ronan schools, in retirement and spend her time practicing her harp, visiting grandchildren and family, being a part of the Port Polson Players, travelling and taking music courses.
“If I have to sit home with nothing to do, then I’m going to go crazy,” she said.
