By STAN STAPP

I'VE BEEN CLEANING up my overcrowded den, thinning out my possessions when possible - which isn't very often. I can't very well dump my Dad's school books, nor his diaries (three-hole punched and tied with brown shoe laces) going back to 1890, and earlier of his Dad; about life in Somerset and Maywood, Nebraska, before he and my mother came to Seattle in 1901; nor the eight juvenile books my brother Art had written; and what about the photos and films, 35 mm slides, 8 mm home movies, black and white negatives?

The latter, which I'd completely forgotten about, consisted of 58 4x5 negatives which I'd never made prints of - including the photograph of the 64 airplanes accompanying this column. Most of the 58 negatives were of family, friends, kids, dogs and cats, and were probably taken in the early '50s. I was used to shooting pictures in the sky: you may remember the one I used in this column in July 1998 of 27 planes flying in formation over my then-house in Haller Lake in the mid-1940s. (I have several other photos of planes and dirigibles over Seattle - some not too good, taken with the free camera that Kodak gave kids when they were 12 years old.)

What I wonder now is what was the occasion of the planes' formation? What is the meaning of JPJ? Is there anyone else around here that knows the answer, or took a picture themselves? I'd like to know. Phone 524-8426, or e-mail me.

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I CAME ACROSS the following item in my Dad's Diary in the 1920s, referring to me and my sister Pat. She was a year and a half younger than I. "When Stan and Pat were very young they had an argument as to which came first. Stan was insistent. But Pat, her talent for debate already germinating, had the last word: 'No, you weren't first! When you came along, I was already down here looking around for a house!"

* * *

I RECENTLY RECEIVED a note from Carrie Markezinis who years ago lived across the street from me at 4202 Woodlawn Ave. N. and was then known as Carrie Manus. This was back in the days when we published the Outlook in our basement and were probably the cause of some extra automobile traffic in the area, along with Hamilton Junior High, situated across the street from both of us, and Lincoln High but a block away. In addition, the Manus family had four cars themselves.

Carrie wrote: "You or Trudy Weckworth (the Outlook's then-News Editor) put signs on our car windshields to 'Keep your cars on your own side of the street.'"

I didn't recall it was me, so I checked with Trudy.

"I might have done it," she shyly admitted.

Poor Trudy, though, she was in and out of our office a number of times every day, and sometimes had a hard time finding a parking spot. I could hardly blame her - myself enjoying a reserved parking spot on our parking strip on N. 42nd - except for a couple of warning tickets from the police. I wonder why Trudy never ticketed MY car?

What I best recall about Carrie's house, in the '40s I believe, was the day I went out for lunch, and took a little extra time (about an hour and a half). Upon my return, I discovered that three houses across the street were no longer there, houses that I'd seen every day for 20 or 30 years - knocked down, smashed to pieces. As were all the other houses on that block in the next few days, 18 all-told. This was in preparation for enlarging the Wallingford Playfield, making it two blocks wide, instead of one.

* * *

CONGRATULATIONS to Hamilton Middle School Principal Terry Acena, and to the Seattle Times, for encouraging young people to be neat. A recent editorial in the Times praised the "tough love" principal for her approach to the problem. "Anyone caught dropping litter gets detention. The offending student then spends a few hours cleaning the school. Voila, hallways are cleaner."

Which reminds me of Hamilton's first principal, George R. Austin, who was my principal (three years at Interlake Elementary and another three at Hamilton, 1924-1930).

I have written about him several times in the past: how if Mr. Austin came across a scrap of paper or other garbage in the school hall he'd yank open the nearest classroom door, roaring like a bear, and a scared teacher would send a scared kid out to pick it up. At first I thought it was unfair, neither the pupil nor the teacher having been responsible. But the longer I thought about it, the more it seemed OK. Why should the principal have to be the one to do it? Anyhow, Hamilton had clean halls in those days, too.

One of his rules I never had the opportunity of testing: That a boy couldn't walk to school with a girl unless he had a note from home. Unfortunately, living right across the street from Hamilton, the only girl I might have walked with would have been my sister, Pat. Neither she, nor I, would have gotten any fun out of that!

And Mr. Austin also had a rule about walking on the grassy parking strips. "Don't do it!" And to this day, I don't.

* * * And now a tribute to two Seattle newsmen who died recently who were important to me over the years:

JERRY ZUBROD spent a lot of time in Wallingford, the location of the Washington Newspaper Publishers Association office. He was executive director for 23 years of the statewide organization, representing some 125 community newspapers. WNPA was originally on the University of Washington campus, then moved to the University District, and finally to Wallingford where it still operates at 3838 Stone Way. Jerry retired in 1988, and died this April, age 81.

I was active in WNPA for many years and had a close relationship with Jerry. Quite often he would have lunch with my wife Dorothy and me when he desired to get out of the office for a few minutes - and we were handy.

One time when we were about to take off for a conference in Oregon, which Jerry was running, he learned that one of his scheduled speakers couldn't make it. Jerry had a problem: What to do? Luckily, he caught me on the phone as I was going out the door, and asked if I'd fill in. "You can pick your own topic, and let me know when we get there," he said.

The subject uppermost in my mind at the time saved the day. The week before I'd lost our circulation man (we had had a tiff) and had to deal with the delivery of some 46,000 Outlooks to 300 carriers, not knowing who half of them were. (It's a long story.)

Anyway, with practically no preparation, I gave my speech. It was the best one that day, I felt - because I was on-line and all heated up, delivering a topic they might all face sometime themselves - solving a problem in a hurry, for newspapers with no home to go to lose their value quickly.

Jerry also had a sense of humor: At another convention, we discovered the doctors were meeting next door and had left about 20 signs on sticks with names of various diseases on them out in the hall. I noticed that one of them read, "STAPHYLOCOCCUS" (almost like my last name), and on the spur of the moment picked it up, and headed for our convention, which was reconvening after lunch. Jerry and the others started grabbing favorite diseases, too, and we all marched in and around the floor making quite a racket - and back into the hall, returning the signs (with no damage done) seemingly without the doctors' knowledge. It was the highlight of our convention!

At another convention Jerry advised us that we were going to have a lot of fun "so you are all to come dressed in funny costumes!" Which we did. But when we made our entrance Jerry and his wife June greeted us in FORMAL ATTIRE - and we were all in SILLY DUDS. Jerry "had let us down!" But as we passed through (some of us griping) and when we looked around, were we surprised! The Zubrods, when seen from the rear, had cut the backs out of their formal duds, baring quite a bit of skin.

* * *

EMMETT WATSON and his three-dot paragraph columns were probably Seattle's favorite reading for many years, including myself. All the more so as he often picked up little items from the Outlook news pages in the '50s, '60s and early '70s, and my column in the '80s and '90s. Emmett was 82 when he died this past month. I last saw him in 1989 when he was personally working on his column in a little office in the Pike Place Market where Dorothy and I were to meet Clayton Park for lunch, Clayton having recently become editor of the Market News. (Clayton was also working for a small public relations firm called Alex Hubbard & Associates which shared an office with Emmett at that time.)

Emmett looked up from his old-fashioned electric typewriter and greeted me pleasantly. While we were talking, Emmett's longtime miniature French poodle, Tiger, was getting acquainted with Dorothy. He picked up his little ball and deposited it at Dorothy's feet, and indicated he wanted to play ball. So Dorothy would toss the ball to Tiger and he would return it.

Things were not quite right, though - until Dorothy caught on that Tiger preferred rolling the ball on the floor. Once she learned that trick and repeated it several times, Tiger was satisfied she'd finally caught on (and needed no further training), so he called it quits - and went back to his nap. (