HEREABOUTS SANDRA BAER
Jay and Tina Pernik of Centerville both come from families with roots in the community. Tina Pernik, the daughter of Jack, now deceased, and Miriam Fitzharris, was born in Dayton, but moved to Centerville with her family at 2 years old.
“We were the 50th family to join Incarnation Church,” said Pernik, who attended kindergarten and first grade in Centerville, but then transferred to Incarnation when the Catholic school opened. “We lived in the Zengel Platt across from Incarnation. It was all truly corn fields around here. The closest grocery store was Dorothy Lane Market. There was one police officer and we called him ‘Jim the Cop.’ ”
Tina Pernik also remembers visiting the one-room library in the center of town and the freedom she and the other children had to ride their bikes around town. All 12 grades of the public school were housed in Magsig School, one of two junior high schools in the district.
“I used to baby-sit Phil Donahue’s kids,” said Tina Pernik, who remembers that there was a stop light on Franklin Road and not another one until you reached Stroop Road in Kettering. “I went to Centerville in the ninth grade, before I transferred to (Archbishop) Alter High School. I knew from the first day I stepped into my French class at Centerville, that I wanted to teach French. My dad used to talk about being in France during World War II and that’s all I wanted to do.”
She became active in the French Club, Spanish Club, Future Teachers of America and the Key Club, a service organization that she now advises at Bellbrook High School.
After graduating from high school in 1968, Tina Pernik attended Ohio University, where she studied French and education. While student teaching in Cleveland with her best friend from high school, Joni Pernik (Hinshaw), who now works as a special education teacher in Atlanta, she met Jay, who was studying mechanical engineering at Case Western Reserve.
The couple married in 1974 and moved to Nashville, Tenn., before moving back to Centerville where Tina taught French at Alter High School and Jay Pernik joined the family business, Dayton Products, founded by his father, John Pernik, who has since passed away.
Jay Pernik, a 1969 Alter High School graduate, was a member of the tennis team and active in Tutorial, a service club through which he earned experience campaigning for local candidates.
After four years of teaching, Tina Pernik remained at home with the couple’s two children, Juliana and Audrey.
Juliana is a 2001 Alter High School graduate who earned a degree in psychology from Washington University in St. Louis and is currently pursuing a master’s degree in public administration at The Ohio State University Glenn School of Public Affairs.
Juliana Pernik also started a young adult service group, called Columbus Gives Back, (www.columbusgivesback.org) that currently has more than 250 members, who meet to socialize and give back to the community.
Audrey Pernik graduated from Centerville High School in 2001 and from American University in Washington, D.C., in 2007 with a degree in broadcast journalism. Following a television reporting job in Charlottesville, Va., she returned to Washington D.C. to work as the associate manager for media advocacy of the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network.
Tina Pernik returned to teach French at Meadowdale High School and taught for five years before accepting a position teaching French at Bellbrook High School, where she now works as a guidance counselor. She also is an avid biker. And despite her hectic schedule, ensures that she has home-cooked meals, by preparing and freezing 150 entrees during the summer months when she is not in school.
Jay Pernik retired from Dayton Plastics in 1996 and founded his own business, Just Fabricated Parts. The Franklin business makes silk screen rulers used in the quilting industry.
“We buy, distribute, plus manufacture our own,” said Jay Pernik, who continued golfing after high school and now is a member of “The Trunk Slammers,” a group of golfers who meet at different golf courses and always end the sessions by putting their clubs in the car and slamming the trunk.
Contact this columnist at (937) 432-9054 or jjbaer@aol.com.
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