Waterford Kettering High School

01 / The story of this place

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Waterford Kettering High School opened in 1961 in Waterford Township, a growing Oakland County suburb northwest of Detroit, and was named after inventor and General Motors research chief Charles F. Kettering. Kirk Gibson starred here in both football and baseball before graduating in 1975, then went on to Michigan State University and a Major League Baseball career that included the 1984 World Series with the Detroit Tigers and his famous pinch-hit home run for the Los Angeles Dodgers in the 1988 World Series. A few years behind him, Pat LaFontaine attended Kettering in the late 1970s and early 1980s before a junior hockey and then NHL career that eventually landed him in the Hockey Hall of Fame. Two Hall of Fame-level athletes from the same suburban Detroit hallway, a few grades apart, is the kind of coincidence Kettering still likes to point to. The school remains open today as part of the Waterford School District.

1. Opened in 1961 in Waterford Township, Oakland County
2. Kirk Gibson graduated here in 1975, later a World Series hero with the Tigers and Dodgers
3. Pat LaFontaine attended in the late 1970s and early 1980s before his Hall of Fame hockey career
4. Still an active Waterford School District high school today