Beyond
The Game
Before the world knew their names, they were part of a team here.
Highland Park athletes, cheerleaders, Belles and student leaders have gone on to extraordinary lives in science, public service, business, medicine, exploration, entertainment and philanthropy. Their stories remind us that what young people learn through participation can travel with them for the rest of their lives.
What Happens After The Uniform Comes Off?
Championships are part of Highland Park's history. They are not the whole story.
Every season, young people learn to prepare, compete, accept coaching, respond to disappointment, manage their time, lead teammates and become accountable to something larger than themselves.
Then the season ends.
The uniform is put away. The scoreboard is forgotten. Most will never compete professionally.
But the habits developed through participation can remain: discipline, resilience, teamwork, confidence, leadership and the willingness to keep working when something is difficult.
Those qualities do not guarantee an extraordinary life. But they can help prepare a young person for one.
Prepare.
Learn that meaningful achievement usually begins before anyone is watching.
Compete.
Pursue excellence while respecting the people beside you and across from you.
Respond.
Experience setbacks, criticism and disappointment — then learn to come back the next day.
Belong.
Become part of a team and learn that individual success often depends on others.
The Scoreboard Records A Season.
The Impact Can Last A Lifetime.
From Highland Park
To A Much Bigger Stage
These are not simply stories about successful alumni. They are stories about young people who once practiced, competed, performed and learned here — then carried those experiences into lives few could have predicted.
Elliot See
See participated in several varsity sports at Highland Park, including boxing. His path after high school led through engineering, naval aviation and test piloting before NASA selected him as a member of its second astronaut group in 1962.
He was named command pilot of Gemini IX. See and fellow astronaut Charles Bassett were killed in a training aircraft accident in 1966 before they could fly the mission.
A Highland Park student-athlete became part of the generation that helped open the frontier of human spaceflight.
Bill Clements
Clements played guard for Highland Park and earned All-State recognition during his senior year. College football opportunities followed, but the financial realities of the Great Depression sent him instead to work in the Texas oil fields.
He later built SEDCO into a major international drilling company, served as United States Deputy Secretary of Defense and served two nonconsecutive terms as Governor of Texas.
The teenager who learned to compete in a Highland Park uniform would eventually lead in business, national defense and state government.
Dick Bass
Richard “Dick” Bass was a Highland Park cheerleader before becoming an entrepreneur and one of the best-known American mountaineers of his generation.
In 1985, Bass reached the summit of Mount Everest and became the first person to complete the Seven Summits challenge — climbing the highest mountain on each continent.
His story is a reminder that the skills developed through participation are not limited to the activity in which they were first learned.
George Underwood
George Underwood played golf for Highland Park and later SMU before building a career in real estate, banking and civic service.
He served on the Dallas City Council and chaired the construction committee that planned and built the airport that became Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport.
His life connected competition, business and public service to a project that helped reshape the future of the entire region.
There Is No Single Path
From Participation To Purpose.
Different Fields.
The Same Foundation.
The destinations were different. Law. Medicine. Business. Education. Entertainment. Olympic competition. The common thread is not that sport guaranteed success. It is that participation became part of a much larger education.
Tom Luce
Luce was a three-sport athlete at Highland Park and received an athletic scholarship to Virginia Military Institute. He later built one of Texas' prominent legal careers while becoming a major education reformer, civic leader and public servant, including service as United States Assistant Secretary of Education.
Harold “Hal” DeMoss
At Highland Park, DeMoss was co-captain of varsity basketball, president of the Student Council and editor of The Bagpipe. He later played basketball at Rice, served in the Army Judge Advocate General's Corps and built a distinguished legal career before joining the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
Garry Weber
Weber's Highland Park story began with unusual determination. Living outside the district, he earned his enrollment by cleaning the gym floors each morning while attending classes and practicing football. He later earned a football scholarship to SMU, built a successful investment career, served on the Dallas City Council and as Dallas County Judge, and became a major civic philanthropist.
George Seay
Seay captained Highland Park football and received the school's Blanket Award. After HP, he earned his bachelor's degree summa cum laude and an MBA from the University of Texas, followed by a law degree from SMU. He later founded the investment firm that became Annandale Capital and has served in numerous civic and institutional leadership roles.
Steve Van Amburgh
Van Amburgh played football at Highland Park and later attended Washington and Lee University. As a longtime leader of Dallas-based KDC, he has been involved in more than 150 corporate office and industrial projects totaling more than 37 million square feet while also directing substantial nonprofit development and civic work.
Jerry Fullinwider
Fullinwider competed on Highland Park's championship swim team, earned a business degree at SMU and served as a United States Navy officer in Korea and Japan. He later built a nearly six-decade career in international energy and became co-founder and vice chairman of Hillwood International Energy.
Karl Rathjen, M.D.
Rathjen participated in athletics and Student Council at Highland Park before attending the University of Texas and UT Southwestern Medical Center. He became a pediatric orthopedic surgeon, professor at UT Southwestern and a senior leader at Scottish Rite for Children.
Shaun Jordan
Jordan was a Texas state medalist while swimming for Highland Park, then became a four-time national champion and team captain at the University of Texas. He won Olympic gold medals in 1988 and 1992, later earned an MBA, built a career in business and marketing, and gave back through free swimming clinics for underserved young people.
Angie Harmon
Harmon was a Highland Belle before building an international modeling career and becoming a prominent television actress. Her work has included major roles on Law & Order and Rizzoli & Isles. Her story adds another dimension to this history: preparation, confidence and performance can lead far beyond an athletic field.
Amber Venz Box
Venz Box was a Highland Park cheerleader before co-founding the company that became LTK. The technology business connects creators, retailers and brands and helped shape the modern creator-commerce industry — a distinctly twenty-first-century example of Highland Park alumni leadership.
Sport Is Part Of An Education.
A young person's education does not happen only at a desk.
It can happen at an early-morning practice. In a locker room. On a bus ride home after a loss. During rehab from an injury. While trying to finish homework after a long day of training. Or in the moment a student realizes that teammates are depending on them.
Academic work develops knowledge, intellectual discipline and the ability to think critically. Athletics and other team activities create repeated opportunities to practice preparation, accountability, resilience, teamwork, time management and leadership.
At their best, they reinforce one another.
A complete education develops more than one part of a young person.
George Seay
Football captaincy and student leadership at Highland Park were followed by a bachelor's degree earned summa cum laude, an MBA and a law degree. Competition and academics were not opposing paths.
Karl Rathjen
Athletics and student leadership preceded undergraduate study, medical school, orthopedic training and a career devoted to pediatric medicine and service.
Shaun Jordan
Elite swimming led through Highland Park, national championships and Olympic gold — followed by an MBA, a business career and service to the next generation.
We Don't Know What They Will Become.
No one standing on a Highland Park sideline decades ago could have known that one student would become a NASA astronaut, another a governor, another a pioneering mountaineer and another would help build DFW International Airport.
We cannot know which current Highland Park student-athlete will someday lead a company, care for children, build an institution, serve the country, make an important discovery or transform a community.
That is not our job to predict.
Our responsibility is to help make sure young people have opportunities to participate, compete, belong, learn from coaches and teammates, and discover what they are capable of.
Highland Park Sports Club strengthens that environment by providing resources beyond what public-school funding alone can provide — supporting district-approved priorities for student-athletes, teams, coaches, facilities, equipment, technology, scholarships and the long-term future of Highland Park athletics.
We know some of the extraordinary names that came before.
Who's next?
A Living Historical Project
Beyond the Game is intentionally selective. Inclusion requires a documented Highland Park connection through athletics, cheer, Belles or another meaningful student activity, together with a life of exceptional achievement, leadership or service. The archive will continue to grow as additional histories are verified.
Know A Story We Should Research?
We welcome yearbook records, team photographs, rosters, newspaper articles and other historical documentation. Email admin@hpsportsclub.org with the person's name, Highland Park connection and any supporting information.
Historical Research & Sources
- Highland Park Education Foundation — Distinguished Alumni
- HPHS Distinguished Alumni — Past Recipients
- NASA — Elliot See & Charles Bassett
- NASA — Gemini IX
- Texas State Library — Bill Clements
- HP Cheer Centennial History
- Dallas Morning News — George Underwood
- Dallas Morning News — Tom Luce
- Harold “Hal” DeMoss Biography
- HPHS Alumni — Hal DeMoss & Garry Weber
- HPHS Alumni Association — George Seay Football Captain
- People Newspapers — George Seay Blanket Award
- Annandale Capital — George Seay Biography
- HPHS Alumni — Steve Van Amburgh
- KDC — Steve Van Amburgh
- SMU — Jerry Fullinwider
- Dallas Morning News — Highland Belles / Cathy Wheat
- Highland Park Sports Club — Mission & Impact