Like Mr. Obama, he was of mixed parentage the son of a Filipino father and a Czech mother and his parents were divorced. In his day, he was a better basketball player than a golfer. On this visit alone, Obama has spent more than 22 hours with the group on the lush golf courses that dot the island of Oahu. Then there's the copy of Life magazine that Obama presents as his racial awakening at age 9. If Obama did show flashes of anger or hurt, according to friends and teammates, it sprang from his lack of minutes on the basketball court more than his angst as a young black man in a multiracial society. Ramadi fell to IS in May, marking a major setback for Iraq and the U.S. Topolinski said neither he nor Obama were stars on their high school team. But it was on the court in the off-season that Obama seemed to be even happier. Hawaii had become a state only two years before Obama's birth, and there were plenty of native Hawaiians still deeply unhappy about it. "But it was only playing." "I brood," Mr. Obama's friend Mr. Ramos said a few years ago. The photos appear in the new issue of TIME, which hits news stands Friday. He is undergoing what some have called the Profile Primary -- which is testing his ability to keep control of his public image, as journalists sketch portraits of the candidate as a young man and comb for contradictions and potential embarrassments in his past. While Obama's prom photographs have never been seen before, details have previously emerged about his high school years. Wed drive around in my van listening to Earth, Wind & Fire and looking for places to play, he said. Barack Obama, #23, during his senior year at Punahou School, Honolulu. Then, one day about a year after he had arrived, Obama was gone. After years during which the friends grew apart, Mr. Obama reconnected with Mike Ramos, Bobby Titcomb and Greg Orme a decade ago. I know that was hard for him.". He said they adored his slam-dunking style and no-look passing, but their coaches were not fans. Bendix added that he was not shocked when Obama was elected president. Franklin D. Roosevelt made frequent trips back to Hyde Park, N.Y., throwing picnics or barbecues for former neighbors and friends, and George H.W. He posed in lifeguard stands. 'It was a really fun, happy time,' she said. During her son's earliest years, Obama's mother, whose full name was Stanley Ann Dunham because her father desperately had wished for a boy, attended college at the University of Hawaii. They were joined by two other teenagers - his best friend Greg Orme and date Kelli McCormack. Back in 1979 he was known as Barry and he had a beef with his basketball coach. President Obama may have had a tough couple of weeks, but newly-released images will remind him of his more carefree days. He said Obama may have come across as easy going, but he was no pushover. President-elect Barack Obama and friend Greg Orme wait to warm up on the driving range to play golf with friends December 29, 2008 in Kailua, Hawaii.. President-elect Barack Obama hugs friend Greg Orme before a round of golf December 29, 2008 at the Mid Pacific Country Club in Kailua, Hawaii. Asked Saturday about Kakugawa's recollections, the Obama campaign declined to make the senator available. Greg? HONOLULU (AP) The Latest on President Barack Obama family vacation in Hawaii (all times local): 10 p.m. President Barack Obama and his family dined with friends Wednesday night to cap off another day of their Hawaii getaway. Obama is playing golf with three of his friends, Mike Ramos, Bobby Titcomb and Greg Orme. They're not his wife and daughters, who came with him, but a trio of pals whose friendship dates back to Obama's high school days in Hawaii. 'You really deserve better than clowns like us; you even laugh at my jokes! The number at Dunhams apartment in a nondescript Honolulu high rise has not changed in more than a quarter-century. Now lots of people are interested in helping graduates of Punahou School jog their foggy memories, trolling for revelations about a young man who spent much of his time that season riding the bench. Hes off the grid, said Hale, who is now the schools head basketball coach. 'You are extremely sweet and foxy, I don't know why Greg would want to spend any time with me at all!' Maurer, who played ball with Obama from the seventh grade through their senior year, said Julius Erving, better known as Dr. J, was their basketball hero. Darin Maurer and then-presidential candidate Barack Obama. 14:27 GMT 23 May 2013 Like Obama, Topolinski had to straddle a racial divide. Yet those who knew him disputed that during recent interviews. But generally, said the presidential biographer Doris Kearns Goodwin, It does seem like these presidents need to find a sanctuary whether its a place or a group of people where they can just be themselves and feel the connection from the present to the past. High school friends who predate adulthood and professional attainments often know each others siblings, parents, even grandparents and know each other in a way that later friends often cannot. After graduating in 1979, Maurer wound up at Stanford where he made the team as a walk on and found God. Likewise for Mr. Obama, it seems. In the early 1970s, diplomats and Indonesian businessmen lived there in fancy gated houses with wide paved roads and sculpted bushes. Ramos, who graduated from Punahou in 1978, bonded with Obama over their mutual affinity for jazz. For most of their high school years, Orme and Obama lived and loved basketball, even if their hours of practice never translated into much playing time on game day. He was always very focused.. Now that life story is being edited by others. "He lived across the street from school and before classes hed shoot baskets on the outside courts, then at lunch hed shoot more baskets, then Id have him for three hours, then hed go home, eat supper, and then be outside again shooting baskets.. "He didn't say what country he wanted to be president of. When Obama was in 4th grade, the Soetoro family moved. Obama and his Punahou School classmates Mike Ramos, Bobby Titcomb and Greg Orme enjoyed a sunny and breezy day on the links. Obama and his mother joined her new husband, a kind man who later would become a detached heavy drinker and womanizer, family members in Indonesia say. From left: Greg Orme, Kelli Allman, Barack Obama and Megan Hughes at Allmans parents house in Honolulu. Barry spent his days at the Punahou School in Hawaii studying, shooting hoops and goofing off with his friends. For much of their childhoods, Orme and Obama were more like brothers than buddies, constant companions both on and off the basketball court who even double-dated on senior prom night. But twice that year the group gathered in Hawaii in August before the Democratic National Convention and in December after Mr. Obamas election. Marty Nesbitt, one of Obama's friends from . "At the time, it was about basketball," said Orme, who has remained friends with Obama over the years and who plays basketball with him almost every Christmas when the two return to Hawaii to visit family. On the lower half of the seventh-grade page is the same group, under a heading of Useless Races in America. The joke, it seems, is on intolerance. Furushima paused, then sighed, pointing out how the potential president was prone to drawing a little Afro atop the B and the O on his signature. Obama spent the weekend in California after meeting Friday at a resort with Jordan's king. In a newly unearthed photo published Thursday in TIME magazine, a 17-year-old Barack Obama is seen wearing a white dinner jacket as he poses with friends on the night of their senior prom in Hawaii. (D-Hawaii), a close friend of Obama . "He would be very helpful with friends. 18:47 GMT 23 May 2013. The havoc time wreaks on fashion spares no one, not even the president of the United States.In a newly unearthed photo published Thursday in TIME magazine, a 17-year-old Barack Obama is seen wearing a white dinner jacket as he poses with friends on the night of their senior prom in Hawaii. Although the Choom Gang has come to define Mr. Obamas high school circle owing partly to the presidents memoir, Dreams From My Father, and a notation that Mr. Obama made in his senior yearbook thanking the group for good times Mr. Ramos said in an interview after leaving Oahu this week that the phrase does not describe their circle. Of course, Obama embraced the image of the athlete, dribbling a ball to school and between classes. Daily Mail Reporter, Images show Obama ahead of his prom night in Honolulu in 1979, The Obamas to return to Martha's Vineyard? Yet many say they have trouble reconciling their nearly 30-year-old memories with Obamas more recent descriptions of himself as a brooding and sometimes angry adolescent, grappling with his mixed race and the void left by a father who gave him his black skin but little else. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. Not many presidents retained friendships from as far back as high school, although George W. Bush had close friends from his prep school days at Andover. Former playmates remember Obama as "Barry Soetoro," or simply "Barry," a chubby little boy very different from the gangly Obama people know today. Adept at nailing long jump shots, Obama was called "Barry O'Bomber" by teammates. In the second term, presidents have often sought refuge from the pressure by disappearing into nature to fish or hunt, said Douglas Brinkley, a presidential historian at Rice University. Far less is known about Obama's buddies, of course, than about the president himself. Even though Trump is a loose cannon at least he will stick up for what he believes.. Obamas presidential prospects have been fueled in large part by an arresting life story: The son of a Kenyan goatherder, he wrestled with his dual identities to become the first black editor of the Harvard Law Review and a member of the U.S. Senate. You had three part-Hawaiians, one Filipino and me., But Hale said he is still enjoying the novelty of a famous classmate. "Looking back now, I'd say he really is kind of the perfect combination of all of them," said his half sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng. Wearing a white shirt and dark-colored shorts and a baseball hat, President Barack Obama finished 18 holes of golf at the Kapolei Golf Course in Kapolei, Hawaii. And they have cheered Obama on even when they disagreed with him. She also sent advice about his future. Back then, Punahou was a completely open campus, with several basketball courts where 20-something men from Honolulu would come in the late afternoon for what often turned into flashy, highly competitive pickup sessions. I think hes done great with all the stuff he inherited, like the recession and the two wars. We played a lot of playground ball.. KAILUA, HI - DECEMBER 29: (AFP OUT) U.S. President-elect Barack Obama and friend Greg Orme (R) wait to warm up on the driving range to play golf with friends December 29, 2008 in Kailua, Hawaii. Some of the Betawi children threw rocks at the open Catholic classrooms, remembered Cecilia Sugini Hananto, who taught Obama in 2nd grade. Once content to join their parents for outings to the aquarium or to get shave ice, Sasha and Malia are now more independent. Obama and his family have . Im a Republican, but Ill endorse Barry for anything he wants, said Tom Topolinski, who backed his old buddy twice and voted this time for Trump. In his best-selling autobiography, "Dreams from My Father," Obama describes having heated conversations about racism with another black student, "Ray." 2023 TIME USA, LLC. The White House says Obama teed off Saturday at the nine-hole course at the Sunnylands retreat in Rancho Mirage with childhood friends Bobby Titcomb, Greg Orme and Michael Ramos. "There's no doubt that Keith's story is tragic and sad," Burton added. But I was pretty wrapped up in my own world back then.. The comments below have not been moderated, By While the foursome gets together in Hawaii over the holidays each year, Titcomb, Orme and Ramos. 'We had great vibes between us.'. As it made its way over the mountain pass, he took in views of the lush, green and misty Koolau mountains. One of those friends, Neil Abercrombie, then a graduate student in the sociology department, frequently would see young Obama around town with his grandfather Stanley, whom Obama called "Gramps." He added: "I can't say that I've avoided all, or any, of these hazards successfully." His love for Michelle and Sasha and Malia is outstanding. College would be his next stop. But such solitude has become less and less attainable for presidents in modern times. Rik Smith, a black Punahou student two years older than Obama, remembers a Halloween when white students would dress as slaves, coming to school in tattered clothes with their faces painted black with shoe polish. Another story put forth in "Dreams" as one of Obama's pivotal moments of racial awakening checks out essentially as he wrote it. You can see how he was much more sensitive than the other guys, even back then.. Left: Kelli Allmans OAHUAN 1979 Yearbook. Here is how some of Obamas former teammates and coaches remember those years: To understand President Obama, you have to understand his Hawaiian roots, Maurer said. I dont want to accuse her of stealing it, but it was on the table when she arrived and it wasnt when she left, said Furushima. Whatever misgivings Obama had about Punahou, attending the school was largely his decision. Barry did a good job but I think we needed a change," he said. A spokeswoman for People said the reporter, West Coast correspondent Maureen Harrington, did not take the list. "He would protect the smaller ones." Both of them seemed surprised to hear that in "Dreams"--which neither of them had read--Obama writes about routinely going to parties at Schofield Barracks and other military bases in order to hang out with "Ray," who like Anthony and Smith was two years ahead of him in school. Mr. Obamas concern, Mr. Axelrod said, was for Mr. Titcomb, whose arrest was international news because he happened to be Barack Obamas friend.. "Like being black was a funny costume in and of itself," recalled Smith, now a doctor who specializes in geriatrics in California. The three men - Mike Ramos (right), Bobby Titcomb (not pictured) and Greg Orme (left) - are among the few people still in Obama's life who knew him long before he was famous. Hes kind of in and out. Basketball was the great equalizer, he said. One place Obama has said he found a sense of community was on the basketball court. Genevieve Cook, an elementary school teacher, and Obama met at a Christmas party in the East Village in 1983. He also liked to take outside shots and sometimes he got really hot.. ', The comments below have not been moderated, President Obama waves his veto pen in the face of incoming Republican majority, Americans again name Hillary Clinton the most admired woman in the world and Obama the most admired man (and Princess Kate outranks Elizabeth Warren), Secret Service agents blame White House security lapses on post-9/11 demands to protect more people with less money but lawmakers say agency has been unaccountable for years, Military couple 'not at all' upset that President Obama's golf game had them booted from Hawaii course hours before their weddingas groom boasts he could beat his boss at golf, Pavement where disabled woman gestured at cyclist before fatal crash, TN residents say Jack Daniel's distillery spews black mold, Incredible footage of Ukrainian soldiers fighting Russians in Bakhmut, Pro-Ukrainian drone lands on Russian spy planes exposing location, 'Buster is next!' ", Ive known Barry since the fifth grade, he said. He describes making friends easily, becoming fluent in Indonesian in just six months and melding quite easily into the very foreign fabric of Jakarta. The fun may wear off, if history is any guide. We have this tradition to head home to Hawaii for Christmas. With a trimmed Afro, Hawaiian flower leis around his neck, Obama was surrounded by the disparate people who shaped him. Though Orme spent most afternoons with Obama and considered him one of his closest friends, he said Obama never brought up issues of race, never talked about feeling out of place at Punahou. The real Ray, Keith Kakugawa, is half black and half Japanese. The article included photos of a black man who had destroyed his skin with powerful chemical lighteners that promised to make him white. Third-grade teacher Fermina Katarina Sinaga, now 67, has perhaps the most telling story. His wife and daughters are skiing in Colorado. And on Tuesday, in what's become a yearly tradition, the men and their families gathered for a luau hosted by Titcomb. Obama never became terribly close with the children of the new school--this time a predominantly Muslim one--where he was enrolled. The same as in Washington, Orme said. For an optimal experience visit our site on another browser. Electricity had arrived only a couple of years earlier. Outside of their regular vacation activities, the First Couple (along with Vice President Biden and Dr. Jill Biden) released their holiday playlists. The 1979 photo was snapped inside the home of former classmate, Kelli Allman, who was the prom date of the pr, Fashion alert! McLachlin said he survived a severe stroke shortly before Obama was elected president in 2008. "The brothers," as Lewis Anthony Jr., an African-American in the class of 1977 put it, hung out together, often talking about issues involving race and civil rights. ', 'I'd made my share of friends at school, gone on the occasional awkward date,' Obama wrote, 'And if I sometimes puzzled over the mysterious realignments of status that took place among my classmates, as some rose and others fell depending on the whims of their bodies or the make of their cars, I took comfort in the knowledge that my own position had steadily improved.'. It was also how he wanted to be remembered. Our second string should be playing more.'" The motorcade arrived in Kapolei around 11:30 a.m. ___ I would never say, ah, that didnt happen, said Hale. The term wasn't considered a slur at the time in Indonesia. The three men Mike Ramos, Bobby Titcomb and Greg. They're not his wife and daughters, who came with him, but a trio of pals whose friendship dates back to Obama's high school days in Hawaii. ___ 10:40 a.m. The Obamas attended a luau on Oahu's North Shore at the home of the president's childhood friend Bobby Titcomb, spending more than six hours at the gathering. A young black man struggles for acceptance at an institution of privilege, where he finds himself growing so angry and disillusioned at the world around him that he turns to alcohol and drugs. And while they did enjoy marijuana, Mr. Ramos acknowledged, we played a lot more basketball than we smoked pot.. As is usual when on the island, the president has been far from political advisers and hangers-on, and has instead spent time with the high school friends who have come to be known collectively, if inaccurately, as the Choom Gang. And the accounts bear out much of Obama's self-portrait as someone deeply affected by his father's abandonment yet able to thrive in greatly disparate worlds. To them, the characteristics Obama displayed on the hardwood as one of the Sons of Oahu were evident in the way he handled the daunting responsibilities as leader of the free world. Titcomb and Orme are part of a group of Obama's friends who reunite in Hawaii every year, a practice that continued even after Obama became president. Still, Bendix said, his old pal should have been a starter at Punahou and insisted he was not just being loyal to an old friend. "I don't imagine the decision to let him stay behind was an easy one for anyone," Soetoro-Ng said. She said a woman from People came to visit with her and then walked away with the Punahou reunion list and all its phone numbers. Yet no such Life issue exists, according to historians at the magazine. You are extremely sweet and foxy, he wrote. Obama also made golf outings,. 'The sexual warmth is definitely there,' Cook wrote in her journal. Hopefully now that hes done well get to see each other more, he said. I am not giving any interviews, Obamas grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, curtly interjected when a reporter phoned. They agreed to rendezvous in Hawaii every year for the holidays, and their reunions became regular even as Mr. Obama was busy climbing to senator and president, a path none of them imagined nearly four decades ago and 5,000 miles from Washington. But spokesman Bill Burton said Obama "stands by his recollections of these events as related in his book." Millions of American teenagers will go to proms this year. He knew the really small apartment that Mr. Obama lived in with his grandparents and what a talker Gramps was. As Obama's senior year drew to a close, his mother sent him letters from afar, about life in Indonesia and her work there with non-profit groups doing economic development. FILE - In this Dec. 29, 2014 file photo, President Barack Obama, center, walks during a round of golf with Greg Orme, left, and Mike Ramos, on the 18th hole of the Mid Pacific Country Club in . The sailboat the Manu Kai (bird of the sea, in English) is about to set sail behind him. He would bring up worldly topics far beyond his years. Standing up for your buddies. Barry was a very confident player who liked to drive to the basket. In April 2011, Mr. Titcomb was arrested on a charge of soliciting prostitution in a Honolulu sting operation, but the reunions with the president never stopped. Some of that crew has stayed in Hawaii, but others have moved off island. The race to track them down and coax them to open up likely will include reporters as well as opposition research experts for political rivals. TIME Magazine obtained and published this picture of President Obama the night of his senior prom in Honolulu, Hawaii, in 1979, from his classmate Kelli Allman. On page 271 of the 1979 Oahuan, Obama's entry reflects the crossroads he found himself at as he prepared for life beyond Hawaii. So far, this process has not yielded anything especially damaging to Obamas candidacy. The havoc time wreaks on fashion spares no one, not even the president of the United States.In a newly unearthed photo published Thursday in TIME magazine, a 17-year-old Barack Obama is seen. "He was very intelligent and witty. Cook, who was 25, and Obama, then 22, dated for 18 months, passing their time discussing books and cooking. Instead, the chemicals had peeled off much of his skin, leaving him sad and scarred, Obama recalled. He was loving and generous." Yearbook note Obama left for classmate Tom Topolinski when they graduated in 1979 from the Punahou school. The images from 1979 show a grinning 17-year-old Obama in a white suit with his arm around his date, Megan Hughes, before they headed to the party at Punahou School in Honolulu, Hawaii. A member of the varsity squad, though not a starter, Obama and his teammates brought Punahou the state championship in 1979, his senior year. You have reached your limit of 4 free articles. Then his young mother, now divorced, met and married an Indonesian student studying at the University of Hawaii. "They were like brothers," says Allman. A close friend and track teammate of Kakugawa, John Hagar, also said he was surprised by Obama's description of the character representing Kakugawa as an angry young black man. Since returning to his childhood home this month on vacation, President Barack Obama has spent a good part of most days cloistered with three people whose company puts him at ease. Madelyn Dunham, a rising executive at the Bank of Hawaii during Obama's Punahou days, was more reserved but seemed to love having her grandson's friends over to play and hang out.