By Nikki Golden
Rob Sherman was a fixture of my childhood, growing up in Buffalo Grove, as he was often protesting something going on in our school district, where his son was a few years younger than me. I believe it was often the Pledge, and of course, you’d see that car with his ATHEIST plates around town.
In high school at Buffalo Grove HS, I was on the newspaper, and two other dorky friends and I started to cover the school board meetings, which hadn’t been covered before. My junior year of high school, the school board took three days away from our Winter Break, so instead of getting the full two weeks, we’d come back on a Wednesday. Their argument was it was too hard to get the requisite however many days the school year had to be otherwise.
So my two dorky friends and I created a petition, and having contacts from the other school newspapers, spread this petition district-wide and presented it to the school board. So you can imagine, we’re quite nervous about this and get to the board meeting, and everyone’s getting settled, and in walks Rob Sherman, who is also on the agenda to discuss the winter break issue. So we’re like, GAH! He’s probably wanting them to eliminate it all together because of the holidays, blah blah. We think we’re totally screwed because once he had something in his craw about it infringing on his atheist rights, he pursued it to the nth degree.
So after I speak nervously and present our petition, he gets up and speaks incredibly eloquently about the importance of family time and how with busy lives, winter break is two weeks for the family to slow down and be together, etc., etc. We were floored, but very grateful he wasn’t against us.
And we got our three days added back in. Crowning achievement of my lifetime 😉
Rob Sherman was definitely a man before his time and viewed as somewhat of an oddity in the community – though truth be told, I think often it was the way the message was delivered than the actual message that was scoffed.
But as soon as news hit of his plane crash, I got a group text from one of my dorky friends about it, and there was a moment of sadness that we acknowledged with his passing.
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See also:
* Noted Atheist Rob Sherman Dies In Plane Crash: ‘He Was Dedicated To His Causes.’
* Atheist, Activist And Aviator: Remembering Rob Sherman.
* Memories Of Rob Sherman’s Worldview And His Car.
* Rob Sherman’s Legal Battles Took Him From Wauconda To Zion.
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Rob Sherman on ballot access.
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Rob Sherman on his congressional agenda.
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Rob Sherman’s Atheist TV News Forum.
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Comments welcome.
Posted on December 14, 2016