STAN BARRETT (June 1961)

When Stan Barrett (June’61) was a student at Roosevelt his adviser told him, during a moment of frustration, that he would never amount to anything.
Stan has always remembered those words and has used them as a motivational tool to make certain that prediction will never come to fruition.
After serving his country in the Air Force, this Golden Gloves boxing champion and holder of two Black Belts in karate embarked on a career in the film industry as an actor, stuntman, stunt coordinator, producer and director that lasted more than four decades.
His acting credits include appearances in the films Hondo, The Sea Wolf, The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean, Suppose They Gave a War and Nobody Came, Beneath the Planet of the Apes, and Star Trek.
Stan did stunts or was stunt coordinator for over fifty movies, including The Last of the Mohicans, Hooper, Smokey and the Bandit, Airplane 77, Little Big Man, The Green Berets, and Sam Whiskey. He acted as a stunt double for both Paul Newman and Burt Reynolds.
Because of his reputation and demonstrated ability as a stuntman, Stan was recruited to join Project S.O.S. (Speed of Sound), an enterprise to develop a vehicle to break the sound barrier on land. The result of this effort was a bullet-shaped rocket car thirty-nine feet long with 60,000 horse power. On December 17, 1979 at Edwards Air Force Base, Stan drove the rocket car at 739.67 mph, becoming the first man in history to travel faster than the speed of sound on land.
Between 1980-1990, he was also a NASCAR driver and raced in nineteen Winston Cup Series races.
Barrett has used his celebrity standing to become a humanitarian and to do, as he says, “more important things.” Most recently, through his association with the Slavic Gospel Association, he has become involved with a children’s hospital in the Ukraine which treats victims of the continuing radiation from the Chernobyl nuclear disaster. A children’s camp in Belarus is another of his projects. Stan also helps to provide daily necessities for senior citizens unable to escape the ravages of the continuing war in Ukraine.
For a person would “never amount to anything,” Stan Barrett has had a positive impact on thousands of individuals throughout the world. He is a man who is truly in a class by himself.
Welcome to the Roosevelt High School Alumni Hall of Fame, Stan Barrett.