Quayle Swings by High School, Miramar

Vice President Dan Quayle stopped off Wednesday in San Diego on a brief journey that carried him to a high school pep rally, a sailor-of-the-year luncheon at Miramar Naval Air Station. and a North Park store operated by the disabled.

Along the way, Quayle was joined by Sen. Pete Wilson, the probable Republican gubernatorial candidate who was the recipient of a political “twofer” Wednesday. First, he was with Quayle in the early morning, as the vice president toured the North Park store. Hours later, he stood by as Ronald Reagan plugged his candidacy at the bayside Marriott Hotel.

Another Quayle beneficiary was Rep. Bill Lowery (R-San Diego), who used the occasion to announce the establishment of a nonprofit scholarship program for poor high school students in San Diego.

It was at the sprawling Mira Mesa High School campus where the vice president received his loudest reception, as most of the school’s 2,500 students packed into the small gymnasium, sitting on long wooden beachers.

From the reaction to Quayle, it could have been any crowded high school gym in any small town in Quayle’s home state of Indiana getting ready for a big basketball game. Blue and gold balloons and hand-painted signs were festooned throughout. Cheerleaders holding “Go Dan Quayle” signs added to the pep rally atmosphere, as students yelled in unison and waved miniature American flags. Heat from so many bodies pressed together made it stifling.

Almost everything Quayle said in his 10-minute talk drew thunderous response. “Mira Mesa equals Top Gun,” he said. The students roared. “We’re No. 1, and you’ll help us remain No. 1 in this world,” he told them. Deafening cheers.

“It’s like a movie star coming to town,” said 17-year-old senior Roberto Villapando, an editor for the school newspaper, describing the students’ reaction.

But when Quayle began describing a motherhood-and-apple-pie version of government policies that place students first, followed by parents and teachers, and then neighborhoods and communities, groans cascaded down from the far high end of the bleachers.

It was a brief glitch in the program though. Students mobbed the vice president after his speech as he walked down from the podium onto the gym floor.

Earlier, Quayle started his day in San Diego by visiting the Spoke Shop, a store in the 2800 block of University Avenue in North Park that repairs wheelchairs and other equipment for the disabled.

There, the vice president and Wilson, accompanied by his wife Gayle, talked to people such as Ray Zanella, the store’s manager, about the intricacies of wheelchair repair. “Lives can’t stop if a piece of machinery breaks,” Zanella told Quayle. Later, Quayle met privately with store employees and others from the Community Service Center for the Disabled, which operates the Spoke Shop.

As was the case throughout his visit to San Diego, the vice president did not meet with reporters or answer their questions.

Quayle’s trip ended when he made a surprise stop at the Miramar Chief Petty Officers Club, where he used a sword to cut a cake at a ceremony honoring Petty Officer 1st Class Glenn LaBarge as sailor of the year at Miramar Naval Air Station.

Minutes later, the vice president concluded his two-day swing through Southern California and departed for Peoria, Ill.