John Sitton and his grandson, Preston. Sitton was a long-time coach and educator in Central Kitsap, and in retirement works just as hard keeping up with family.
(Photo: Contributed photo)

Retirement has slowed former Central Kitsap teacher and coach John Sitton down some. That's all relative, because slow to Sitton is fast for many others. He has a problem finding a lower gear because he’s a learned workaholic.

“I blame my parents and my grandparents for this,” he says. “I think all of them had it in perspective, except for my dad. He went too far. Back in the day, they didn’t go to counseling. He was an overachiever.

“My grandparents on my dad’s side and my grandfather Armin Jahr, who became the dean of Olympic College and then superintendent of Bremerton School District, were stewards of children’s education. Both looked at it very simply; you take care of it.

“My grandfathers were athletic, both families worked very hard – there was no slacking anywhere from the farm to education and teaching and my grandmother (Leola Jahr) went back to school to get her teaching degree when she was like 55.”

The passion for work and for the country was evident in the original John Sitton (there are now five John Sittons). He went off to fight in World War I and survived, at least physically, nine major battles, including the battle of Verdun on the Western Front, the longest battle of that war.

“He came back a very quiet man,” says Sitton. “He had nightmares about a machine gun. Every night he had a nightmare. His machine gun would get hot and stop firing. But he was a good man – a real good man and had that work ethic and took care of what he had.”

All of this, along with a positive outlook, was engrained into Sitton very early and have had a profound influence on him. That side of Sitton was in full display a day after he and wife CJ Hjelmaa got back from a recent vacation from Hawaii. They both served that day as chaperones for a field trip to the Washington State Historical Museum in Tacoma with their grandson Preston’s Silver Ridge Elementary class.

Heck, they might even have had a chance to unpack before leaving on the field trip. But that is the way for Sitton, whose early life was centered on difficult work in Eastern Washington and continued on through his long

career as teacher and coach.

For 19 years (1982-2001) he coached Central Kitsap basketball, and until retirement in 2010 he was assistant fastpitch softball coach. 

Coaching is just the tip of the iceberg of his contribution to CK, along with CJ, who was activities director. Sitton was the ASB advisor, athletic director, announcer for games, and put together the leadership curriculum and taught leadership classes.

He was able also to get the school district to accept a student on its school board, becoming the first school in the state to do so. Sitton also introduced the Student Court, where students were judged by their peers over misconduct. 

He and CJ also successfully fought to have their own offices in what is now called the student center, where they together could better coordinate student activities.

“It was a big step forward for the school,” says Sitton, adding with a laugh, “So we were engaged 24/7. We had the whole thing.”

Sitton spent his first eight years in Washtucna, a small farm town about 65 miles west of Pullman. His relatives came from Minnesota and ran wheat farms in Washtucna. Sitton’s father and his sister each inherited half of their parent’s farm and raised wheat and barley with about 30 head of heifers each. He did everything they did and quickly learned that hard work was a necessity.

“I loved it,” Sitton says. “Then when it was harvest time we had crews coming in to the bunk house. – four or five guys. That was the fun part for me. They would hire a cook and there was food going on all the time. All day there was this good smell coming from the kitchen.”

From his dad's side of the family Sitton learned to work hard and respect the environment, or in his words, "being good stewards of the land."

"You really took care of it so it could provide for them. And that is where the work ethic came. I ended up teaching life science, zoology and environment science and biology and botany.”

Sitton’s dad spent a year at Gonzaga, where he played basketball and baseball, then went into the Marines as a medical corpsman. When he got out of the service he collected his undergraduate degree from Washington, went back to the Washtucna farm and then to Washington State to get his veterinarian degree (also played baseball) where he graduated at the top of his class.

It was while living on campus at WSU that Sitton got to do something that would bring envy to others. One, his dad played on a team of veterinarian students and when they played against a group of pharmacy students, Bohler Gym would be packed. 

“I had a front row seat,” Sitton says proudly. “I lived in Bohler Gym. That is when Marv Harshman and Jud Heathcote were coaching.”

Sitton also got to be a bat boy or the scoreboard operator for legendary WSU baseball coach Buck Bailey. 

“We (kids) would get out of school and jump on our bikes and race to the (baseball field),” Sitton says.

C.J. left, and John Sitton at a political rally on the Manette Bridge in 2016. (Photo: Contributor photo)

Their pay? 

“He (Bailey) gave us all the broken bats. That was our pay,” Sitton says.

During football season, he and other kids got to hang out with the football players on the practice field and were at all the games. This was when Hugh Campbell and Keith Lincoln were playing for WSU. And he attended all the WSU basketball games — sitting under the basket with students — and gymnastic and swim meets.

“It was a crazy experience,” he says. “It was cool. I loved it. It was fun and unbelievable.”

Sitton finally made it to Bremerton as an 8th-grader when his dad took a job as a veterinarian on Kitsap Way. The family settled in the Naval Avenue area and soon he was playing baseball with guys like Frank Jackson and Larry Seabaugh. He ended up at West High, where he also played basketball and became the ASB president.

After graduating from West he got his degree from Washington State and came back in 1975 to become an assistant basketball coach at the school. When West and East merged in 1978 he became the first assistant coach to legendary Les Eathorne at Bremerton High, and in 1982 was hired at CK to teach and coach the basketball team.

“Yeah, it took a lot (of energy),” says Sitton of his long love affair with education at CK. “Sometimes I wonder where did I get all this stuff. Cindy (CJ) and her family are the same way. Her family was in education. She was the head of the social studies department. I owe my family a lot.“