Goodbye, Gucker: Security Guard Will Miss the Students at Edmonds-Woodway

Edmonds-Woodway High School teachers and staff know him as Fred Gucker. Security guard.

To students, he's simply Gucker. Or as his name is properly pronounced, “Gooker.” (Is that a perfect name for a high-school enforcer or what?)

Fred Gucker has retired from , and it’s a good bet some of the kids think they can get away with something now. Gucker was security at E-Dub, which meant he was the guy who busted you if you tried to slip off campus to Burger King. He's the guy who bellowed “hey!” if you were caught wandering the halls without permission.

Gucker, 65, was honored at a school assembly late last month where the football team presented him with a signed football. But Gucker isn’t completely gone, as the longtime E-W football assistant still takes care of equipment and pitches in wherever head coach John Gradwohl needs him. But to understand how much Gucker was recognized on campus, you only have to know this: There is a Facebook page in his honor.

His information page is creatively snarky: About: “One of the greatest men to ever live.” Personal information: “Always has a good story to tell about when he was back in Nam.” Personal interests: “Hates freshmen.”

As you might expect, Gucker doesn’t really hate freshmen. At least that’s what he says, LOL.

“It’s great to watch them mature and grow into young men and women,” he said last Friday before the Warriors’ homecoming game. “Most kids at school are great kids because they have great parents.”

Gucker arrived in Puget Sound as a kid when his father moved his family Midwest to take a job at Boeing. He grew up in Lake Forest Park, graduated from Shorecrest High School in Shoreline and—the Facebook post is correct—served in Vietnam as a member of the Army.

Gucker hesitates when asked about Vietnam, where he saw combat as a squad leader. “I really don’t talk about that stuff,” he said. “It turns people off.”

Returning from Vietnam, he earned an accounting degree at the University of Washington and—like his father—started work at Boeing, where he stayed for 30 years.

Before E-W, where he patrolled for 10 years, Gucker said he briefly sold cars. “I was a loan shark and used-car salesman,” he says with a smile, and you get the impression he was glad to land at E-W.

Gucker says he’s semi-retired now and will be looking for work in Bainbridge Island, where he recently bought a home after he and his wife of 35 years sold their Edmonds home. They have three grandchildren on Bainbridge.

When prodded, Gucker admits he’s aware of his reputation as a take-no-prisoners security guard at E-W. “It created a bit of fear,” he says, “but perhaps contributed to good behavior. It creates respect, too. Kids have to respect you.”

E-W kids may not know it, but Gucker says he also has respect for them—and those in charge of helping them grow into young adults.

“It was real joy. Working at Edmonds-Woodway was the best job I’ve ever had. I can understand why people teach. I have real respect for them.”