Cindy (Falen) Sherburn began her junior year of school at Lowry High School in Winnemucca when it seemed that her parents might put together a lease on a ranch in Paradise Valley. Instead they made a deal on the Home Ranch 10 miles out of Orovada but could not take possession until March. With only a couple of months of her junior and her senior year left, they chose to let her continue at Lowry, where she played basketball for coach Lori Echaveria, even though her brother was a freshman at McDermitt. Eventually all her siblings graduated from MHS, and Cindy would have her two sisters as students when she first started teaching at McDermitt Combined School 30 years ago.
Cindy is named for two of her favorite people - her paternal grandmother, Letha Lucinda (Phipps) Falen, and her maternal grandmother Emmajean (Jordan) Franklin. Cindy can trace her Phipps ancestors back 10 generations to Joseph Phipps, a Quaker, who came from Berkshire England with his wife, Sarah, to Pennsylvania in order to escape religious persecution. A painting of him standing at the right hand of William Penn, and his signature on Penn's original Pennsylvania charter drafted in 1683, places Joseph as among the first residents of Philadelphia.
Cindy's Dutch ancestor, Johannes Ackerman, came from the Netherlands to New Amsterdam (Later renamed New York City) during its infancy in the 1620's and died there in 1631. Cindy was given a gold thimble, engraved with an 'L', that her grandma Jean thought should be hers, originally belonging to her great-great-great grandmother Lavina (Van Tassell) Ackerman. Lavina had received it on her golden wedding anniversary in 1907. Samuel Jordan came to the America's on a ship from England, bringing supplies to the colony of Jamestown sometime around 1610. He lived on his plantation called Jordan's Journey and served in 1619, in Jamestown, in the New World's oldest legislative assembly. He was a survivor of the Jamestown Indian Massacre of 1622 and likely witnessed the wedding of John Smith to the Indian Princess Pocahontas.
Lucinda Jean (Falen) Sherburn was born in Moscow, Idaho March 11, 1960 (almost 400 years after the above events) to John and Sharon (Franklin) Falen. Her dad had just graduated from the University of Idaho and, as she was late entering the world, had left for his new job in Southern Idaho. He didn't get to see his daughter until she was a week old, when he came to move Sharon and Cindy to their new home at Emmett, Idaho. Cindy attended kindergarten in Gooding, Idaho and when her dad went to work for Idaho Meat Pack she went to 1st through 3rd grade in Caldwell, Idaho. Those first years of school she learned that the boys would let her play kickball with them if she brought the game ball. Her parents became partners in a feedlot at Wilder, Idaho and she attended the rest of her grade school years there. She still loved sports and, as they didn't have a junior high girl's athletic program (the principal told them sports were too hard on girls!), she continued to school every morning with her football and basketball in hand and again the boys let her play with them while the other girls did 'sissy' things like hopscotch and jump rope! During these years her mom felt it was important for her to learn to be a lady and made her wear a dress to school one day a week - the only day she left home in tears!
Her freshman year found her in Melba, Idaho where she began her high school volleyball, basketball and - her favorite - softball career. Her sophomore year was in Grandview and Cindy, who got her driver's license at age 14 (she would tell you now that was way too young!), had to drive all of her siblings 15 miles down a mountain road to the bus stop. A big responsibility for a 15 year old!! The ranch they lived on that year had no electricity and her mom read, aloud, the Little House on the Prairie series by oil lamp in the evenings. Cindy's after school job was cleaning stalls at a horse ranch and she bought pair of boots - the first with her own money - the neatest boots she ever owned!
While still in junior high in Wilder, Cindy's cousins that were students at Northwest Nazarene College would come to visit them and she decided, at that time, she wanted to study there and major in physical education. Not one to change her mind, she headed to Nampa, Idaho and NNC (now NNU) when she graduated from Lowry High School in 1978. She played basketball for two years and thought it was neat when the school paid for half of her basketball shoes - white Adidas with a black stripe. (The only basketball shoes you could get at the time)!
It was while home for summer that she met Loyd Sherburn, who was working at the Cordero Mine. He later came to work at the Home Ranch and on June 20, 1981 they were married in the meadows at the ranch. She still had one more year of school to receive her Bachelor of Science degree and graduated in the spring of 1982. The next fall she went to UNR to earn her education certification and did her student teaching at McDermitt Combined School when her sister, Judy, was a senior at MHS.
The next year she joined the staff part time at McDermitt, teaching Reading and English in the junior high, and PE K-12. Working full time a year later, she also became the assistant basketball coach under Bob Pace, and her sister, Johnna, who was a sophomore by then, was on the Bulldog volleyball and basketball teams. Cindy coached under Bob for several years developing a coaching style that was influenced by him the boys coach, Neil Stevens. Bob retired from coaching after the 1989 season and Cindy took over as the head coach-a position she held for the next five years. During this time Cindy's team were division or co-division champs every year, and in 1992 were the state runner up. In 1994, Coach Sherburn was one of four women in the state of Nevada to receive recognition as an Outstanding Female Coach and Role Model -National Girls & Women in Sports Day -"Breaking Barriers".
That year Cindy was diagnosed with diabetes and retired from coaching all but junior high basketball and track. She then found out, at age 34, that she and Loyd were going to have a new baby!
Sharon Yvonne, (also named after her two grandmothers) was born Feb. 13, 1995. She completed all 12 years at McDermitt Combined School and, inheriting her parents' love for sports, began her career with rural basketball. Her mom was her coach in junior high and her Gramma says that in all the years she had kids or grandkids playing MHS sports, she only complained to the coach once and that was when Sharon Yvonne was in the sixth grade, and Gramma had to get after the coach, (aka MOM!), for not playing her granddaughter enough!! Sharon Yvonne is now a sophomore at the University of Great Falls in Montana, on a basketball scholarship. She is grateful for the education she received at MHS as well as the basketball training that she received from her coach, Jamie Wilkinson. She is also a member of the UGF track team.
Cindy retired this spring after 30 years at a very rewarding career. It was fun student teaching with her sister, Judy, as a senior, and sharing four years of driving to school with, and coaching, her sister Johnna-especially Johnna's senior year when she and her team won the state championship. Cindy may not have graduated from MHS but her three siblings did - and her nephew Jake Kershner, niece Becky Kershner and her daughter are all MHS alumni as well. She says that she always enjoyed teaching or coaching a talented kid - especially when you could see the 'light bulb' come on. She says, "It was fun when they did what I always knew they could do!" She felt it really showed up in the individual events in track. She adds, "Many thanks to all of my students who made my 30 years at McDermitt Combined School so special!" Cindy appreciates the amazing staff she worked with and is grateful to Darlene Albisu for her role as a mentor. She still lives at the Home Ranch - now owned by her family - where she has been since her junior year in high school. She loves the ranch - located only a few miles north of the ranch where her husband Loyd's, great-great grandfather Adam Adrian, was the first person to raise alfalfa in Nevada nearly 140 years ago.
In retirement she is going to start making and filling a 'bucket list'. Though she walked most of it, she completed a 5K color run in Boise in August and says that one day she will be the 'old' one getting the gold medal. She plans to go to Montana to watch her daughter compete in her sports. She thinks she may be able to get Loyd to go on those trips. She wants to go to the Grand Canyon and would like to watch her sister, Johnna's, kids - Kaylee in high school rodeo and Gage play football -in New Mexico. She plans to continue to watch and support the McDermitt kids and is looking forward to being a sub and staying involved with MHS. Cindy would leave the kids with this advice, "Have a career - not just a job - whatever it is you choose to do. I never hated going to work - there was always something to look forward to, and that is what I pray for all MHS students."[[In-content Ad]]
