Sue Turner instilled confidence in generations of Seattle kids.
Over nearly four decades of teaching elementary school gym class, Miz T, as her students called her, taught first graders to jump double Dutch, second graders to do back handsprings, third graders to ride a unicycle, fourth graders to juggle, fifth graders to walk on their hands.
Turner, along with her husband Bud, started a youth acrobatics team -- its members drawn from her students -- that performed at parades, Husky games, Sonics half-time shows and other public events for years.
Little kids, most of whom had never performed an acrobatic feat in their lives before they entered Turner's gymnasium, would perform in front of thousands, juggling clubs, cruising on 10-foot-tall unicycles, leapfrogging over each other while two jump ropes swung over and around them.
"To us she was like a mother figure, an ongoing mentor from childhood through adulthood," said Isabelle Canlas, a former student of Miz T's who jumped double Dutch and juggled on the acrobatic team, known as SCATS. "It's more than that: She taught us discipline, motivation; she taught us to keep going."
The goal with SCATS was to move away from traditional gym class activities like dodgeball, where there are winners and losers and half the class dreads participating.
Canlas, 37, now a manager at T-Mobile, credits Miz T with helping keep her "off the streets." She helped organize a ceremony in her honor Saturday.
Around 100 former students and colleagues stood in a persistent drizzle on the playfields at Sanislo Elementary, where Miz T taught for 36 years, to swap stories and pay tribute to the legacy she left.
Turner died in October at age 77. And Sanislo, which opened in 1970, is one of four schools that Seattle Public Schools has considered shuttering next year.
Asha Youmans enrolled at Sanislo, in West Seattle's Delridge neighborhood, in 1977, just two years after Miz T started teaching there. She was 6. She calls herself one of the "original, O.G. SCATS."
Youmans went on to become an elementary school teacher herself, teaching for two decades at Bertschi School. They kept in touch. Miz T came to her baby shower.
"I became a leader because of her," Youmans said.
Miz T made her think she was her favorite student, the one who excelled above her classmates. Then she would talk to her friends. "And they'd all say, 'No, no I'm her favorite.'"
As Miz T's former students took turns speaking in the rain Saturday, a half-dozen claimed to be her favorite.
Miz T would leave the gym open after school for kids who had nowhere else to go. She bought kids snacks and uniforms. When a kid with a different body type looked terrified at the prospect of the spandex SCATS uniforms, Miz T would pull a set of sweats out of her bag that just happened to be the right size.
Isaac Tualaulelei, 39, flew home to Seattle for the ceremony. He lives in Los Angeles now, North Hollywood, where he is a professional dancer and choreographer.
"I learned how to perform from her, she pushed me through the fear of performance and the crowd," Tualaulelei said. "I was a chunky kid. She made me believe in myself."
Miz T taught eight gym classes a day, 180 school days a year.
She would kneel on a blue gym mat as student after student flipped over her arm, using it as a fulcrum, to attempt, complete and perfect a back handspring.
"It gave them this confidence that they can do something other kids can't do," said Tom Myers, whose two daughters, now in their 20s, were Miz T's students.
Myers brought his daughters' old unicycle to the ceremony Saturday. He got on, his wife helping him balance, and performed a few unsteady pedals before he tilted left and tipped off the cycle, jogging away. He was never Miz T's student.
Turner, with her husband, who was director of health and physical education for Seattle Public Schools, co-authored seven books on physical education.
Carolyn Autenrieth taught art at Sanislo for seven years, and helped out with SCATS practices.
She would act as a spotter as kids did flips and tumbling passes.
"It was just amazing to watch," Autenrieth said. Kids would do a handspring, and land. Then they would turn toward their friends, their teachers. Their eyes would get big, amazed by what had just happened. "Oh my God, did you see what I did?"