SOUTH BEND, Ind. (AP) — It was a running joke in his AP U.S. history class at Saint Joseph High School: Would Peter Buttigieg — the smartest kid in class, language whiz and devotee of John F....
“It was the late 1990s, Bill Clinton was in the White House, and a round-faced teenager in South Bend, Indiana, was viewed by many around him as an eventual successor. As early as grade school, Buttigieg exhibited an attention-grabbing combination of brains and curiosity, the sort of kid with a reputation — among kids and teachers. He would be named high school valedictorian, voted senior class president and chosen Most Likely to be U.S. President. He sat at the adults table.”
“But people who have known Buttigieg since his Indiana boyhood say it all feels predictable.Interviews with nearly two dozen people who knew him in his formative years paint a picture of a child with an extraordinary range of talent and ambition, cultivated by a tight-knit family able to indulge his many interests. There were clear signs of the candidate’s earnestness and intensity. Friends and family say he worked to overcome an early shyness by throwing himself into challenges. All the while he felt a bit apart.“It was always understood,” says Patrick Bayliss, a friend from high school. “It was just kind of matter of fact that he was special and brilliant.”“
