Student Government pulled out all available stops for this year’s Homecoming weekend, presenting: Gaultown! Gaultown was a virtual platform for students to mingle and play games in a digital town using their own avatars. In addition, Webb hired a magician/mentalist to perform a show on Zoom and convince intelligent Webb students that, indeed, magic is real.  

While it was not a Homecoming dance, it was a thoughtfully put–together event. 

55 students rolled into Gaultown on Saturday, November 14th. A couple hours before the games started at 9:00 p.m. PST, some students were talking to their friends in small chat rooms or out on a virtual field. These chat rooms and virtual fields was a nice change of pace from the endless Zoom calls that students have faced since March.  

Webbies played plenty of games throughout the night ranging from Escape rooms and Jackbox, an online platform with a variety of games such as murder mystery, Tee KO, and Quip lash. Student Government hosted these games in small groups. 

“Being able to play Jackbox with other students was super fun! I even bought the game for myself immediately after the event ended to play it more with my friends,” said Dean Woelfle (‘21), senior class vice-president.  “Being able to interact with students who I haven’t even talked to since last spring felt nice, and I’m relieved Webb was able to successfully have a big community event even though we were all online.” 

“The rooms were really challenging so it was nice to see people working together to get past the puzzles,” said Abbie O. Arroyo (‘21), VWS student government executive and the escape room host. “People really had to think outside of the box. The amount of unbounded thinking was astronomical,” said Abbie, laughing  

“Gaultown is one of the more successful events of the year,“ Abbie said this about the events. “I think we had a great turnout and it was so cool to see kids from all different grades interacting with each other! All the activities like the magician, Amoung Us, Jackbox, and escape rooms really made this event so unique. Being online is not the best but it has allowed us to think outside the box and try new things.” 

Atlanta’s #1 Magician, Debbie Liefer, aka Magic Debbie, began her show at 8 p.m. on Saturday. Her performance consisted of card tricks, a disappearing coin, and crazy math magic, with a common focus on mentalism and reading minds.  

Magic Debbie worked many hours to plan her online show, performing many test–runs with family members and friends. A large portion of this planning went towards creating an experience for the audience where they get to be part of the tricks, despite being far apart. Though in March she lost a lot of in–person gigs, now that she is one of the few magicians to be performing online, Magic Debbie is back in business, performing on Zoom for parties, corporate events, and high schoolers.  

“My motivation [to be a magician] is to make people feel god about themselves, that is why my show involves everybody,” Magic Debbie said. “I’m trying to empower people to believe in themselves.” 

“I think the most interesting thing about the show was how it felt like we were all an in-person audience, even though this was on Zoom.” Emily Berg (‘24) said. “It was very engaging and interactive, and I forgot at times that I was actually alone in my bedroom.” 

Emily played a key role in a trick Magic Debbie performed. Debbie pulled out a shiny half dollar coin and wrote Emily’s initials on one side. Before moving on to the magic, Debbie made sure to tell her audience that none of this was pre-planned; all the choices in the performance were determined live.  

Placing Emily’s coin in her fist, Magic Debbie reached back with her empty hand and revealed a locked, wooden jewelry box. Debbie placed the box on a table in front of her and opened both of her palms for the audience; both were empty.  

After unlocking the box, Magic Debbie opened the lid to reveal another, smaller box inside. She unlatched the smaller box, lifted the lid, and low and behold, lying in the box from inside another locked box, was the coin with Emily’s initials on it.  

“I personally do believe in magic,” said Emily the next day.  

The last trick Magic Debbie performed began with Yvette Shu (‘23) choosing a random card from a deck – she chose the six of diamonds. Then, one by one, Magic Debbie asked volunteers for a random area code, exchange code, and the last four digits of a phone number. Four students together generated the random phone number (626) 892–5721. Debbie dialed the number on her cell phone and called. 

“Hi this is Antonio’s Pizza please hold,” said the operator of the phone number. 

Magic Debbie asked the man to name any playing card in the deck, any card at all. 

“Like a playing card? Uhhhhh, six of diamonds,” he said.  

Debbie Liefer’s magic show left students excited that they were able to participate in her performance and enlivened that they did so successfully.  

Even though Gaultown and the Magic Debbie performance did not have too many attendees, these live events showed the thought, care, and effort that went into creating a virtual space for students to spend some time together.