WHEN GREG GARCIA was attending Yorktown High School back in the mid-‘80s, he never imagined he’d be inducted into the school’s hall of fame.

“I thought if anything, if there had been a wall of infamy, I would have ended up on that,” said Garcia, an Emmy award-winning television writer and creator of the series “My Name Is Earl.”

But last week, in the auditorium of his alma mater, he was immortalized among astronauts, senators and other distinguished Yorktown alumni. The last time Garcia had set foot in the auditorium, he said, was more than 20 years ago when, for his senior prank, he released a bag full of mice during a student performance of “Grease.”

“It’s very exciting,” he said after receiving the honor. “My parents are very proud. I think they invited more people to this than they did to my wedding.”

GARCIA was one of seven people inducted into the Yorktown hall of fame last week. This year’s inductees ran the gamut from poets and journalists to musicians and CEOs.

Upon accepting their awards, many took a tongue-in-cheek approach to their acceptance speeches.

“It’s a great relief to know that your attendance record doesn’t count against your Hall of Fame induction,” National Review editor Rich Lowry, class of ’86, said. “I don’t remember a damn thing I learned here,” managing editor of CNBC Business News Tyler Mathison, class of ’72, said. “Not a damn thing.”

But beneath this irreverence, the Yorktown inductees showed great appreciation for their school. Children’s book author Elisa Carbone, class of ’71, said that her time in high school was greatly influential on her work.

“What inspired me to write in the first place was because I wanted to say something to young people,” she said. Carbone also mentioned that one of her books was set in the halls of Yorktown High.

THE HALL OF FAME inductions were organized by a group of Yorktown alumni who continue to feel a connectedness with their school.

“We have a love for our school that is second to none,” Melody Miller, class of ’63, said. “After 40 years, it was inevitable that we would have some distinguished graduates.”

The 2008 inductees will be alongside some of the better known residents in the County’s recent history. CBS news anchor Katie Couric, the late U.S. Sen. Paul Wellstone, Olympic gold medal swimmer Tom Dolan, and David Charlesbois, the pilot of the hijacked airplane that flew into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001, are all enshrined in Yorktown’s Hall of Fame.

Despite all the star power in the Yorktown auditorium last week, the real guest of honor was Sarah Jane Knight, a social studies teacher at Yorktown from 1961 to 1992. After receiving a standing ovation from the crowd, Knight accepted an honorary Hall of Fame plaque.

Receiving the plaque “brought back such wonderful memories of the 30 years at the school,” she said. “All of my students, whenever I see them, it’s a wonderful thing no matter what they’re doing … I hope they would all be successful at whatever they chose and that they would be good citizens.”