When I saw that English teacher David Cagley was voted Most Likely to Become a Professional Comedian in this year’s yearbook, I thought that for sure that he’d blame me, but, Mr. Cagley, I swear I didn’t tell anyone.

See, until this article was published, I was one of only a handful of people who knew that Cagley—who retires this year—actually was a professional comedian before becoming a teacher and that he still writes comedy.

In an interview for this story, Cagley told me that he would rather keep private his former profession (and his moonlighting as a writer) until he was about to leave FUHS. It’s been a tough secret for me to keep, though. Some of Cagley’s students I interviewed suspected there was more to their English teacher.

For instance, I asked senior Osvaldo Munoz about his favorite teacher: “I honestly think [Cagley] should have chosen a different career,” he said. “Mr. Cagley should have been a comedian. He’s so funny that there’s never a day I’m not laughing in this class.”

Ozzie had no idea what I knew.

When Cagley was in high school, he was the class clown, and in college he participated in many theater productions. His friend Sammy Kay got Cagley into stand-up comedy. He took the stage at Los Angeles’s Comedy Store when he was 19.

“The first show was funny because I was so nervous and young, but I killed it,” Cagley said. “Fast-forward to show number two. I was so bad. I don’t have words to describe how bad I was. It was so quiet in the room. I was so unfunny. I could hear ice cubes melting in the glasses. You could hear cars outside on the street driving by. It was horrible, but that’s what intrigued me.”

The sporadic opportunities for a budding stand-up comedian didn’t always pay the bills. Then one of Cagley’s friends suggested that he try substitute teaching because of the flexibility.

“It was kind of a weird thing, and I was pretty good at it,” Cagley said. School districts “were like, ‘Hey, you wanna work again? You wanna work again,’ and the next thing I know I’m back at school becoming a teacher.”

As of this year, Cagley has been teaching for 34 years, with 25 of them at FUHS. Cagley also taught adult education for 10 years at the Orange County Department of Education.

He began his teaching career in the Huntington Beach Union High School District then taught at a Santa Ana Unified intermediate school. His daughter Lauren Cagley graduated in 2022 from FUHS, and senior Tess Cagley, his other daughter, graduates this week.

“He always takes interest in what I’m doing such as paintings or little video games and I always ask him about football, even though I don’t understand it,” Tess said. “He also always used to play the song ‘Nowhere Man’ by the Beatles on the guitar for us when we were little and read us classic stories for bedtime like the original Alice in Wonderland.”

Cagley sometimes juggled parenting and performing. “Once we were doing a play and I had to take [my daughter] Lauren, who was in her little baby holder, backstage. I laughed cause I had, like, 40 babysitters gathered around, all looking after her which was so sweet,” he said.

Students praise Cagley’s teaching style and his support.

“Some teachers don’t have time to connect with students, but Cagley always called us by who we are, by what we do,” Munoz said. “When he told us he was retiring, everyone fake cried as a joke, but we also supported his decision. He’s been here since Jesus left. It’s been a while.” 

Senior Adrian Antunez says that you could expect the unexpected from Cagley’s class, like an episode of ICarly. Despite his class’s sometimes silliness, Antunez looks up to Cagley’s work ethic and his ability to educate students about real world problems.

“His presentation is a lot different from other teachers’,” Antunez said. “He usually begins class talking about whatever’s on his mind then smoothly transitions into what he’s trying to teach us. Because we’re already interested, it doesn’t even feel like a lecture.”

Cagley said that when people ask him what his post-retirement plans are, he answers with one word: Anything. However, just because Cagley’s retired and plans to travel to Australia or New Zealand, trust that he’ll never stop teaching and never stop making people laugh.