Putting cows on the front page since 1885.
Putting cows on the front page since 1885.
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That March 16, 1969, my father passed away. I was shaken. He was strong and big. He could do anything. A blood clot caused a pulmonary embolism that struck him down in his sleep while he was only 50 years old. Deep vein thrombosis (DVT) was the cause. Six of his seven siblings developed DVTs. It runs in the family. I had basketball scholarship offers from Millersburg, Shippensburg, Bucknell Colleges; they are all universities now. Tom Beach went down to Elizabethtown College to tryout for their team. Coach Batzel drove him down and invited me...
As the basketball season proceeded toward the end, NBC was tied with Bedford High School for the Bedford County Championship. Bedford was a big school. We had soundly beat Bedford on our basketball court but Bedford had won on their court. So now there was a playoff on a neutral court. The game was on a Tuesday and played at Everett High School. The bleachers were filled and there was standing room only. Dad drove from Pittsburgh to watch the game. I could hear his voice over the large roaring...
In 11th grade, I was a starter for the JV team and on a few occasions I was allowed to dress for the varsity team. Usually at half-time for the varsity team, the head Coach Dale Batzel would give me and Ronald Steele the nod to go dress for the second half. Those were the days that I wanted our varsity team to have a great lead by half time! My senior year was extra special. I was five-foot-ten and 155 pounds. A thin, lanky fellow, with a big smile. The 1968-69 basketball season was off to a...
My classmates David Long, Harry Speicher, and Scott St. Clair were football players that brought the game to the basketball court. They called them the “Hatchet Squad.” They played a high impact and contact game of basketball. They were physical. Now Coach Ewart reminded us that even dancing was a contact sport, so we should expect a little contact in basketball. That’s why they were the second string and when they checked in to play, the tempo and wildness went up three notches. We had a lot of fun even when we lost a game at that stage in li...
Then there were the games of “PIG” and “HORSE” we played at Cousin’s Daryl’s house. One person would make a shot and the next guy had to make the same shot. If you missed, you got a “P.” If you missed enough time to get “PIG,” you were the loser and eliminated from the game. That is where I learned to make a hook shot, make a basket facing away from the basket and to shoot behind my back: the trick shots that won you the game of “HORSE!” Since the basketball hoop was on the end of the garage and the driveway was steep down to State Route 26...
In ninth grade, I was growing and getting bigger and had more skills thanks to playing inside barn basketball with my brother, cousin Daryl, Jim Miller, Earl and Ellis Rush, and the Clark boys. Barn basketball is the roughest toughest game there is. During June – and then again in August, if the grasses grow and it rains enough, but not too much – you make hay! Yes, you make hay when the sun shines. For if the hay is wet or too green and put in the barn, then there is spontaneous combustion because of the heat and the barn burns down. Any...
This is not for the birds (fowl). This is for you. This is about basketball, High School basketball. This happened in the 20th Century, in a farming community, in Bedford County, Pennsylvania. Back in the 1950s five small school districts got together to make the Northern Bedford County School District. They even built a brand new high school building to bring us all together. Well, education was important, but making friends and socializing was a big part of going to school back then, perhaps even now. Then in seventh grade they added that...
