The blog has been updated to show all the YouTubes presented at the Saturday evening banquet. They're on the About the Class of 62 page, and you can view it by clicking here . . .
With politics now in full bloom I looked back and found a post from two years ago regarding the politics of our time, when we didn't know there was such a thing as a swing state, and living in a location where the chosen TV stations don't cover your area is a blessing. You can read the post here . . .
In my conversations with Butch Pederson (LMHS '62) last week we also discussed the football season that I discovered had been a downer for both teams/schools. By the time we played against each other in the last game I am sure he was looking more favorably at the upcoming basketball season than our last football game. Both teams limped to the finish line, NKHS because of the loss of key players and in his opinion their misfortune came from people playing in the wrong position. He's right - he probably should have been their running back.
Strangely enough, I didn't know or had forgotten that he was playing across the line from me, although we were not head-up. Regarding the incorrect score posted in their annual he laughed and said, "Yeah, we saw it and knew it was wrong. But I figured what the heck, it meant another win for us!" Ha Ha, I said.
It was about this time of the summer in 1961 when we were beginning to fantasize about a great senior football season, so we determined some illegal summertime practice would be a good thing. It lasted one night, and you can find out why by reading this post . . .
Showing posts with label LMHS. Show all posts
Showing posts with label LMHS. Show all posts
Monday, July 23, 2012
Thursday, July 19, 2012
a boy and his horse
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| Larry Holstad |
We sent the original photo to Larry and he has confirmed that he is the rider, on a picture taken at his grandfather's farm just south of Austin, MN. We don't know for sure what year the photo was taken but do know that on at least one occasion he rode his horse to Lake Mills for the heck of it, and perhaps the picture was transferred to Lonna on one of those occasions.
Nobody really knows for sure but all the conjecture is fun.
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
thoughts following the reunions
There's a whole lot of things that will run through your head before, during, and after a 50-year reunion. Here are some examples.
Most of us would wonder why we did those stupid things that we did in HS. Chuck Helgeland has become known for apologizing, but like the rest of us cannot undo what has been done. Linda Loken is a world-class historian with scrapbooks of practically every event of our four years, and I found in them the "senior interview" we all did for the Anchor. I read mine and was embarrassed by what I wrote. Somebody should have slapped some sense into me, but it's too late now.
Lonna's class had a float (created by Richard Hrubetz) for the Lake Mills Jubilee on Saturday, so we were there for the parade, and I noticed the Class of '52 had a float in the parade as well. Imagine this - There we will be, 10 years from now... Are you ready?
Their lives were certainly different since they lived through and likely can recall World War II and the Korean War. So then I projected in a different way - backwards - to realize that in 1962, it was the Class of 1912 that would have been celebrating their 50th! That may change your perspective. It did mine.
The Lake Mills reunion was pretty much a one-day event, confirming even further that with holding a four-day affair, our class is pretty unique. I have heard from NKHS grads both before and after our time who say their reunion is pretty much a three-hour meal and that's it. I described to some folks on Saturday our four days together, and they just kind of stared at me like, "ok, really?" Think of this: would any class ever purposely try to arrange either style, limiting itself to the three-hour dinner or creating the four-day gathering? Probably not. Either one just sort of "happens." The design flows from the people and their relationships, though I think the Lake Mills folks might enjoy an extended reunion, too.
Do you realize we had classmates returning from Massachusetts, New Jersey, California, and numerous points in between? And Dick Brunsvold who lives in Norway, missed it.
Our classmates have experienced a pretty good level of success, but so have the LMHS grads. Makes me think that Norwegian ancestry may have a hand in all this, although I once knew a fellow from Kansas who graduated in a class of four. Three of them earned doctorates while he was a successful business owner. That sets a pretty high standard.
Saturday evening I had a chance to visit at length with Wayne "Butch" Pederson, the Lake Mills shooting guard with the high-arching shot that probably was inadvertently blocked at one time or another by the arches in our gym. Butch lives in Chicago where he was a teacher/administrator for a number of years.
Like the other players on the floor for those games in '61-'62, he recalls the high level of competition between NK and LM that all agree made everyone better. "You know, it started in junior high and just carried through," he commented.
His memories of our final game have a little different perspective. "We trailed, what, 18 - 4 at the end of the 1st quarter? I thought we were done. I did. Then in the 3rd quarter I got hot, shots going in that I couldn't believe. And I won't forget my 2 free throws with 15 seconds left. We were leading by four and I knew how important they were because it could be the game. I hardly recall the ball leaving my fingertips, and it just floated in."
Paul Charlson was quoted in an earlier post about his own memories of the season, and you can read his story here . . .
Just before we left, Butch and I looked around and hypothesized about our common future, what with the incidence of cancer, heart disease, tumors . . . Some of the people attending their reunion - just like ours - won't be there next time, and that's a sad reality. Until then, let's stay in touch.
Most of us would wonder why we did those stupid things that we did in HS. Chuck Helgeland has become known for apologizing, but like the rest of us cannot undo what has been done. Linda Loken is a world-class historian with scrapbooks of practically every event of our four years, and I found in them the "senior interview" we all did for the Anchor. I read mine and was embarrassed by what I wrote. Somebody should have slapped some sense into me, but it's too late now.
Lonna's class had a float (created by Richard Hrubetz) for the Lake Mills Jubilee on Saturday, so we were there for the parade, and I noticed the Class of '52 had a float in the parade as well. Imagine this - There we will be, 10 years from now... Are you ready?
Their lives were certainly different since they lived through and likely can recall World War II and the Korean War. So then I projected in a different way - backwards - to realize that in 1962, it was the Class of 1912 that would have been celebrating their 50th! That may change your perspective. It did mine.
The Lake Mills reunion was pretty much a one-day event, confirming even further that with holding a four-day affair, our class is pretty unique. I have heard from NKHS grads both before and after our time who say their reunion is pretty much a three-hour meal and that's it. I described to some folks on Saturday our four days together, and they just kind of stared at me like, "ok, really?" Think of this: would any class ever purposely try to arrange either style, limiting itself to the three-hour dinner or creating the four-day gathering? Probably not. Either one just sort of "happens." The design flows from the people and their relationships, though I think the Lake Mills folks might enjoy an extended reunion, too.
Do you realize we had classmates returning from Massachusetts, New Jersey, California, and numerous points in between? And Dick Brunsvold who lives in Norway, missed it.
Our classmates have experienced a pretty good level of success, but so have the LMHS grads. Makes me think that Norwegian ancestry may have a hand in all this, although I once knew a fellow from Kansas who graduated in a class of four. Three of them earned doctorates while he was a successful business owner. That sets a pretty high standard.
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| "Butch" Pederson |
Like the other players on the floor for those games in '61-'62, he recalls the high level of competition between NK and LM that all agree made everyone better. "You know, it started in junior high and just carried through," he commented.
His memories of our final game have a little different perspective. "We trailed, what, 18 - 4 at the end of the 1st quarter? I thought we were done. I did. Then in the 3rd quarter I got hot, shots going in that I couldn't believe. And I won't forget my 2 free throws with 15 seconds left. We were leading by four and I knew how important they were because it could be the game. I hardly recall the ball leaving my fingertips, and it just floated in."
Paul Charlson was quoted in an earlier post about his own memories of the season, and you can read his story here . . .
Just before we left, Butch and I looked around and hypothesized about our common future, what with the incidence of cancer, heart disease, tumors . . . Some of the people attending their reunion - just like ours - won't be there next time, and that's a sad reality. Until then, let's stay in touch.
Monday, July 16, 2012
a Bulldog 50th
Another Reunion has gone by, this one held at Rice Lake Country Club last weekend for the LMHS Class of '62. Paul Charlson reports he has set up a Facebook page for the group, so if you're a Facebook user you could probably enjoy their photos. If not, here are a few that we took, and I'm sure you will recognize many faces.
Paul is a good man and has been the organizer of the past few Bulldog Reunions. This year they very appropriately copied our recognition of classmates no longer with us. Two names in particular struck me - Arlen Stensrud and Allen Holstad, both members of their basketball team and good athletes, well known to Northwood athletes.
I don't have a headcount but I believe their turnout was about the same as ours, with several classmates returning for the reunion for perhaps the first time. I also discovered that one classmate, David Rosheim, is a "writer of history, short stories, articles and poetry . . . and is Norwegian by descent . . . " We purchased Old Iowegian Legends (what a classy, memorable name, eh?) and will be quoting from it from time to time, I suspect. Lonna tells me he is familiar with Dan Sorenson, the Iowa Farm Boy, and the two will surely provide more for the grist mill.
I flipped open the book and found this story on page 113:
In late summer of 1962, the administrators of Luther College finally came out of their long established fortifications against student dancing and at long last decided to allow the once taboo activity to become a legitimate student recreation. When I heard this I was surprised. I had been rocking and rolling and bopping along at sock hops since 1957 and was amazed to know that the college I had chosen had not been permitting it.
Those of you who were Norsemen will remember those days, and the rest of us will scratch our heads but recall that times were indeed significantly different 50 years ago. Change is good.
I don't have a headcount but I believe their turnout was about the same as ours, with several classmates returning for the reunion for perhaps the first time. I also discovered that one classmate, David Rosheim, is a "writer of history, short stories, articles and poetry . . . and is Norwegian by descent . . . " We purchased Old Iowegian Legends (what a classy, memorable name, eh?) and will be quoting from it from time to time, I suspect. Lonna tells me he is familiar with Dan Sorenson, the Iowa Farm Boy, and the two will surely provide more for the grist mill.
I flipped open the book and found this story on page 113:
In late summer of 1962, the administrators of Luther College finally came out of their long established fortifications against student dancing and at long last decided to allow the once taboo activity to become a legitimate student recreation. When I heard this I was surprised. I had been rocking and rolling and bopping along at sock hops since 1957 and was amazed to know that the college I had chosen had not been permitting it.
Those of you who were Norsemen will remember those days, and the rest of us will scratch our heads but recall that times were indeed significantly different 50 years ago. Change is good.
Saturday, March 24, 2012
The Other Guys - LMHS
During the course of researching one of our stories mention was made about the LMHS yearbooks, and since I married a Bulldog and her '62 Yearbook is shelved in the basement next to the Viking '62 Yearbook, I took a chance it might provide the information I was looking for. It did not, but I did find a horrible historical inaccuracy. According to their yearbook, copy inserted here, the Bulldogs beat us 7-6 in the final game of the 1961 football season.
Obviously I was horribly offended by this inaccuracy, but Lonna didn't think it was much of a big whoop and asked me who I was going to report it to. But here it is, check it out for yourself, and then compare it to the proper records of our own Yearbook:
She may not have thought it important today but look at her cheerleading face in this photo, full of excitement and smiles, in a game against NKHS. It has to be the game played at LMHS since it's on the stage, and if you look carefully (click the photo for a larger view) you will see David Skellenger on the far left end of the bench, what may be the crewcut of Maynard Midtgaard, and Gwen Hillman poised to cheer in response.
Obviously I was horribly offended by this inaccuracy, but Lonna didn't think it was much of a big whoop and asked me who I was going to report it to. But here it is, check it out for yourself, and then compare it to the proper records of our own Yearbook:
She may not have thought it important today but look at her cheerleading face in this photo, full of excitement and smiles, in a game against NKHS. It has to be the game played at LMHS since it's on the stage, and if you look carefully (click the photo for a larger view) you will see David Skellenger on the far left end of the bench, what may be the crewcut of Maynard Midtgaard, and Gwen Hillman poised to cheer in response.
You may recall I once reported that she usually didn't know what was going on in a game, has little memory of the games, and so on, but she did seem to be pretty excited at what was happening at this moment. And on the next page of their yearbook is this quality photo, full page, taken by a fellow named Bill Bakken.
This appears to be a shot taken at the Sectional game in St Ansgar, won by the Bulldogs 72-66. Unfortunately, this time they did get the score correct, but some things you can't change. The scoreboard, barely visible at left, shows the Visitor has 48 points at the time of this tip. And notice that once again the crowd is standing room only.
Click the photo for a larger view, but if you can't read the caption it says: OUR MIGHTY FIVE!!! Arlen (Stensrud) takes the tip from Phil!! The Bulldogs topped Northwood in sectional play 72-66 after being beaten by the Vikings twice in the conference contests. A sad side note - Arlen and Allen Holstad (far left) are no longer with us.
You gotta admit - the rivalry with the Bulldogs was one-of-a-kind.
Saturday, March 3, 2012
Old and Sad News - Around the Nation
March 1, 1962 -
The NIC champion NK Vikings were defeated in the first game of the sectional tournaments by the Lake Mills Bulldogs 72-66 Wednesday night to end a 16-game winning streak. The Vikings had defeated the Bulldogs twice in the regular season and will still go down in history as one of the greatest teams in the history of the school.
Not until 2006-07 when the Vikings won a state championship was this level of performance achieved again. The next day at school was sad, but there was a sense of relief that it was over. The follow-up 50 years later appeared in a posting just last month. Read more here . . .
Mrs. Dean Morris and her daughter Barbara of rural Northwood were injured in a train-car crash Monday night at the rail crossing over Highway 105 two miles west of Carpenter. Both were taken to Mercy Hospital in Mason City by ambulance where their condition is rated as fair at the present time.
We all know what happened here, the death from an apparent blood clot that moved in a broken leg. It was a sad moment for the school, and we all looked at what life is about at this funeral. Read the previous blog article from a year ago. . . Apparently the accident occurred on Monday the 26th, and the game on Wednesday the 28th, but if you have better information, let us know. One loss was painful, the other devastating.
Bringing home top honors from the district declam contest held Saturday in Mason City were Donna Davenport, Robert Hickman, Gerald Sawin, Ardis Holstad, Phyllis Mueller, Carol Boutelle, Sue Bergan and Sue Drury. These winners will participate in the state speech contest in Cedar Rapids March 30 and 31.
"Mad Men" returns on March 25 with more references to the history and culture of our era, including a mention of two simultaneously-occurring events in New York City: March 1, 1962 was a day of intense horror and immense celebration for New York City. On that momentous Thursday morning, an American Airlines flight crashed on takeoff from Idlewild Airport (now John F. Kennedy International Airport), killing all 95 passengers and crew aboard. At the same moment, a roaring crowd of four million people waited enthusiastically along Broadway to honor astronaut John Glenn with a ticker-tape parade for becoming the first American to orbit the Earth.
March 1, 1962 is the date that K-Mart opened, and the US and Britain conducted joint nuclear tests in Nevada. Each lives in a different kind of infamy.
The NIC champion NK Vikings were defeated in the first game of the sectional tournaments by the Lake Mills Bulldogs 72-66 Wednesday night to end a 16-game winning streak. The Vikings had defeated the Bulldogs twice in the regular season and will still go down in history as one of the greatest teams in the history of the school.
Not until 2006-07 when the Vikings won a state championship was this level of performance achieved again. The next day at school was sad, but there was a sense of relief that it was over. The follow-up 50 years later appeared in a posting just last month. Read more here . . .
Mrs. Dean Morris and her daughter Barbara of rural Northwood were injured in a train-car crash Monday night at the rail crossing over Highway 105 two miles west of Carpenter. Both were taken to Mercy Hospital in Mason City by ambulance where their condition is rated as fair at the present time.
We all know what happened here, the death from an apparent blood clot that moved in a broken leg. It was a sad moment for the school, and we all looked at what life is about at this funeral. Read the previous blog article from a year ago. . . Apparently the accident occurred on Monday the 26th, and the game on Wednesday the 28th, but if you have better information, let us know. One loss was painful, the other devastating.
Bringing home top honors from the district declam contest held Saturday in Mason City were Donna Davenport, Robert Hickman, Gerald Sawin, Ardis Holstad, Phyllis Mueller, Carol Boutelle, Sue Bergan and Sue Drury. These winners will participate in the state speech contest in Cedar Rapids March 30 and 31.
March 1, 1962 is the date that K-Mart opened, and the US and Britain conducted joint nuclear tests in Nevada. Each lives in a different kind of infamy.
Saturday, February 11, 2012
Dance Party Plus
In the far left corner of the photo below – the brunette is Connie Valens – Richie Valens sister. At the Surf on Dance Party weekend, you are bound to run into people like Connie. She has come to be a welcome and much appreciated guest of the Surf.
She gets right up on stage and transfuses energy to the bands who are playing Richie’s music. Last weekend the goal was to sing “La Bamba” so loud that Richie and the rest could hear us up in heaven. So we did.
The man with the broad Smile is Paul Charlson of Lake Mills '62 – he played basketball against you guys in HS. The woman in the black and white striped blouse is Lavonne Forland Welch (NKHS class of 1963).
I have seen Mr Charlson at the Surf Winter Dance Party several years running now. We never had reason in particular to visit. LaVonne and Paul know one another pretty well from church and from having worked together on a large church improvement project.
Turns out Paul knows the Northwood 1962 BB team pretty well too as he played against you guys “back then”. I made a comment to Paul that we all liked the Lake Mills guys up until they came to Northwood and started dating our girls. Paul was pretty quick to point out that Leroy L. went so far as to marry one of the LM cheer leaders.
I said to Paul that truthfully I was impressed that he knew most all the names of the 1962 NKHS BB team. I wonder if the Northwood guys know the Lake Mills guys names that well.
It was all fun “back and forth banter," especially when Paul made the comment that in Lake Mills, the NKHS athletes were all regarded “gentlemen”. In my vocabulary, that is a pretty high complement. If you guys know Paul, I want to verify that he is “out there” offering some very nice compliments in your direction
For me, this kind of encounter really warms my heart. There are lots of wonderful people “out there” we cross paths with them all the time every day. This past weekend at the Surf was extra nice in my opinion that way …. best described as not so much “glitz and glamour” as in the past.
Just the ordinary people doing what really is the spirit of the Surf and the mid west.
I love what goes on there; the fun; the friendship; the plain old good times. The photo above embodies a lot of these feelings.
I run into Paul at Rice Lake Golf Course every once in a while. We always enjoy talking about the NK and LM BB teams from 1962 – great memories. You can’t find a better guy than Paul. Maybe some of the NK BB team could challenge some of the LM BB team on the golf course in July!!! It’s a thought anyway!
I do recognize some of the names.. Richard, who I just met, Larry, Phil and Chuck and of course my newest friend LaVonne. It was fun to meet Richard who was escorting LaVonne to the Surf and of course he knew all the NK guys and is a cousin of Larry. It was fun and interesting to talk to both Richard and LaVonne about the old days. I learned a quite a lot about NK and some of its graduates.
I am impressed by the good rapport and apparent contact you guys appear to have. LM '62 has not had as good contact, at least not by our BB team. But we do have some good reunions. And I do enjoy seeing Lee and Lonna, our class mates, the golf outings and the good discussion.
Since retiring, I golf Northwood on Wed and LM on Thursday , so I see Coach Maynard Midtgaard frequently and we have fun discussions and banter and what a great guy, good coach and he can play some really good golf. At LM I see Chuck H at times and you all know he is a super dude, but he golfs left handed and does so well.
I look forward to seeing you, Lee and Lonna in July and I hope Northwood has a very successful and fun 50th anniversary the week before.
Yes he knows all the Northwood BB guys, and is indeed a fine fellow. I now see him every 5 years at the LMHS Class of '62 reunion and have thought about emailing him for some thoughts on the NK-LMHS rivalry for inclusion in the blog but never have.
I have always enjoyed going to the LM reunion and spending some time with Paul, Wayne Pederson, Denny Hall, David Heltne, and others. In spite of our high school competitiveness, or maybe because of it, they're pretty good guys. They have always made me feel very welcome there.
The LMHS 50th Reunion is scheduled for July 14, a week after ours. That's an awful lot of celebrating for folks our age but we'll do our best.
It is a small world and yes we had some very memorable games with the Bulldogs in the “old” days. It was such a pleasure playing on the “stage" in the Lake Mils auditorium (where the circles intertwined) and trying to stop Butch Petersen from launching ¾ shots and trying to keep Paul, Al Holstad and Arlen Stensrud off the boards if he happened to miss one. Or taking the ball out of bounds on the sideline and not hitting your head on the radiator, or running up the wall on the side baskets during early warm-up and dunking before Coach Midtgaard came up and stopped us.
She gets right up on stage and transfuses energy to the bands who are playing Richie’s music. Last weekend the goal was to sing “La Bamba” so loud that Richie and the rest could hear us up in heaven. So we did.
The man with the broad Smile is Paul Charlson of Lake Mills '62 – he played basketball against you guys in HS. The woman in the black and white striped blouse is Lavonne Forland Welch (NKHS class of 1963).
I have seen Mr Charlson at the Surf Winter Dance Party several years running now. We never had reason in particular to visit. LaVonne and Paul know one another pretty well from church and from having worked together on a large church improvement project.
Turns out Paul knows the Northwood 1962 BB team pretty well too as he played against you guys “back then”. I made a comment to Paul that we all liked the Lake Mills guys up until they came to Northwood and started dating our girls. Paul was pretty quick to point out that Leroy L. went so far as to marry one of the LM cheer leaders.
I said to Paul that truthfully I was impressed that he knew most all the names of the 1962 NKHS BB team. I wonder if the Northwood guys know the Lake Mills guys names that well.
It was all fun “back and forth banter," especially when Paul made the comment that in Lake Mills, the NKHS athletes were all regarded “gentlemen”. In my vocabulary, that is a pretty high complement. If you guys know Paul, I want to verify that he is “out there” offering some very nice compliments in your direction
Just the ordinary people doing what really is the spirit of the Surf and the mid west.
I love what goes on there; the fun; the friendship; the plain old good times. The photo above embodies a lot of these feelings.
--Richard Holstad
-- Chuck Hendrickson
I am impressed by the good rapport and apparent contact you guys appear to have. LM '62 has not had as good contact, at least not by our BB team. But we do have some good reunions. And I do enjoy seeing Lee and Lonna, our class mates, the golf outings and the good discussion.
Since retiring, I golf Northwood on Wed and LM on Thursday , so I see Coach Maynard Midtgaard frequently and we have fun discussions and banter and what a great guy, good coach and he can play some really good golf. At LM I see Chuck H at times and you all know he is a super dude, but he golfs left handed and does so well.
I look forward to seeing you, Lee and Lonna in July and I hope Northwood has a very successful and fun 50th anniversary the week before.
-- Paul Charlson, LMHS '62
I have always enjoyed going to the LM reunion and spending some time with Paul, Wayne Pederson, Denny Hall, David Heltne, and others. In spite of our high school competitiveness, or maybe because of it, they're pretty good guys. They have always made me feel very welcome there.
The LMHS 50th Reunion is scheduled for July 14, a week after ours. That's an awful lot of celebrating for folks our age but we'll do our best.
It is a small world and yes we had some very memorable games with the Bulldogs in the “old” days. It was such a pleasure playing on the “stage" in the Lake Mils auditorium (where the circles intertwined) and trying to stop Butch Petersen from launching ¾ shots and trying to keep Paul, Al Holstad and Arlen Stensrud off the boards if he happened to miss one. Or taking the ball out of bounds on the sideline and not hitting your head on the radiator, or running up the wall on the side baskets during early warm-up and dunking before Coach Midtgaard came up and stopped us.
Mike and I talked on the bus ride over the night of our senior year about a couple of phone calls we received just before we left home wishing us good luck and that we had this feeling that at least a couple of people in each community had more than just community pride on the line. If I also recall right, Mike didn’t have a typical game for him that night in Lake Mills, (I believe it was something about a Bulldog trying to date his girlfriend, does Mr. Charlson know anything about that?) but he stepped up with the game tied and made two free throws at the end to win the game for us.
We also respected the Bulldogs tremendously and knew they were good guys, it was just easier to get up to play them if we said we didn’t like them. But just to let them know there is still a few hard feelings that after they beat us in the tournament, they let everyone down by getting beat in the next round. Our feelings were if you were going to lose you could have lost to us and let us try to advance.
We also respected the Bulldogs tremendously and knew they were good guys, it was just easier to get up to play them if we said we didn’t like them. But just to let them know there is still a few hard feelings that after they beat us in the tournament, they let everyone down by getting beat in the next round. Our feelings were if you were going to lose you could have lost to us and let us try to advance.
Seriously, it was a fun rivalry (and hard to believe that it was 50 years ago) and brings back so many memories, some painful but all good.
-- Larry Holstad
Friday, September 16, 2011
Memories - Many Lost Forever
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| The Lake Mills Bulldog |
"What great memories do you have?" I asked.
"None," she said.
"You mean you don't even recall the upset in St. Ansgar?"
"Why? Who did we play? All I remember is that I always wanted to win - but I don't recall the details." And she laughed at me.
Oh, Lordy. Here I thought all that stuff was important. Maybe she's just putting it in perspective for me.
Monday, September 5, 2011
Jon Swenson
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| Click on the Photo to Enlarge |
He was a good guy with great intentions and a personal philosophy summed up in his response to the Class of '61 Dedication of their Yearbook to him. Essentially, he said one should set goals, believe you will accomplish them, and set out to do so immediately. And he is the one person with whom I have a clear memory of a conversation about my career before leaving high school.
Ultimately he earned a Doctorate in Educational Administration and became the Stillwater, MN, High School Principal. I happened to bump into him there in the late 80s and he was the same guy that we knew at NKHS.
Just recently I had a conversation with a fellow who graduated from Stillwater in the mid-80s. He was a bit down on his luck and had made some choices in life that were not helping him greatly, but he seemed to have a warm spot for Big Jon. Apparently this fellow had once been "encouraged" to pull the fire alarm at school, did so, and was called on the carpet in front of Swenson.
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| Yearbook Dedication by the Class of '61 |
When we were sophomores Swenson set up a basketball "league" in our PE class, with self-reporting of wins and losses, all of them recorded on a paper thumb-tacked to the bulletin board between the gym floor and steps to the locker room. Somehow there was a difference of opinion as to who had won which games, and memories seemed to get a bit out of whack as to whether Team A or Team B had won and what the score was, so there he was standing at the bulletin board, trying to sort it all out, with numerous individuals trying to insert their own version of the truth.
It wasn't going so well, especially when John Roberts very correctly said, "This can't be right because the number of all the wins when added up HAVE TO equal the number of losses!" With that, Swenson ripped the page off the wall and marched into the coaches room, and the league was over. We never heard another word about it again.
He was a good guy, even if his faith and optimism sometimes got undermined by reality.
Thursday, September 1, 2011
Real Men Wear Leather Helmets
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| Click the Photo for Larger Version |
Richard Holstad noticed my post the other day about the Leather Helmets we were fortunate not to wear, and I was pleasantly surprised when he emailed this program from a game Northwood played vs (you guessed it!) Lake Mills, in October, 1956.
Reading the names of the players on the roster indeed brings back memories. As freshmen we were on the '58 squad, using the phrase loosely, with seniors like Holtan, Johnson, Fistler, and Mehaffey so we had a personalized respect for them, and older players like Jay Gullickson, Vic Edwards and others can make you smile just from the memories of the names.
Jay Gullickson brings a particular memory to mind - because of the helmets. I don't know that these guys actually wore leather helmets and in fact I suspect they had those same plastic shells that we used later, but I do know, and you will recall from an earlier posting, that facemasks were not de rigeur at the time of this game in 1956.
So one Saturday morning in the fall of 1956, Jay came out to our place with his dad, Joe, sporting a beautiful shiner - a bruise about the size of an orange, planted directly around the eye. Joe smiled his slow smile and said, "He blocked a kick last night." Jay was a quarterback but I can well imagine that on defense he would fit very well as a linebacker, and when defending an extra point he would make every effort, as the tough guy that he was, to block a kick. He succeeded - and paid a price.Jon Swenson, an LMHS grad who played football at Iowa State Teachers College in Cedar Falls (previously known as the Normal School and today the University of Northern Iowa) was a teacher/coach for us for a couple of years and knew what tough guys were about. When practicing blocking technique, he said, it was important to get your head as close to the body of the defender as you possibly could, so you could avoid having him slip off your shoulder.
That was why, he said, "in the old days" you could tell the good blockers because their cheeks were always roughed up, caused by their "good technique," and he personally bemoaned the use of facemasks. Well, Jay was a good blocker, too, of a sort, and we know what happened to him.
Personally, I'm glad we never had to wear the leather helmets. My cheeks are plenty rosy as they are, thank you.
Friday, August 26, 2011
Home Opener Tonight - vs Lake Mills
The Anchor reports the Vikings will host the Lake Mills Bulldogs tonight for the football home opener, having lost to Newman of Mason City last week.
Lake Mills was always a grudge match, it seems, and when we played them in the final game of the '61 season, we could only tie them 6 - 6, keeping our record .500 for the season at three wins, three losses, two ties. The game itself was anticlimactic, and was personally a downer when the season had started with so much hope. Apparently the record was the school's best since 1955, but nowhere near the performance of teams since then.
Just for the record, in case any of today's players may read this, we did NOT have leather helmets that could be folded and put in your pocket, and we DID have facemasks, but they were more a single bar or two made of nylon and they didn't look very cool at all. I believe facemasks first came out when we were in seventh grade and Billy Roberts was the first to be able to put one on his helmet. I don't know why he was selected but the rest of us didn't get them until 8th grade.
Our equipment was much inferior to what's available today, especially the helmet, which was a suspension style, a shell held off the head by a web of straps. They were a little better than the leather style of prior players, but not much. It hurt to "get your bell rung."
The yearbook report on the Lake Mills game says we completely dominated except for one Lake Mills touchdown drive brought about by a costly lapse in defense. My recollection is more along the line of our just not getting our act together throughout the game than seeing any domination on our part. If we dominated, why did we lose? It was a cool or cold night, combined with a so-so record, so the turnout wasn't that great either.
Afterwards we got on the bus and the season's sorrow was mixed with a relief that it was over, unfortunately. So we wish the 2011 version of the NK Vikings much better success tonight against the archenemy. And I may place a bet on it with my Bulldog wife.
Lake Mills was always a grudge match, it seems, and when we played them in the final game of the '61 season, we could only tie them 6 - 6, keeping our record .500 for the season at three wins, three losses, two ties. The game itself was anticlimactic, and was personally a downer when the season had started with so much hope. Apparently the record was the school's best since 1955, but nowhere near the performance of teams since then.
Just for the record, in case any of today's players may read this, we did NOT have leather helmets that could be folded and put in your pocket, and we DID have facemasks, but they were more a single bar or two made of nylon and they didn't look very cool at all. I believe facemasks first came out when we were in seventh grade and Billy Roberts was the first to be able to put one on his helmet. I don't know why he was selected but the rest of us didn't get them until 8th grade.
Our equipment was much inferior to what's available today, especially the helmet, which was a suspension style, a shell held off the head by a web of straps. They were a little better than the leather style of prior players, but not much. It hurt to "get your bell rung."
The yearbook report on the Lake Mills game says we completely dominated except for one Lake Mills touchdown drive brought about by a costly lapse in defense. My recollection is more along the line of our just not getting our act together throughout the game than seeing any domination on our part. If we dominated, why did we lose? It was a cool or cold night, combined with a so-so record, so the turnout wasn't that great either.
Afterwards we got on the bus and the season's sorrow was mixed with a relief that it was over, unfortunately. So we wish the 2011 version of the NK Vikings much better success tonight against the archenemy. And I may place a bet on it with my Bulldog wife.
Monday, June 6, 2011
The Year of the "Music Man"
The North Iowa Band Festival was a big deal in '62, what with the world premier of "The Music Man" in Mason City, Meredith Wilson, Robert Preston, Shirley Jones and others all in attendance. And I've heard that some upperclassmen may have been nearby during the shooting of the movie and have stories to tell. Perhaps we can get more on that later.Being able to see folks of that fame from "up close" (curbside as their convertibles drove by in the parade) was pretty cool, and the energy in Mason City for the event was pretty incredible. I recall being struck by how pretty Shirley Jones was, and I'm sure I wasn't the only one who felt that way. If you've already clicked the link above to the Wikipedia article you know she played Marian the Librarian and Preston was Harold Hill.
Reading in Wikipedia, I had forgotten the number of songs that came from the musical, many of which pop easily back into my head. Mostly I recall it was a beautiful day, and Phil Johnson and I were both decked out in white Bermuda shorts. Shows off your tan better, doncha know.
I always thought this Festival was scheduled for June but I see it's already completed for this year, prior to Memorial Day. I can't imagine that it will ever go away because the economic impact for Mason City has to be significant, especially for a town that seems to have lost some of the gloss of our era.
If you're wondering about the attached photo - I don't know who our queen candidate was, but I happen to have this one - of the Lake Mills candidate, Lonna Hoel, who swept me off my feet a couple years later. For me the Lake Mills rivalry ended long ago. It had to.
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