Sports Collecting

 Wow, it has been over a month since my last post, I guess I need to write something. In that time period, there have been a few rocket launches, a hurricane hit (Nicole), visits to the Zoo, beach, wetlands and eating out a few times. I am continuing my reading list and trying to clean house and yard. While cleaning, I pulled out some of my old albums of newspaper clippings, mostly about football when I was a kid. My dad help me get started back in 1966 when I was just 9 years old. I decided to scan and share the historical documents. I am amazed that things I collected over 50 years ago have so many connections to friends I have today...

My sister Patsy had graduated in 1965 and she was a football cheerleader. We went to every game, both home and away. I even had the pleasure of dressing up as the Tiger mascot for one home game, I think I was 6 or 7. The things you do for your older sister.

My oldest brother John played and that is when I started the clipping of newspaper articles. In 1967, I saved the "Meet the Tigers" article from the Addison Independent, which was our weekly local paper.

Some connections in this clipping of John's team-mates include:

1. Albert Bingham was the older brother of my classmate Craig and Tom's classmate Eric.
2. Laird Covey was the older brother of my classmate Mark
3. Jay Flickinger was the older brother of the twins who were in Tom's class.

The next two photos/clippings were from the 1968 season. My brother John had graduated and headed off to the Culinary Institute of America, a great cooking college. The snow fence you see in the background completely surrounded the field. I am not sure when that changed. The first clipping is two photos, one of Henry Forgues and the other of Jack Sheehan.

The connections with Jack Sheehan is many. First, his dad Bobo, was a friend and classmate of my dad Harold. Bobo was also the ski coach at Middlebury College and my dad spent weekends in the winter working at the Middlebury College Snow Bowl, our local ski area. Jack's oldest brother was nicknamed Butch and was a great friend and classmate of my brother John. They were on the ski team together in HS. There was a brother Steve who I did not know very well, and a sister Patty, who became a professional golfer. I was introduced to Patty after a tournament in Florida, by my good friend Rodney Bicknell. The Sheehan's moved away to Nevada but Jack stayed in Middlebury to finish his time at MUHS. I played softball with Jack and still run into him at Neshobe golf course where my brother Tom works. I even played a round with him.

Another 1968 clipping shows my neighbor in Middlebury Francis Paquette. The caption spells his name wrong. If I went throw all my Paquette connections, we be here all day. You know, the Paquettes lived across the street when I was growing up and there were 12 kids.

The following 1969 is my good friend Bobby Bicknell who played for the Tigers, as well as his younger brother Rodney. They grew up in the Weybridge Street area. I have kept in touch with the family and have spent time with them including Norm, Carol, Bobby, Rodney & Cheryl.

My dad liked to do things like make this football award for my brother Tom's first game from 1970.

In 1971, the following clipping was in the paper with South Burlington player Jack Leggett and Middlebury player Jim Doria. My connections to these two players are interesting. When I went to UVM, I decided to go out for the baseball team my sophomore year, and the Head coach had just graduated college and was Jack Leggett, the same one that was in my scrapbook. Jack went to University of Maine where he played football and went to the College World Series in baseball. He was a great coach but my grades went down so I quit the team, Jack was not happy!

The connection to Jim goes back to his father and Uncles who were all friends with my dad, Uncle Joe being a classmate of Harold. Joe Doria got me my first job at Middlebury College washing dishes at SDU (Students Dining Unit) with, none other, than Jim Doria,  My HS senior year I spent the summer doing dishes on the weekend at the Dog Team where my brother John was the head chef. Doing dishes with me, and also peeling potatoes, was Jim again. It was no wonder that many years later I would be a silent partner in Jim's restaurant in Middlebury called Dorias. Jim & his wife Sharon now live in Florida.

Jim was also a classmate with my brother Tom; making a tackle in the next clipping from 1971. In 1972, Tom and Jim would join Rodney Bicknell as tri-captains of the MUHS football team.

In 1972, my sophomore year in High School, I started to write sports for the Addison Independent. Here is the first article I wrote about the first game played by the Tigers in the 1972 season, Tom's Senior year.

The advantage of being the sports writer and an athlete, I could write about myself in the articles.

In this 1973 clipping, I even reported that I was out for six weeks. I had broken my collarbone against Peru, New York in a pre-season scrimmage.

In my albums, I started to collect other sports beyond football. Here is the MUHS field hockey team. As the sports writer for the local paper, I also got to know coach Gail Jette real well because I would have to interview her about the most recent games so I could get them into the paper which came out on Thursdays. I also got to know many of the coaches of most sports.

I was also collecting skiing stories. Here is Rodney Bicknell winning another race.

And let's not forget about the wrestling team, coached by Hubie Wagner, who also coached the football team at MUHS. Coach was also one of our Phys Ed teachers. He always liked me and knew me since I was a kid with older brothers playing and hanging out at practices with my dad. When we had wrestling in PhysEd, if there were an odd number, Coach would always volunteer to even out the participants and always grab me to be his wrestling partner. Not sure if that was an advantage to me or not since he had 40 pounds on me back then. Ha ha.

I also found that I had a lot more football clipping from Middlebury College including players that I had watched in High School. I have not even started to scan those yet. I found this cool picture of the Middlebury College field at sunrise.

I also found this photo of them building Space Coast Stadium in Viera. That is where I spent 20 seasons watching MLB baseball in Spring Training.

And if you are going to collect sports memorabilia, you need to include comics...

I love the dog's reaction to his answer...