Kicked off the team
Every one seemed to smoke in those days and having a cigarette was pretty acceptable for many people. True young people weren’t supposed to smoke but celebrities did and even professional athletes relaxed according to the advertising with a good smoke. I smoked but not all the time, least of all during football season.
I was in tenth grade and out for football. Coach Pollack posted a list in our locker room at Breese Stevens field as to who would be dressing for the Friday night game. My name was on the list. I was really excited, not many tenth graders got to dress for varsity games. I had played on the meat squad for two weeks against all conference Paul Smelzer. He was big, strong, fast, and mean. Meeting him was like trying to stop a truck or worse. Trucks aren’t mean, he was. When he pulled from his position that usually meant 220 pound all conference full back Dennis Schmelskopf would come roaring through. That was worse because he was mean and with a head of steam built up. I didn’t complain though, that wasn’t allowed, although I had the bruises to justify it. Maybe getting beat up by guys like Smelzer and Schmelskopf was worth it, maybe the coaches had noticed.
It was lunch hour in the early fall, sunny and warm yet. I was on Gorham Street where some student cars were parked. Chuck Gribble offered me a cigarette and I accepted. We were lighting up.
All of a sudden one of the football coaches go out of a car near us. He was moving his car like the kids did to prevent being ticketed. Freshman Coach Risser looked over at me from about four car lengths away and said simply “Shapiro, check your equipment in!”
I didn’t go to another practice; the season was over for me. The last thing I had to worry about was dressing for a big game. I was trying to be cool and tough as a 10th grader. My mother knew what had happened, and didn’t say much more that she knew about it, my dad didn’t talk about it. Getting kicked off the team did register though, and I really appreciated being able to play the next two seasons.
The Christian Stein Award
It was class award night and I was excited about graduating. I was never a really good student but by the time I was a senior I knew I had to work and was getting pretty good grades. I sure wasn’t going to get any awards for scholarship though. Thus towards the end of the ceremony I was really shocked when Principal Brown called me to the stage. The auditorium was packed with students and parents. I was honored with the Christian Stein award. Most graduates I’m sure don’t remember the award. It was for the kid that had improved himself the most through his high school years. That moment is precious to me. It did a lot to build my confidence and probably helped me in my struggle to get through the University of Wisconsin.
Al Colucci
I remember Al Colucci in his first year of teaching at Central. Mr. Colucci didn’t look very formidable and some even made fun of his fireplug build. He stood up in front of the class the moment the bell rang and got started with his first class. His remarks went something like this. “Before starting teaching I was in the 82nd airborne as a paratrooper. I learned how to take people apart. If any one wants to screw around in this class, start now and I’ll demonstrate.” The classroom really was quiet and stayed that way. He was a great guy.
The Christmas Tree
I was homeroom 301 President. It was Christmas and we wanted a tree in our homeroom. The “hat” was passed and some money collected. Several of the boys volunteered to get the tree. They got a great tree and at a very reduced price (in fact for free) while visiting the arboretum and cutting their own down. The money went for beer, their reward for the effort.
Christmas came and passed. The tree went through Christmas break without being watered and the needles were really falling off it. Mr. Lanning, our homeroom teacher, was in poor health, missing quite a few days of school, and we had a lady substitute.
I don’t remember who got the idea. We convinced her that the janitors would not want all those needles falling in the hallway. Because of this there was just one good way of getting it down from the third floor and that was via the window. She went along with the plan, not that there was any pressure to get her consent. The window was raised and several of us tossed the tree as far as we could. It was really neat seeing the tree fall three stories. Nothing bad happened. The cars were parked far enough away, thus not hit. Best of all we didn’t get into any trouble.
The 2:30 am Lecture
Away football games at Kenosha or Racine meant late nights. The interstate system was yet to be built. We traveled by Greyhound or Badger bus, leaving early Friday afternoon, playing the game at 7 pm, afterwards eating dinner (fried Chicken) at a restaurant after 9 pm and getting back to our Breese Stevens home base between 2 and 3 am in the morning.
Central didn’t win that many games. Other schools in the Big 8 Conference had so much more size and depth, thus conference wins were really important. There was talk about a taking Central out of the Big 8 Conference because of its size. We had to prove differently.
Racine Horlick was a school we could beat if we put our mind to it. There was a lot of screwing around on the bus trip to Racine. I remember a muscular guy named Cunningham sponsoring misbehavior that others copied.
We played the game and we lost, 13 to 21. We just didn’t show up, it was a pathetic showing. No one seemed too concerned though, and some of the same screwing around went on during the trip home.
The bus pulled up at Breese Steven’s and players started getting off. Line Coach Bob Harris, The Boomer, a mountain of a man, stood up almost immediately. His words, in his booming and somewhat impeded (because of his hair lip) speech were ‘Linemen stay in your seats” When the backs were off the bus the lecture started, and you could hear him all the way to the back. There were no sounds other than his voice. “I have never coached a worst bunch of “kittens” (a cat reference but a slightly different word) than you-when are you going to grow up?“ He obviously had been boiling all the way home and he really unloaded for 10 minutes or more. I don’t remember his exact words but they were about accepting responsibility as an adult, and not acting like a bunch of little girls. For good measure as I recall, after the lecture he told us that we could all show up for Four Lakes football later that morning. That would be in about four hours.
The 2:30 am lecture affected me, I have thought about it many times during the last 50 plus years.
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