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Archive for the ‘Memories’ Category

1964 for the win

Posted in Memories, tagged , , , , , on August 26, 2021| Leave a Comment »

Dale Sherman, man of the hour. (Photos courtesy Jack Sell)

Everyone gets a win.

You get one, and you get one, and what the heck, you get a couple more for good measure.

Coupeville High School’s athletic programs were all clicking during the 1963-1964 school year, as a look through one of my landlord’s yearbooks proves.

It was a year when Wolf football, boys basketball, and baseball all posted winning records, going a combined 28-14, while the CHS boys tennis team captured league and sub-district titles.

What was the netters record, you ask?

The Leloo Cly of the day ain’t tellin’, so I ain’t sayin’, but it was a campaign which included multiple titles and ended with David Lortz and Ron Edwards playing at the state tourney, so probably pretty darn good.

Toss in what appears to be a four-man track and field squad, and a seven-woman girls tennis team which (rare for the time period) got to compete against rival schools, and things were hoppin’ back in the day.

Roger Eelkema, ready to run like the wind.

 

How things played out in ’63-’64:

 

Baseball:

The Wolves, paced by Bob Rea, the Strikeout King of Snakelum Point, went 11-5 overall, 8-4 in Northwest League play, finishing a close second to Granite Falls.

Coupeville dropped 19 runs in one win over Langley, and swept all four games against arch-rival La Conner, but it was a mid-season game at Darrington which will live forever.

That was the day Rea, then a junior, rang up 27 strikeouts across 16 innings in a 2-1 win.

Yes, those numbers are correct, and as we descend further and further into a nanny state dominated by pitch-count rules, it is the one CHS record, in any sport, which will absolutely, positively, NEVER be broken.

 

Boys basketball:

Denny Clark closed one of the great Wolf hardwood careers, pouring in 365 of his 869 career points to pace a squad which went 12-5, finishing third at the league tourney.

The buzz-cut one was #2 all-time in scoring when he graduated, behind just Mike Criscuola, and nearly 60 years (and the introduction of the three-point line) later, still sits at #9 on the career scoring chart.

Clark had plenty of help, with three others putting up triple-digits in the time of the two-hand set-shot.

David Lortz banked in 251, Dick Smith popped for 173, and future prairie farming legend Dale Sherman tossed in 142 during a campaign in which the Wolves won eight straight games at one point.

 

Boys tennis:

Coupeville beat Friday Harbor in the season finale to claim the Northwest League crown, with Lee Milheim, Bill Bainbridge, and Bruce Seiger coming up big in the match.

From there, the Wolves stormed their way through the postseason, with Ron Edwards and David Lortz keying a sub-district team title, then advancing to state, where the duo made the final eight.

 

Cheer:

Carolyn Hancock led a five-woman team, with Sharon Meadors, Marilyn Sherman, Sue Gable, and Christy Carter joining her in bringing the noise ‘n pep.

 

Football:

A team which featured my landlord, Jack Sell, and was led by coach Ray Olmstead, overcame injuries to finish 5-4, beating everyone it played except league kingpins Chimacum and Granite Falls.

The Wolves started 3-0, with a 57-7 shellacking of La Conner capping the run, before a one-point loss to Chimacum ended any dreams of a perfect season.

Coupeville bounced back to blow out La Conner again, this time triumphing 33-13, while a 39-6 thrashing of Darrington clinched the winning mark.

Six seniors — Paul Leese, Denny Keith, Gary Crandall, Dale Sherman, Denny Clark, and Ed Brown — led the way, with Crandall earning Most Inspirational honors.

 

Girls tennis:

Title IX was still years away, with girls sports mostly intramurals under the banner of the Girls Athletic Association.

But in ’64, the CHS girls purchased their first tennis uniforms — “white sweatshirts, bright red Bermuda’s, and white tennis shoes” — and played Friday Harbor, Tolt, and Granite Falls.

Coupeville’s top girls doubles duo.

While no record is recorded in the yearbook, the lineup is:

1st singles — Liz Edwards
2nd singles — Sue Gable
3rd singles — Sharon Meadors

1st doubles — Jan Pickard/Marilyn Sherman
2nd doubles — Betty Brown/Sue Bowers

 

Track and Field:

Dick Bogardus, Paul Messner, Roger Eelkema, and Lee Dennis are all shown in photos, though there is not a word about their exploits.

Still, looking at a photo of pole vaulter Messner, gridiron legend and future Santa Claus, draws a line from the past to the present.

“How you doin’?”

Decades later, one of Messner’s grandchildren, Jordan Ford, also repping Coupeville, went all the way to the state tourney and medaled in the pole vault.

It was meant to be.

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November memories fall like rain

Posted in Memories, tagged , , , , on November 12, 2020| Leave a Comment »

Virgil Roehl, with dad Tom, missed a chunk of his senior football season in 1993 after suffering a broken leg. (Photo courtesy Noah Roehl)

In the prep sports world, November is a month of transition.

Normally.

In years without ongoing pandemics, November is when fall sports have their final moments, then everyone heads inside and starts work for the upcoming basketball season.

Now, 2020 is not normal, and we haven’t had live games in Coupeville, in any sport, since back in February.

And won’t for at least the rest of this calendar year.

But, thanks to old sports sections I kept from my days as Whidbey News-Times Sports Editor, we can look back at two Novembers — 1992 and 1993 — when things were still hoppin’.

I worked at the paper through ’94, but, by November of that year, was into a 12-year run behind the counter at Videoville.

Like I said, a month of transition.

But hop in the time machine and let’s go back.

 

November 1992:

The Wolf football team, which pulled off a stunning Homecoming win –https://coupevillesports.com/2020/10/28/under-siege-a-win-for-the-ages/ — finished 4-5 and earned this quote from coach Ron Bagby.

“I was a little disappointed that we didn’t win a few more games that we could have. But we played hard and surprised some people.”

Shifty QB Troy Blouin and bruising back Todd Brown led a seven-pack of departing seniors, but the table was far from bare, with junior Virgil Roehl and Kit Manzanares leading a strong group of underclassmen.

The duo, fellow junior Jeremiah Prater, and Brown all landed on the All-Cascade League squad.

In the gym, the CHS spikers were in a rebuilding year after losing All-League players Linda Cheshier and Emily Vracin, but a 2-13 record was a little misleading, as many matches were close.

Led by team MVP Kari Iverson, All-League pick Misty Sellgren, and rock-solid senior Joli Smith, the young Wolves surprised with a third-place finish at the late-season Darrington Tournament.

Marlys “The Masher” West claimed Outstanding Hitter at the team’s awards banquet, but coach Deb Whittaker was pleased to get production across the board.

“I thought we played well,” she said. “Each game it wasn’t one kid who got all the kills. We spread it around; that was exciting.”

Coupeville’s other fall squads sent multiple athletes to district, with six tennis players and two cross country runners advancing to the postseason.

For the Wolf netters, Keith Currier and Jon Crimmins excelled, while the harriers gave two of their three postseason awards to middle schoolers.

Gerald McIntosh, the lone senior on the ’92 team, was MVP.

Meanwhile, up-and-comers Paul Donnallen (Wolf Award) and Lily Gunn (Most Inspirational) led a middle school group which included future stars (in other sports) Marnie Bartelson and Scott Stuurmans.

Rounding out fall of ’92 was the CHS cheer squad, with Greta Robinett (Wolf Award), Gina Dozier (Coaches Award), and Dawn Caveness (Most Spirited) honored.

 

November 1993:

This was a rough fall for CHS, at least in terms of wins and losses, but there were moments, which now in hindsight, signaled much-better times around the corner.

The biggest of these was Kim Meche taking over the Wolf volleyball program.

The first person I ever inducted into the Coupeville Sports Hall o’ Fame, she launched a resurgence in the program, one which Toni Crebbin kept going after Meche left to take school administration jobs.

In ’93, the varsity spikers were led by Sellgren (Best Offense), Jenn Youngsman (Best Defense), and a pack of hard workers like Mika Hosek, West, Sara Griggs, and Natalie Slater.

Scroll down to the JV and C-Team awards for that season, and it’s dominated by names which have stood the test of time — Jen Canfield, Mimi Iverson, Vanessa Bodley, Emrie McCauslin, and Jacelyn Cobb.

Now, to be honest, back in those days, trying to balance Oak Harbor and Coupeville, I only covered varsity matches in person.

Which may be why I managed to screw up BOTH of Emrie’s names in my newspaper awards story, calling her “Emily McCaulsin.”

Yikes…

Hopefully I made up for it years later by always spelling daughter Maddy Hilkey’s name correctly (I think…) through her middle and high school athletic exploits.

Back in ’93, Kirk Sherrill replaced Chet Baker as coach, inheriting a team with virtually no playing experience.

But the Wolves had Chad Jones, a first-year player and senior, who did a really good imitation of Jim Carrey, so they had entertainment.

In a side note, Jones would go in to star in Dreamer, an award-winning (seriously, I have the certificate!) short film we made once I moved on to Videoville.

So, yeah.

Out on the prairie, Eileen Kennedy, who had previously played volleyball, emerged as Coupeville’s top cross country runner, starting down a path which would lead to joining Meche in our Hall o’ Fame.

Life on the gridiron wasn’t full of much joy in ’93, however, as a string of injuries and ineligible players gutted the roster.

None hurt as badly as when Wolf QB Virgil Roehl missed a considerable chunk of his senior year with a broken leg.

Still, despite playing in only a handful of games for a 1-8 team, he joined Prater in being named as a First-Team All-League pick on defense.

Other league honorees included Manzanares, Jason Hughes, Scott Kirkwood, Jimmy Bennett, Scott Gadbois, and Brad Miller.

Coupeville cheer was led by Sarah Engle (Coaches Award) and Lark Eelkema (Most Spirited), while the one Wolf athlete who truly had an outstanding fall wore a different uniform.

After much back-and-forth, CHS formed a “unified” girls soccer team with Oak Harbor High School, and a previously dormant program lurched to life, narrowly missing the state playoffs.

The squad, coached by Coupeville’s Carol Bartelson, swept arch-rival Cascade for the first time, scared powerhouse Snohomish, and put the state on notice.

Playing in OHHS uniforms, the Wildcats were stung by the loss of Amiee Montiel — one of the most dynamic athletes I’ve ever covered — when the explosive playmaker suffered a brutal broken nose that kept her on the bench for seven games.

But in her absence, Coupeville freshman Marnie Bartelson seized the spotlight, shattering the school scoring record by tallying 15 goals.

It was the start of something big … and a something big I missed out on.

I left the News-Times in mid-1994, went and toiled for a few months on the mussel rafts in Penn Cove (why??), then snuggled down in Videoville starting Oct. 4 – the same day the original Jurassic Park hit VHS.

Meanwhile, the OHHS/CHS girls soccer squad took off like a rocket, with Marnie and Co. running wild.

Behind her, dominating in the net, was a new goalie, and second player from Coupeville, one Amanda Allmer.

She and her family moved to The Rock after I left the WNT, just in time for her senior year, and Allmer rocked the joint as a soccer star and basketball supernova.

Led by their Wolves, the Wildcats made their first trip to the state tourney and made it a big one, winning two matches en route to a 4th place finish in 3A.

It was the first of three-straight trips to the big dance for the program, none of which I covered.

Instead, I was knee-deep in movies and spilled popcorn, living a different dream.

Oh well.

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Alas, no splash

Posted in Baseball, Memories, tagged , , , , on November 8, 2019| Leave a Comment »

Denny Zylstra, planning some shenanigans.

Denny Zylstra is one of the true big-timers in the history of Coupeville athletics.

His runs as an athlete, coach, and die-hard supporter have been well-documented, and he has been a member of the Coupeville Sports Hall o’ Fame for some time.

Today, though, thanks to Charlie Burrow, we have a story about a young Denny which I hadn’t previously heard.

One day in the spring of 1958, the Coupeville High School baseball team was returning from a game in Port Townsend aboard the PT-Keystone ferry.

The players were still in uniform because the county stadium where we played in downtown PT didn’t have showers – the team suited up at the Coupeville school, then went by bus to Keystone and walked aboard the ferry.

At that time the PT ferry dock was further north than the current dock and only about a block from the stadium, so CHS saved having to pay the fare for the bus by having the team walk aboard.

Anyway, at some point after we departed PT, someone dared Denny Zylstra (CHS ’58), the team’s leading pitcher, and prankster, to jump off the ferry while it was underway.

He said he’d do it for $35.

So, when enough pledges were raised from players and supporters to meet his price, he began to strip off his uniform preparatory to making the plunge.

But, unfortunately (or, fortunately for Denny) a member of the ferry crew who’d gotten wind of the proceedings intervened and warned us that if he jumped, they’d be calling the sheriff and Denny would be arrested when we arrived at Keystone.

So much for that idea.

PS — Don’t remember who won the ball game.

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Boom goes the … dynamite?

Posted in Football, Memories, tagged , , , , on November 7, 2019| 1 Comment »

The olden days, when things were rowdier.

Everyone has a story, and this is a good one.

It comes to us from Charlie Burrow, Coupeville High School Class of ’61, and he offers it up for consideration for induction into my Hall o’ Fame.

Boom. Done deal.

And now on to the story:

Here’s a somewhat long winded item I wrote up in May 2007, on the occasion of an all-class reunion held in the old main school building that was built in 1943 and was now scheduled for demolition.

When I was in school in Coupeville (1956-61), the elementary school playfield and high school athletic fields were all part of one large undivided grassy area behind the school.

During the fall, portable bleachers were set up beside the football field, which was laid out in the west part of the area, then, in the spring, they were moved to the baseball diamond, in the southeast corner.

The entire area was used by high school students for physical education (PE) classes and as a playground by elementary school students during lunch and recess breaks.

Supervision was sometimes spotty. For example, I dislocated my wrist while playing in an illegal tackle football game during lunch break while in the 8th grade.

On another occasion, an elementary school student was severely injured when he was struck on the head by a lead shot-put thrown by a member of the high school track and field team.

A funnier incident (to some) occurred one afternoon during my freshman year, when I was out on the field during PE class.

The football coaches, Mr. Boushey and Mr. Olmstead, were in the process of digging holes to accommodate new goal posts for the football field.

But the ground was very hard and they weren’t making much progress.

So, they had obtained some dynamite from somewhere and were using it to blast out the holes.

We all stood around and watched as they cut dynamite sticks in half, then attached a fuse to a blasting cap and inserted it into one of the half-sticks of dynamite.

Then, one of them would place the stick into the hole, light the fuse, and back off to wait for the explosion.

Except, one stick didn’t explode.

So, they waited, and waited, and waited, and finally, one of them (I don’t remember which) carefully approached the hole and was reaching down when, all of a sudden, “BANG!”

Someone (who shall remain nameless – class of ’58, I believe) had set off a firecracker behind him.

I never heard so many swear words come out of one teacher’s mouth in my life!

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It’s the library life for me!!

Posted in Memories, tagged , , , , , on August 1, 2017| Leave a Comment »

And yes, we already had library cards.

I grew up in libraries.

My mom was the children’s librarian in Kelso when my sister Sarah and I were younger, and we spent a lot of time in that two-story building stashed on the corner of a street next to the post office.

She got us our first library cards not long after we started walking, which made sense, as she spent her life reading.

Everyone in the family had a story about how if they wanted to find my mom when she was young, they would go searching only to find her every time, stashed away, face in book, lost to the world.

As Sarah and I were growing up, our dad was a carpet cleaner/window washer, and each year the Kelso Library would shut down over the winter holidays and our parents would clean the joint from top to bottom.

While they did that, we got the run of the locked-down library, eating at 2 AM in the librarian’s kitchen — a magical place normally off limits to anyone not an employee — and I got to read piles of Mad Magazine and Sports Illustrated while camped out in a carpet-lined bath tub that sat downstairs in the kid’s section.

This was still a time of card catalogs and before DVDs and other electronic doodads infiltrated a kingdom dominated by the written (and published) word.

Librarians working downstairs, like my mom, used a dumbwaiter to send books upstairs, an old-school touch which still fascinates me.

Even after we moved to Tumwater when I was in the sixth grade, and then Oak Harbor when I was a high school senior (my mom finding new libraries two minutes after each arrival) we continued to go back for the holiday cleaning adventures.

The final trip came in 1990, when the first season of Twin Peaks, the defining TV show of my life, was in reruns.

By that time the Kelso Library had a TV behind the upstairs counter, where the librarians could watch it (Why? Good question…), so, in between hours of reading (and trying to do as little work as possible), I watched an episode unfold in surreal fashion.

Slouched in a chair in the dark of a closed-down library, as an eerie train whistle sounded nearby, staring out on deserted streets which looked a lot like those in the original Twin Peaks, it was one of the great TV experiences of my life.

Normally, when I watched the show at our house out at Cornet Bay, it was followed by me walking up a dark, winding gravel road next to our house to where my sister was babysitting.

As I went up that road, the same type of trees you saw mysteriously swaying on Twin Peaks were moving in the wind all around me.

Then an owl would hoot, and I would curse David Lynch, that twisted, magnificent son of a gun, as every hair on the back of my neck exploded.

Watching the episode in the shuttered-up library was just as creepy in its own way, the image of a maniacally laughing Killer BOB reflected on the window, as the train whistle crawled up my spine.

I haven’t been back to the Kelso Library since that trip, and yet, 27 years later, I can close my eyes and perfectly see every nook and cranny of my home away from home.

I’m sure a trip back there would reveal that it, like my childhood home (which I have seen) are no longer the same. Probably better to let it remain suspended in memory.

That library, and all the others I have lived in, offer deep connections to my late mother, who gave Sarah and I a love of reading and sent us on a writer’s path.

This is all coming to the surface right now, because my second book, Bow Down to Cow Town, is in the process of landing in local libraries.

Any day now the Sno-Isle library system will officially stock two copies of my collection of small town sports stories.

One book is headed to Coupeville, another to Oak Harbor, and they’re “in transit” as of this morning.

They will join Memoirs of an Idiot, which looked up at me from the biography section, sharing shelf space with a book by Nelson Mandela(!), as I strolled through the Coupeville Library yesterday.

The world has changed, certainly.

Computers, DVDs, CDs and other stuff share space with books and magazines at libraries, while card catalogs (and dumbwaiters, probably) are long gone, though Twin Peaks is back(!) and as mystifying as ever.

I know people consume a lot of their reading in non-printed form (this blog, for one), but it’s still special to me to see my book land in a library.

I don’t make any money off the transaction, and who knows how many times it will be checked out. Neither part of that really matters, though.

It’s there, words on paper, a book, and it’s in a library.

My mom isn’t with us anymore, but I know she would be immensely proud of what Sarah (who has somewhere around 237 books in print) and I are accomplishing with our writing.

Libraries are life. It’s nice to be a small part of keeping that alive.

 

Seriously, my books are in the library system:

https://sno-isle.bibliocommons.com/item/show/1579442121_bow_down_to_cow_town

https://sno-isle.bibliocommons.com/item/show/830979121_memoirs_of_an_idiot

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