Friday Night Lights - Dave’s Midwestern Ohio Memories

A Series of Guest Blogs by an out-of-state Fish Report reader originally from this area about fond memories of growing up in Midwestern Ohio during the 50’s & 60’s.


Friday Night Lights

To continue my series of blogs on football memories, this edition focuses on high school football. But what does a photo of some pumpkins, a 64 1/2 Mustang and Baltimore Colts quarterback Johnny Unitas have to do with high school football? Well, let me connect the dots. Because our high school did not offer football back in the 60’s, our play was limited to pick-up games and attending other high school football in the area. One of those schools was the Bradford Railroaders with a player who would eventually became my fraternity brother at college. But obviously I didn’t know him at the time. Some friends and I would go to a Bradford game in the fall, then attend the annual Pumpkin Show after the game. Beyond the pumpkins and football, there was always the traditional confetti being thrown around at the festival. Great fun; however, my mom would complain about finding confetti around the house for weeks afterwards!

Now for the connection to other two photos; the Minster Wildcats had a pretty good football team so we attended one of their games early in the ’65 season and then afterwards headed for the Friday night dance at Eagle Park. As a couple of friends and I were walking into the dance hall, a brand new 1964 1/2 Mustang convertible drove in loaded with several cute girls. As we began chatting with them, a group of guys approached the car lead by a good looking hunk with a perfect Johnny Unitas-type flat top haircut. Turns out he was Minster’s quarterback with his entourage. Needless to say, my buddies and I were relegated to the sidelines and it was at that moment we really regretting not having a football team. But I’m glad now in light of the concussion and injury problems associated with football. My bones are creaky enough without having played football; but thankfully no joint replacements so far! Regarding the quarterback, he’s since packed it on and weighs about 300 pounds!