High School Basketball - Dave's Midwestern Ohio Memories

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

High School Basketball

Congratulations to Loramie girls and Botkins boys for winning state basketball championships. What an accomplishment for both teams as well as a testament to the Shelby County Athletic League and Shelby County schools in general.

The long history of the athletic programs in the SCAL schools originated for the most part during the Great Depression when the federal government established the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and hired unemployed workers to build infrastructure projects like schools, libraries, roads and bridges. It was during this time that many of the Shelby County schools were built or expanded to include gymnasiums. Those old cracker box gyms written about in this previous blogpost provided the foundation for the time-honored athletic success of the SCAL.

Ft. Loramie's basketball program officially started when their old school pictured on the left with the fire escape was expanded with WPA-built classrooms and gymnasium on the right that opened in 1935. Altogether, the WPA built or expanded over 9000 school buildings and other infrastructure projects across the country, employing over 3.5 million people.

Prior to that time, I recall my dad telling about playing other teams from around the area in about 1930. They played in the upper level of Brucken’s Café and those initial games eventually led to the creation of Ft. Loramie’s basketball program and eventually the Shelby County Athletic League. After a recent meal at Brucken’s, my brother and I, along with our sons, climbed up to the Brucken’s upper level to see the setting for ourselves and to share the story with our sons. There were a lot of cracker box gyms prevalent back in the day, but upstairs at Brucken’s literally takes the cake!

The Shelby County Athletic League is very special. As evidence, here’s an impressive list of every Ohio state champion from the SCAL over its long history, starting out with the Russia Boys baseball in 1971:

Click To Expand

A few final points, the Pleiman boys, who starred in the Botkins state championship run, have Ft. Loramie roots!! Also, my niece, Lauren Francis, was a key member of the 2013 3200 meter relay State Championship team. As a member of the self-proclaimed inaugural County golf league, I’m still waiting patiently for a golf state championship for SCAL. What do you say, Ross Fiessinger? Learn from your grandpa; he’s the best!

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Uncle Gene - Dave's Midwestern Ohio Memories

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

Uncle Gene

My uncle Gene called me recently from his home in Sun City, Florida, where he lives with his lovely wife Pat pictured above. It was a beautiful night here in SW Florida, so he called just as the sun was setting. Uncle Gene is 92 years young and is my mother’s younger brother. He's the little guy on the right side of the bench in this 1937 family photo. My mother is in the back row, third from the left. Mom was 20 and Gene was 8.

Gene is in good health and as always, was in great spirits. He is the only family member in the photo still living, so he represents the last connection to my mother. I really enjoy the stories he tells about growing up on the farm in St. Patrick's. He told me his nickname for my mother was Mom, Jr. as she was the designated baby sitter for Gene and his younger brother Pat seated on the left end of the bench.

Here they are riding a horse drawn sled in 1943. The two youngsters would be given their weekly bath by my mother, and Gene recalls always imploring my mother that he really wasn’t that dirty and could hold off on the bath for another week. But Mom, Jr did not relent so into the tub he went.

One of my fondest memories of Gene was at his wedding to his first wife Liz from Coldwater as documented in this previous blogpost. Before marrying Liz, Gene graduated from the University of Dayton with a chemistry degree and also served in the Army during the Korean War. He and his six brothers are all honored at the Sun City War Memorial with a commemorative brick.

After their marriage, Gene and Liz moved to Chicago where he was in the perfume business where he could apply his chemistry degree; however, his gift of gab quickly got him promoted to the marketing department. Mom and my sisters loved the perfume samples (and the stories) he would bring home every time he visited.

On one of his visits, he also brought back his golf clubs, which us kids enjoyed whacking the ball around the farm yard. I was hooked on golf from that moment on as described in this blog. Years later, after retiring and moving to Sun City, Gene would host an annual golf outing for any relatives visiting Florida over the winter. He’d meticulously plan every phase of the weekend-long event, including the grand finale at the local Sun City German restaurant to celebrate a fun-filled weekend and our German heritage. Any of his nieces attending would be given special treatment, as literally he told every one of them multiple times, and still does to this day, that each was his favorite. Nephews not so much, especially when it came to golf competition!

Gene’s team always seemed to win as evidenced by these photos. What a ringer!

There was one year when I did take Gene's money, fortunately having been paired up with his wife Pat.

As the old saying goes, gambling money has no home - except in Gene’s pocket. Now you get some sense of why dad’s nickname for Gene was Slick!

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Lone Ranger & Tonto - Dave's Midwestern Ohio Memories

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

Lone Ranger & Tonto

While growing up, my favorite TV shows were westerns and my #1 show was the Lone Ranger. His sidekick was Tonto. Even though the TV series began in 1949 with 221 episodes over 8 seasons I can vividly recall the riveting pilot episode that got me hooked on the series as it was played at the beginning of each fall TV season on a Saturday morning. In the pilot, a group of six Texas Rangers were searching for the notorious Cavendish gang of outlaws when they were suddenly ambushed by them after being led into a blind canyon by a double crossing informant. Only one Ranger survived the massacre and he was nursed to health by a native American named Tonto who came upon the injured Ranger after the ambush.

Tonto also buried the five dead Rangers, including digging a fake sixth grave to deceive the bandits and any others who might return to the scene. Thus emerged the Lone Ranger, who along with his new sidekick Tonto, avowed to track down the villains who ambushed them. The two hour pilot ended with them bringing the bad guys to justice. The pair then decided to continue their joint efforts to track down other bad guys in the old West. Tonto’s name for the Lone Ranger was Kemo Sabe, which means trusted scout. His famous horse was named Silver.

The series actually began in 1933 as a radio show that Dad recalled listening to the episodes with his family around the big radio console in their living room. He claimed the way he imagined the characters in the radio show was very similar to those on the TV show.

Check out the opening segment of the TV show featuring the William Tell overture. And here’s Glen Campbell giving a tribute to the Lone Ranger during one of his concerts. The end of each episode had the Lone Ranger and Tonto riding off into the sunset after saving the day, with someone holding the Ranger’s trademark silver bullet asking “Who was that masked man?” High Ho Silver Away!

There was a 2013 Lone Ranger movie that was a flop at the box office, but I did see it and enjoyed the movie, especially the ending, William Tell overture and all.

The Lone Ranger's usage of silver bullets was satirized in an episode of Robot Chicken where after the Ranger expertly shoots a tin can in the air, Tonto laments that the amount of silver the Ranger thoughtlessly wasted could have bought enough food to feed Tonto's entire village for a year.

Couldn’t pass up including this Covid Mask Up ad photo featuring the pair. And recall when President Trump said wearing a mask made him look like the Lone Ranger!

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