Sports Illustrated Jinx - 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

Sports Illustrated Jinx

The inaugural issue of Sports Illustrated was published on August 16, 1954. As an SI subscriber since about age 10, 4 years after the magazine start, coupled now into retirement with my daily read of the Fish Report, Press Pros, ESPN, as well as the sports pages in various newspapers, my craving for sports news is somewhat satisfied. Doesn’t beat attending in person, but with Covid, that’s not possible anyway. Back to Sports Illustrated, the urban legend of the SI Jinx has always intrigued me, so today’s blog will focus on that theme.

The above cover of that first issue showed Milwaukee Braves slugger Eddie Mathews homering to lead the Braves to a nine-game winning streak. The very next game, the team lost and Mathews broke his hand causing him to miss 7 games. Thus began the SI Curse from that very first issue.

Many examples have unfortunately hit home for me over the years, such as the 1978 Pete Rose cover during his 44 game hitting streak. He went hitless the next day! That jinx continues as Rose still unfortunately is banned from the Hall of Fame.

Race car driver Dale Earnhardt appeared on the cover with his son Dale Jr. in 2000. He died two months later on the final lap of the Daytona 500.

Michigan Wolverines quarterback Denard Robinson was featured on the cover. The Wolverines lost their first game of the 2012 season, 41–14, to the #1 ranked and eventual national champion Alabama Crimson Tide.

Detroit Tigers hitter Miguel Cabrera was featured on this 2012 cover. The Tigers were subsequently swept in the World Series by the San Francisco Giants. During the series, Cabrera went 3 for 13, including making the final out of the Series.

And most recently, The March 2021 issue featured the Gonzaga Bulldogs men's basketball team hoping to finally win the National Championship. The Bulldogs did go 31-0 and reached the finals of the NCAA Tournament only to lose to the Baylor Bears 86-70.

And definitely the worst cover jinx of all time: President-elect John F. Kennedy and his wife Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy are shown sailing off Cape Cod in 1961. The president would be assassinated less than three years later.

But some curses I appreciated:

After the Los Angeles Lakers swept the Phoenix Suns in the NBA Western Conference Finals to go undefeated to that point in the playoffs, the 1989 SI cover featured Lakers forward James Worthy with the word "SWEEP!" in large letters and, in smaller letters, the caption: "James Worthy and the Lakers beat the Suns to go 11–0 in the playoffs." The Lakers would go on to lose in the 1989 NBA Finals, being swept 4–0 by the Detroit Pistons.

The Kansas City Chiefs appeared on a 2003 cover after starting the season 9–0, but would lose the following game in Cincinnati to the Bengals. Kansas City finished the regular season 4–3, losing home field advantage to the New England Patriots, followed by losing the divisional playoff against Indianapolis.

Fortunately for the magazine, there are many exceptions to the curse; for example, Phil Mickelson won two other green jackets (one of which I witnessed as described in this blog after his initial win depicted on this 2004 cover. Definitely no jinx for Phil.

And Michael Jordon was on 50 covers, none of which hindered his accomplishments. Except maybe his golf cover in 1989!

Muhammed Ali appeared on 40 covers, experience immense success in his professional and personal life, culminating in him be named Sports Illustrated Sportsman of the Century.

And for sure there was no jinx involving any of models featured in the annual Swim Suit issues!

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Tawawa Park - 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

Tawawa Park

While doing an on-line search for a future blog, I happened upon a name out of the past, Tawawa Park, in Sidney. Running across that name brought back so many wonderful memories. Mom would take us young kids along on her shopping trips to Sidney, which we enjoyed immensely as documented in this previous blog. But what I forgot to include in that blog was Mom would treat us to a drive through the park before we headed home.

To get there, she would typically drive south on Main Street under the Big Four Railroad bridge then circle around to Court Street and ride down the steep hill into Sidney that seemed like a roller coaster to us kids, then right at the bottom of the hill at Riverside Drive to the Tawawa Park entrance. We’d always go all the way to the end to see the Girl Scout camp called Brookside where my sisters attended summer camp when they got older.

My favorite parts were “Big Rock" and Tawawa Lake. We seldom stopped as Mom had to rush home to make supper. Unfortunately, those trips were before the covered bridge was built, but for sure that would have been another favorite to ride the car over over and through it as well.

Speaking of bridges, Tawawa Park incidentally originated because the Big Four railroad bridge replaced an old rail line though Sidney. The abandoned rail bed ran along the Miami river and a tributary called Mosquito Creek east of town. To think the park could have been named Mosquito Park; however the native American name for Mosquito, “Tawawa" was definitely a much better choice.

In 1948, when the rail bed and surrounding land came up for sale at $15,000, a Dayton area motorcycle group made overtures to purchase the land, which motivated civic leader Bill Milligan to take action. A local lawyer and eventual congressman, Milligan conceived the idea to secure the land for a park and created a list of 15 people whom he hoped would contribute a thousand dollars each to purchase the land. It was his thought to get control of the land first, and then put together a plan for developing the park. Milligan's first "ask" was to Wendal Whipp, President of Monarch Machine Tool Company. After hearing Milligan's idea, Whipp wrote a check for the $15,000 on the spot and said, Bill, go buy the land and then go to the others for their money and let's get this project started. And he did just that! The names of those original park supporters represent the Who’s Who of Sidney at the time; names like Amos, Ferguson, Meyer, Wagner and Willman to name a few. Each of those first 15 supporters has an area of the park named after them. Milligan’s Glen is a 20 acre addendum to the park that was donated by the Milligan’s in 1966.

Back then we had no parks in our home town of Ft. Loramie, but fortunately we did have nearby Lake Loramie. Canal Park along Main Street in Ft. Loramie was still a canal before it was filled in during the 1950’s. And of course we had Bender’s Park, but it was just a treed area surrounding a dance hall where everyone parked who attended functions in the hall. We had the ball park and adjacent playground next to the high school, but it just wasn’t the same as a nice neighborhood park like those in place around town today, thanks in large part to similar civic-minded leaders in Ft. Loramie.

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Amazing Athlete - 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

Amazing Scholar Athlete

While our son was visiting us in Florida back in February for his birthday, we discovered he shares the same birthday with one of the long-time residents of our condo building by the name of Ed B, who celebrated his 86th birthday while our son was 42. A week before his birthday, Ed had surgery so was convalescing in a rehab facility that did not allow visitors due to Covid. So a drive-by birthday parade was held in his honor as he sat outside the rehab center as pictured below.

Ed is a very likable guy who was quite an athlete in his day. We’ve come to enjoy the many stories about his sports exploits each Saturday and Sunday afternoon during the snowbird season, when Ed holds court around the tiki bar at our condo’s pool while we watch a football or basketball game on TV. Our son had met Ed during earlier trips and heard his stories as well, so he wanted to spend part of his birthday honoring Ed by joining us for the car parade.

Ed grew up on Long Island in Rye, NY and attended an all boys Catholic high school named Iona Prep in the aerial photo pictured here.

All five starters on their basketball team received college scholarship; Ed to Fordham University in the Bronx. He was also recruited by Tom Blackburn, legendary coach of the Dayton Flyers, but chose to stay closer to home at Fordham. He is enshrined in Iona Prep's Sports Hall of Fame, with the following inscribed on his plaque:

Here are some action photos from his high school yearbook. Note the way the team rested during a timeout!

Incidentally, Fordham originated the three point line in college basketball, experimenting with the concept during the 1940’s. Imagine what Ed’s scoring total would have been the night he scored 60 if the 3 point line was in use? Below is an article about Ed in the student newspaper. While at Fordham, Ed had the opportunity to meet their football coach, Vince Lombardi, who also was an All American player for Fordham in 1937 and later went on to legendary fame with NFL's Green Bay Packers.

After obtaining a business degree from Fordham in 1957, Ed spent the next two years with the Marine Corps, and since his stint was between the Korean and Viet Nam wars and with his athletic prowess, he spent the entire time after basic training playing for the Marine Corps basketball and baseball teams to entertain the leathernecks by holding exhibition games against other military and nearby college teams. Below is a photo of Ed grabbing a rebound in a 1958 game while playing against Camp Lejeune.

Once his Marine Corps tour of duty (if you can call it that!) was complete, Ed became a successful investment banker on Wall Street. One of his perks was a membership in a country club of his choice, so he took the opportunity to join historic Wing Foot, host to many major golf events over the years including last year’s PGA championship won by Bryson DeChambeau as the only player to shoot under par.

It was at Wing Foot where Ed met Anne, the love of his life. The couple was married almost 60 years before Anne's recent death. Both were avid golfers, with Ed not surprisingly becoming a scratch golfer, being the natural athlete he was. Several of their children and grandchildren are also Wing Foot members, with one son playing on the PGA tour and a grandson golfing for Colgate University. In addition to golf, like Ed, family members were skilled athletes, playing championship lacrosse, hockey, tennis, soccer and swimming at the high school and collegiate level.

So needless to say, with Ed’s many personal and family sports endeavors, he could keep us enthralled with hour-after-hour of stories around the tiki bar. Thanks to his connections at Wing Foot, he met many celebrities over the years, stories of whom he would share during commercial breaks. Consider this list: Vin Scully, Rick Pitino, Jim Boeheim, Donald & Melania Trump, Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Fuzzy Zoeller, Billy Casper, Hale Irwin and Wellington Mara, plus Larry Bird, Bob Seeger and Johnny Bench, who all have places nearby in Naples. And he had interesting stories to tell about each. For example, click here for his story about meeting Michael Jordan and several of his friends.

After retiring to Naples and buying a unit in our condo building, Ed and Anne were active locally in many civic and charitable affairs. For example, below is a photo of the couple at a costume charitable fund raiser benefitting the school affiliated with their church, St. Anne’s of course!. They weren’t being recognized for their costumes, although creative, but instead for the amount of money they had donated. In Naples, Ed and Anne loved the view from their condo (as do we) watching the manatees and dolphins swimming in Venetian Bay. So in 2014, to better protect the mammals from being injured by boat propellers, they were instrumental in getting the bay declared a no-wake zone to lower boat speeds.

Ed is one of a kind and a real joy to be around. He makes those weekend afternoons a real treat each winter especially as we observe the manatees and dolphins splashing around in the bay to Ed’s delight!

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Lent, Easter and March Madness - 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

With the NCAA basketball Final Four and the Easter weekend happening concurrently, this former blog highlights related memories from the past:

Lent, Easter and March Madness

Growing up in a Catholic family, the 40 days of Lent meant praying the rosary every night, fasting, no meat on Fridays and definitely no candy. While praying the rosary, mom would randomly pick one of us 5 kids to recite the appropriate mystery, so we had to pay attention! And as a mass server during Holy Week, it meant hours of church services, including Holy Saturday, which one year happened to be the same night as the finals of the NCAA basketball championship. As servers, we could see the large clock in the church sacristy and since we knew exactly when the game was to start, anxiously awaited the completion of the long service. Our focus that night was clearly elsewhere, as unbeaten Ohio State, lead by All-American Jerry Lucas, was pitted against in-state rival Cincinnati Bearcats.

Finally the services were over, so we went to my grandmother’s home to watch the game as she had a color TV. Although the Buckeyes were a big favorite, they lost in what many consider one of the biggest upsets in NCAA history. To say the least, as an avid Buckeye fan, I was devastated and disappointed.

Since the next day was Easter, and as the oldest child in the family, it was my job to hide the Easter eggs around the yard for my younger siblings to find early that morning. I was still upset about the Buckeye loss, so I took it out on the eggs, hiding many of them in unfindable places all over the farm. Since I was taller than my brothers and sisters, some of the eggs were placed in full view, but at a height they could not reach. And some were stashed in places that were never found; in fact, I venture to say, there are still some eggs hidden away some 55 years later! After that stunt, my mother said I was due for the confessional right after Easter, but my sins were nothing compared to the crime that the Bearcats pulled on my (at the time) beloved Buckeyes. PS: The Bucks sure could have used a Jerry Lucas this year!

Happy Easter, Fish Report readers.

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