Seventy-one Years Ago--A Red Letter Day

Sunday, November 29, 1953 will go down in Northeastern A&M college's records as one of the most significant dates in the local institution's history. NEO received the Eastern bid to participate in the Junior Rose Bowl football game at Pasadena on December 12. NEO, which came into being as the "School of Mines" back in 1919, has never before basked in the national spotlight. 

NEO Coaches: Dewey Lynch, Head Coach Red Robertson, Bill Smith

The Norsemen, a rugged gridiron squad has overwhelmed nine rivals this season. They are expected to give Bakersfield, California Jr. College a rousing battle. It is hoped that the game will be another smashing triumph for Red Robertson's aggregation.

 November 30, 1953 Three hitchhikers in an automobile near Vinita heard the radio bulletin: "Northeastern A&M will play in the Jr. Rose Bowl!"

The husky trio let out a whoop and asked the driver, a young lady, to please stop at the nearest public telephone. Jim Wilmoth, Darrell Brooks and Jerry Price couldn't wait to reach Miami before calling home--collect, of course--who could blame them. 

The three hitchhikers will be traveling first-class to Pasadena next weekend. All three are members of the powerful Northeastern football team. Wilmoth and Brooks play guard, and Price is a flashy halfback. "We will win. I'm sure of it." Carter declared after receiving the bid.

No one worked harder promoting the team than Homa Thomas, business instructor and sports publicist. 

December 6, 1953

The Miami News Record reports that the entire NEO football team will be going to Pasadena and so are the Norse Stars...the Airforce ROTC band...and others who can pay for the trip.

Dr. Bruce G. Carter, college president stated: We all get to go. We may eat hamburgers instead of "high off the hog," but the important thing is that we won't leave anybody behind." 

$5000 dollars-plus was raised in a whirlwind three-day rally, and still remains short of the $8,00 goal. Countless individuals have contributed to the fund. 

Lahoma Sue Thomas Weese (7th grader) , daughter of Homa Thomas, attended the game along with Barbara Sue Robertson (9th grader), daughter of Coach Red Robertson, Gladys Robertson, Pat Smith, and Lois Thomas. 

This is her memory of that trip Seventy-one years ago.

We began our excursion on Route 66 heading west through Oklahoma, where our eyes saw nothing but roadside gravel.

We spent our first night in Gallup, New Mexico. I only recall the hills were all reddish colored rocks. 

Now up and ready to go, we drove to the Grand Canyon. Here we explored the sights and grandeur of the canyon. We stayed at the oldest hotel, the El Tovar at the Grand Canyon. Here Barbara Sue and I found out that rubbing your feet on the carpet and touching someone or something like a doorknob would produce a spark of electricity. Can you imagine the fun the two of us had with our mothers that morning.

El Tovar Historic Hotel opened in 1905

After breakfast, we were on our way west. We noticed a young man walking down the road carrying a gas can. We stopped and asked if he needed help. He accepted our help, and we drove him to his car down the road. After the young man stepped out of the car and we were back on the road our mothers gave a great sigh of relief. It seems as though we were all a little nervous with a strange man in the car.

We enjoyed the sights along the way, not knowing what an interesting part of history we had seen going through all of the towns and seeing all of the sight along Route 66.

When we arrived in Pasadena each of us went to the places where we would stay.

One night we attended a filming of a TV show “What’s My Line?” It was Mel Blanc that night and after they recognized him, he performed many of the voices we recognized from the cartoons. After that we all walked across the street to the Formosa Café where a lot of the TV personalities would hang out. Barbara Sue and I saw Frank Sinatra, but we were to bashful to ask for his autograph.

The parade kicked off the game day in California. We all attended the parade ….

The game is another story for the record book.

Yes, we really won the game or would have won the game if the referee hadn’t moved the ball back to the one-yard line on our last touchdown. I know everyone says that, but in this case it’s true! They have admitted it.

The Miami News Record reported that Coach Robertson had nothing but praise for his boys. "The breaks went against us, but we were beaten by a really good ball club. I thought we had a victory until that fumble came along late in the third." Robertson was keenly disappointed with his team's failure to score when they had the ball on Bakersfield's three in the final stanza. Robertson said he thought Graham had scored on the dramatic foot-to-go plunge on the fourth down. Players, too, questioned the decision. But two of the five West Coast officials on duty said Graham's head, but not the ball penetrated the end zone. 

For the return trip the boys were sent home on the train. A train car was rented and Dad was the sponsor. It was a noisy trip with only one hitch. There was a 15-minute stop in Las Vegas, Nevada. As you would suspect, all of the boys got off the train car and ran into the station. When the 15 minutes were up, most of them got back on the train. A few were seen running down the tracks trying to catch the train. Dad pulled the emergency chord that stopped the train. I’m sure there were a few words exchanged with the Conductor, but Dad got his boys back on the train and didn’t care.

Kayleen Thomas, Norse Star writes: 

The Norse stars drove in private cars all the way out to Pasadena to be in the Junior Rose Bowl parade and perform at halftime. We wore two different uniforms our Indian one and our white Fringed one with hoops to do a New York rocket type routine.

The city dance teacher Virginia Lee Wilson was the choreographer for the North stars.

Betty Fields, NEO Band member writes: 

All the band marched in the parade--it was a long march, but the weather was warmer than for most football-marches! We also did a band routine at half-time. I think most band members made the long trip, but some people had already made other plans for the holidays. 

Thoughts by Literally Letty: 

Even though I was young, I heard this story of the Norsemen and Norse Stars going to the Junior Rose Bowl. numerous times.  I joined the Norse Star drill team in 1965 in hopes that we, too, would go to the Rose Bowl. NEO played in the Jr. College Rose Bowl in 1953, 1958 both times they were beaten, but never forgotten by their fans in Northeast Oklahoma. 

As lady luck would have it, my husband and I took the opportunity to go to the Rose Bowl, 2003 in which the University of Oklahoma beat Washington State 34-14. For the one and only time in my life we spent the morning in Pasadena watching the Rose Bowl Parade live, sitting immediately under Al Roker in the CBS tower.  It was one of the sports highlights of my life. 

NEO recently honored Homa Thomas for his dedication to the school and the athletes. Homa Thomas Field

Golf Gypsy: As Only a Mother Can

My mother, Helen Stapp, died unexpectedly nearly twenty-four years ago, and yet I miss her hugs, smiles, and cryptic words of advice daily. We didn't always agree on life's journey or how to best pursue the future.  In our family Mom and Dad had their hands full with two hundred and fifty Miami Country Club members, and two little girls; one adventurous and daring, the other a quiet observer.  My little sister, Jonya, most closely stayed within their boundaries of comfort.  She was a beauty queen and State Amateur Golf Champion.  We both played on the men's golf team at NEO, and made our parents proud when we completed our college degrees (mine just took 10 years to finish.)

USGA Jr. Am. 1965

My childhood days of golf were intense and emotional.  Winning was not something I experienced.  I often missed qualifying for championship flight because of raw nerves, and lack of focus.  Every summer I asked for tennis lessons, swim lessons, diving lessons, anything new on the horizon.  Dad's words were simple, "Tizzy, you need to focus on one sport at a time.  Developing muscles for swimming or tennis might jeopardize your golf swing."  So, I played golf and practiced hours upon hours.  The solitude of practicing became my escape from pressures.

It was the trips to the Jr. State Amateur I loved the most.  Teeing off #1 at Southern Hills and hitting a straight and true shot down the middle is a memory I will carry for a lifetime.  Shaking the hand of a match play opponent at age 14 will also stick with my gut;  "Good luck," I said sincerely as Rita and I shook hands on the first tee.  "Thanks, you'll need it.!" She won the match on hole 14.  Maybe, Dad knew me better when he nicknamed me Tizzy or tried to explain that my golf game seemed lackadaisical.  Maybe, I overheard so many ugly comments by women in tournaments that I thought no one liked a champion?

It was on mother's shoulders that I cried and sobbed with defeat.  Year after year I lost, and yet she held firm in her belief that I could win.  Dad was the teacher, but mom was the counselor, the healer, and the one who uplifted me and told me over and over that I could win. I finally won a Club Championship once before she died, but I was nearly 40 years old.  My family and friends were proud.

Only recently did I realize how much a mother's love and faith in her children can make a difference for a lifetime of learning and growing.  Over the 50 years since my teenage golfing debut, I've learned that it was confidence that I was lacking, not skill.  But it's not enough to have other people believe in you when you don't believe in yourself.  "Oh, well," is such an easy reply to a disappointment in life, whether it is in a career or sport.

A few weeks ago as I walked to my golf cart, before I teed off at Prairie Dunes for the Hutchinson Women's City Championship, my heart was pounding and my stomach lurched.  It was a match play event, one on one.  Now I needed to win one more match for the championship.  I began to question myself.  Did I care enough to focus?  Did I really just want to win, but not fight through my nerves to win?  Will people still like me IF I win?

Helen Stapp probably giving advice.

Like a cloud passing over I heard a whisper, "Letty, I believe in you and always have. Now go out there and prove to yourself that you can play great golf."

My knees buckled and I looked around with tears in my eyes.  "Mom?" my head whispered.   "I'm watching," she replied, and I heard the pursing of her lips.  When her whispering cloud passed over, my shoulders suddenly lightened and memories were filtered.  I knew that somehow I could win that day, and maybe win again while I'm still young enough to compete.  On my golf ball, that day, I wrote these words, "Almost Heaven."

I only hope and pray that I've been that kind of mother for my daughter, one who believes in her child without a doubt--As only a mother can.

*Letty Stapp Watt
daughter and historian

Miami Memories: Norse Stars

Oh, such bitter cold blowing snow outside. The shivering little birds are lined up on my south window ledges hovering out of the storm. Their heads bobbing up and down create an appearance of conversations from facebook. "Golly, can you believe this wind."
"Why didn't we go South for the winter?"
"Too late now, we can't see past the bushes."
"I was too hungry to sleep in. Now here I am foraging for food on the ground."
"What about a zumba or a line dance to stay warm?"

Then just like that they danced, fluttered about and took off. Maybe it's warmer down under the bushes where I stashed their food.

Three Norse Stars who danced in the cold: 
 Letty Watt , Charlotte Rosier, Cindi Lillard

Now I sit and shiver even with a heater at my feet. The cold just seeps in through the glass. Fetching a blanket for my shoulders helped conjure up a frigid memory of being a member of the Norse Stars drill team at NEO A&M.

We were a proud college drill team of well figured young girls. Virginia Lee Wilson worked us hard so we'd be proud to wear the costumes of leotards, tights, vest, fringed skirts, boots, topped with white felt hats on the football fields, basketball courts, or in parades. Our performances took us to such great cities as Coffeyville, KS, Hutchinson, KS, Trinidad, CO, Lawton, OK, and Kilgore, TX. Winter storms during football season or Christmas parades only served to make our performances and travels more memorable. We danced for the big shows at Christmas: Miami, OK; Vinita, OK; Joplin, MO; Seneca, MO.

The college dressed us well in costumes of blue and gold, or for special shows our white Indian guise. One Christmas parade in the tiny town of Seneca we marched in our Indian Headdress costumes. The white feathers on the headdresses were old then and oh, so very fragile. We truly handled them with loving care and only placed them on our heads moments before our lineup. Each of us held our heads high proudly strutting and supporting a full regalia of white Indian feathers that trailed down our backs nearly to the ground. Our white leotards were the base for a highly decorated fringed vest and skirt that didn't cover much. Tan hose covered our bare legs and a pair of socks protected our feet in those golden tasseled white boots.

But on this particular Saturday morning Mrs. Sandmire and other mothers followed our bus to Seneca to help us dress for the bitter winds. It was the invention of saran wrap, laundry cleaner plastic bags, and cellophane that saved our skins and allowed us to march that day.

Oh, what a scene that bus must have been as sixty girls unwrapped themselves from the heavy blue/gold woolen blankets, pulling down leotards and hose, exposing already cold body parts to the world inside the bus. With the help of a few mothers we, one by one, began to wrap each other in clear sticky saran wrap and plastic pieces. The windows steamed over with the heat of anticipation. With the frantic yelling of Virginia Lee and hand clapping of Mrs. Sandmire we at last, one by one, emerged from the bus layered in cellophane, two or three pair of hose, cotton in our ears, and as many socks as our boots would allow. Our smooth youthful bodies looked a bit lumpy under the leotard and adornments of fringe and feathers.

With proper counting, clapping, and training we lined up to march down the narrow main street lined with parents holding blankets around two or three shivering little children. The band's music traveled forward with us in the wind and helped us to keep a steady beat that day. Hearing the crowds clap and cheer kept smiles frozen on our red faces, and helped to propel our legs and nearly numb feet forward with kicks and marched steps. In the end we were greeted by a warm bus, blankets, and a cup of hot chocolate.

It seems only right to say we danced and kicked passionately that day and gave the parade onlookers our best performance ever. Just like the little birds that fluttered away, we, too, fluttered and danced till the performances of our youth gave way to the lives we lead now.

Letty Stapp Watt
storyteller and historian