Bernie Mccarty
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
PAGE 6 BERNIE MCCARTY The College Football Historical Society, and the sport of football itself, recently suffered a major loss with the passing of Bernie McCarty, one of the game’s most prominent historians, on June 13, 1997. Mr McCarty was born in Chicago on October 7, 1933, one of three children: and spent much of his youthful days growing up in the town of Argo, Illinois; an industrial community located just south-west of the Chicago city limits. While attending Argo High School, Bernie quickly discovered his considerable interest in art and drawing. But eclipsing even his inclinations toward art, was his fanatical interest from an early age, in the sport of college football. Bernie often said that the first college game he had ever seen on television was the famous 1949 Notre Dame vs Southern Methodist battle which always remained as one of his personal favorites of all-time. Before long the budding sports historian, while still at Argo High, was spending every possible free moment poring over the old newspaper files at the Chicago Public Library. These were still the days before the common use of microfilm and Bernie was quickly captured by the pleasures that every true historian experiences when confronted by the original newspapers of long ago. Throughout the rest of his life Bernie was a staunch contender of the point that, the newspapers of long ago are the only true source for any type of serious sports historical research. In fact, Bernie was spending so much time at the Chicago Library that he became friends with the newspaper room librarians; who eventually gave the young man access to even the oldest of newspaper files, which were usually kept secured from the general public. The unfortunate aspect of all this time spent at the library, was that Bernie was becoming AWOL from many of his classes at Argo High. While this matter was eventually straightened out, it did result in Bernie graduating from high school somewhat later than his parents had originally expected. After attending Roosevelt University in Chicago and North Central College, for a total of three years, Bernie was drafted into the United States Army; eventually serving a tour of duty in Korea before receiving his honorable discharge in the mid-1950s. Returning to Chicago, Bernie worked for a time as an adjunct art instructor in the city’s high school system, along with various other types of jobs; but eventually the siren call of the newspapers returned and he began working for a printing firm in suburban Chicago. From the time he began earning a regular paycheck; Bernie began building a collection of old newspaper sports sections from around the country; concentrating on those in which college football was the dominant sport in the news. He avidly sought out and acquired newspapers from other collectors and libraries, collected any and every magazine he could find that contained material on college football; and eventually compiled a very large collection of national material for use in his on-going historical research on the game. At some point during the years, Mr McCarty also began collecting vintage comic books; and eventually became recognized as one of the top experts in the field, and an acquaintance of many of the famous artists who illustrated the comics. Somewhere around 1960, Bernie managed to work his way up to the position of sportswriter at the printing company he worked for; which was putting out some of the weekly town newspapers in the south suburban area of Chicago. As the years went by, Bernie became known as one of the most popular and prominent of the writers covering high school sports in the Chicago suburbs In fact, after PAGE 7 25 years as a sportswriter and sports editor, Bernie was honored in ceremonies at Illinois State University in April of 1987, with his induction into the Illinois High School Basketball Hall of Fame for his many years of service to prep athletics. Throughout the decades that passed since his days of playing hooky in order to go to the library; Bernie avidly pursued the research and study of college football history. His areas of concentration became All-American teams and backfield players, but there was no aspect of the game’s history on which Bernie had not extensively read and studied the original source material from the time the events actually took place: and he truly merited the term “walking encyclopedia” on college football. In 1991 Bernie published a landmark book on the history of All-American teams, covering the years 1889-1945; and he had just recently started work on the second volume of the set before the onset of his illness last Fall. Bernie was a prodigious writer of articles on various college football subjects, some of which were published in the pages of his newspaper’s sports section; in addition to writing essays and articles that were included in books and magazines Bernie was also a cofounder of the College Football Historical Society in April of 1987; which we all envisioned as an outlet for true historical research and writings on the sport. College football, and the field of sport history in general, has lost one of its great champions. Bernie McCarty will be greatly missed by his many friends from around the country. STAN CARLSON The College Football Historical Society recently suffered another major loss, with the passing of Mr Stan Carlson of Minneapolis, on December 18, 1996 at the age of 87. A charter member of the Society, Mr Carlson had contributed several articles over the years to our publication, but he was much more prominently known nationally as a writer and publisher in a number of fields. Originally from the Minnesota town of Fridley, by the time he reached sixth grade Stan was already putting out a newspaper for the students at Horace Greeley School in Minneapolis. He went on to attend the University of Minnesota in the mid=1930s, eventually graduating with a bachelor’s degree after having served as the school’s assistant yearbook editor. During this time Stan also was friends with many members of the prominent Golden Gopher football teams of that era, and in fact remained a lifelong friend of Bud Wilkinson. Shortly after graduation from Minnesota, Mr Carlson was hard at work writing, and in fact published a magazine format history of Minnesota football in the 1930s around 1937. In the late 1930s Stan and his wife, Pauline, started the Olympic Press Company in Minneapolis. Eventually Stan would write more than 40 books on a variety of topics, including “Football Fables” and “Faith of Our Fathers”. He also wrote a biography of former Minnesota coach, Doctor Henry Williams, in 1938; but Stan is most famous as a writer in the field of sports for his biography on Lou Gehrig of the New York Yankees, which is today considered to be one of the rarest and most difficult of baseball books to find. Also in the late 1930s Mr Carlson began writing articles for the national publication “Football News”; and in 1940 he began his famous annual series for that publication, in which he named his “Three Deep” All-American team This was a mythical squad that featured three players at each of the eleven positions, with no attempt to necessarily rank them, and the series was still going in 1949, which is the last year that I have a copy of. Stan continued to file material with Football News, including his “Three Deep” feature, throughout the years he spent serving in World War II. He was initially a lieutenant in the Army’s 7th Division, later being promoted to the rank of Major before the War's end Stan served extensive time in the Pacific Theater and on the Aleutian Islands. PAGE 8 After the war, Stan returned to his publishing business in Minneapolis, and continued to write and publish books in a variety of fields. Stan was a champion gardener, was one of the very earliest members of SABR (Society of American Baseball Research), and had served as Minnesota state president of the 4H organization during his high school days. He also was elected to the post of president for the Minnesota Territorial Pioneers organization in 1987; and for several years had worked as a speech writer in the office of the Minnesota state governor. Stan Carlson will be greatly missed by his many friends in CFHS and SABR. DON HUTSON Mr Don Hutson, the player considered to have been possibly the greatest pass receiver of all-time, passed away on June 26, 1997 at Rancho Mirage, California at the age of 84. In 11 seasons with the Green Bay Packers (1935-45), Hutson was named to the NFL’s All-Pro team no less than nine times in a career that culminated with his election to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1963. Three times Hutson played for Packer teams that won the NFL title (1936, 39, and 44). Hutson, known as the “Alabama Antelope”, left a lasting mark on the NFL record books as an incomparable pass receiver, while also handling place kicking work and playing defensive safety, and today he still holds the league records for things such as most seasons leading the league in receptions (8), most seasons leading in touchdowns (8), most seasons leading in scoring (5), and most points scored in a quarter (29 in 1945 against Detroit) He retired with a career mark of 8,010 yards in receptions and 99 touchdowns. He scored a touchdown on his first play as a professional, hauling in a pass that was good for an 83-yard scoring play against the Bears.