Staff Writer Football Banquets of the ‘50s and ‘60s were “really big deals” for the football teams and surrounding participants and even for the townspeople, the folks who “closed down” the town for the big games and left “big game–back tomorrow” signs on their business doors. And my younger days memory may have built this up a little bit–but not too much, especially if you are old enough to remember Bob Futrell, Jack Pippins, Mac McCuistion, Billy Roland, Hayden Eudy, D. C. Carpenter, Bill Costello, Tom Tune, and at least one-hundred more if I keep going over this in the recesses of my mind!
Why, I can remember Paul Themer and Warren Hatley taking their sons, Don and Warren, to games in distant places, such as Van, and stopping on the way home buy large “special sale” root beers, which were hard for the “little guys” to “hold” (if you know what I mean) until they could jump out and run into their houses in Forney, sometimes as late as nearly midnight!
**The football banquets were held in the highly-decorated high school gymnasium with the serving tables under one of the “wooden” backboards that could not be folded higher up! And, the football players could bring “dates in their fancy dresses.” I had a date in 8th Grade; my Dad and I picked her up at her house, and then the two of us took her back home after the banquet. I was too young to legally drive! Mom thought I was too young to “date,” but Dad “outvoted” her!** Football Banquet, 1956-1957. ....Quarterback Club Officers: President, M. O. Penny– Vice-President, Jack Pippins– Secretary/Treasurer– Robert Futrell *You might that many Booster Club officers and members were also businessmen of the town.*
Emcee: (written as M. C. on the program) M. O. Penny Invocation: Reverend Alton Vaughn Dinner.....Menu: Ham– Pineapple Rings, Long Green Beans, Potato Salad, Crystalized Pickles, Hot Rolls, Butter, Tea, Coffee, Pecan Pie The Red Hot Mama of the 50s– Nettie Dozier Modern Tap: Nancy Adams
Melodettes: Ruth Tune, Virglyn Belew, Monna Osborne, Chloe Belew Pantomime: Stephen Austin Introduction of Speaker, J. V. Sikes (The dorm I lived in my first three years at East Texas State University was named in honor of J. V. Sikes, who had been a three-sports star at Texas A & M University and then later a highly respected “old school” football and basketball coach at E. T. S. U. from 1954 to 1963, winning five Lone Star Conference Championships.)
Presentation: Awards and Trophy Benediction: Reverend James Stanley Football Squad, 19561957…..
Senior Squad:
Loyd Duckworth, Aubrey Penny, Charles Futrell, Sonny Compton, Ronnie Vineyard, David Tune, Jerry Adams, Robert Venner, Marvin Shipley, Hewlette Burch, Butch Haynes, Leslie Stark, Jerry Wortham, Davy Owens, Edwin DeMasters, Tommy Duckworth, Robert Seyferth, Roy Adams, Dennis McCuistion, Wesley Crenshaw, Gerald Walker, Charles Coleman, David Duckworth, Troy Moran, Robert Henderson, Roger Shaw, Thomas Eudy, John Smith, Bobby Cawthon, George Anderson, Glenn Griffin, Carl Eudy, Paul Sealy, Lynn Roy Griffin (Manager) Head Coach: A. L. Van Haverbeke, Jr. ..... Assistant Coach: Bobby Rogers Junior Squad: Stephen Dozier, Dickie Fisher, Jimmy Latham, John Murray, David Tanner, Michael Wortham, Jerry McCuistion, Douglas Bush, Jim Dick Criswell, Frankie Franklin, Don Montgomery, J. B. Morris, Waldo Murray, Billy Penny, Roger Richman, Tim Osborne, Frankto lin Kasper *Note–I mostly printed information from a “keepsake program” from this banquet, fixing a few “typos” and referring to my memory for some informanotice tion along the way. I had to guess at a few “faint” spellings with help from my wife and previous Jackrabbit Annuals.
The Rouvaldt family had this program in their “archives.”*
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