Chula Vista High was in the midst of a legendary era in the school’s history, thanks to two gentlemen loosely described by their imaginary headwear, which bespoke of the respect they commanded and clout they carried.

Joe Rindone, the sports-minded school principal and president of the CIF Southern Section executive committee, was known as the “Big Blue Hat”. Chet DeVore, whom Rindone appointed as the Spartans’ football coach in 1951, was the “Little Blue Hat”.

Blue and white were the colors of the school, which opened in 1946 at a temporary location in the Brown Field Air Station, near the U.S.-Mexico border. The campus, on its present site in west Chula Vista, welcomed students a year later.

Rindone and DeVore would leave lasting academic and sports legacies in San Diego and in the Sweetwater Union School District, and it started at Chula Vista, the second high school to be built south of the San Diego city limits. Sweetwater was the first, going all the way back to 1907, when it opened as National City School.

MANY  FOLLOW 

Chula Vista High came upon the scene at a time when the sprawling and still largely undeveloped South Bay region of San Diego began to experience the decades of growth and opportunity that followed World War II.

Ten more public high schools have since emerged: Mar Vista (1950), Hilltop (1959), Castle Park (1963), Bonita Vista (1967), Montgomery (1970), Southwest (1976), Eastlake (1992), Otay Ranch (2003), San Ysidro (2004), and Olympian (2006).

All 12 operate in three leagues under the umbrella of the Metropolitan Conference. Each has its own, mini-geographical rivalries but none match the tradition and, on occasion, fury of Chula Vista-Sweetwater, which have played each other every year since 1947.

DeVore, a San Diego State grad and decorated battlefield veteran of World War II, did not inherit a champion when he was selected to replace Morrie Shepherd as the Spartans’ third coach in the school’s first five years.

Chula Vista was 13-23-3 in its first four seasons, including a 1-3 record against Sweetwater.

FROM 1-3-1 TO 9-0

The coach’s original team started on an equally unimpressive note, shut out in four of the first five games and with a 1-3-1 record, but the Spartans closed at 4-4-1.

DeVore’s program took off in 1952, rolling to nine straight victories before a first-round, Southern Section lower division, playoff loss to Laguna Beach.

Metropolitan League title talk this season started and ended with the Spartans, but Sweetwater coach Barney Newlee also liked his chances. So did Oceanside’s John Simcox.

Sweetwater’s offense revolved around quarterback Don Magee, a Pala Indian whose brother, Dennis, was the team’s center. Don Magee passed for 18 touchdowns and directed the spread offense Newlee had adopted in mid-season 1952.

The Red Devils averaged 29 points with the new look and won four of their last five games, including a 14-13 loss to Chula Vista.

BEWARE THE ROBOT

But the most explosive and dangerous opponent lurked in the Northern reaches of the league, almost 50 miles away at Oceanside, home of C.R. Roberts, one of the top prep running backs in the country.

Roberts scored 31 touchdowns in the first eight games in 1952, running through and around every team on the schedule until he faced the Spartans, who swarmed the 200-pound “Robot” in a 28-7 victory that clinched the Metropolitan League championship.

Chula Vista’s win was tribute to a defense that hounded Roberts virtually  from the moment he walked out of the Pirates’ locker room. Roberts scored Oceanside’s only touchdown but had 11 blue and white escorts wherever he went.

The  encore was 30 touchdowns in the first eight games of 1953, Oceanside and Roberts bearing down again on another championship-deciding game with Chula Vista.

“Robot” was a play on what many thought was  Roberts’ middle initial. “Oceanside Express” also was popular, as was “Chain Reaction”. He seldom was called Cornelius, his first name.  There was no middle name.  The initial actually was for his last name.

MR. TOUCHDOWN!

While rolling out 10 touchdown dashes at distances of 60 to 86 yards and a reported record season of 1,903 rushing yards in nine games, Roberts:

— Singlehandedly outscored Mar Vista 38-0 with 274 yards rushing and five touchdowns and passed 66 yards for another score;

–Scored 33 points and rushed for 331 of Oceanside’s 369 yards on the ground in a 40-19 victory over Escondido;

–Rushed for 317 yards in 28 carries and scored five touchdowns in a 41-6 rout of San Dieguito;

–Scored from 60, 46, 61, 59, and 62 yards in a 52-13 rout of Vista;

–Passed for seven touchdowns  including strikes of 81, 66, 55, and 54 yards.

Roberts also was the president of his Sunday School group in junior high, graduated near the top of his senior class at the then-named Oceanside-Carlsbad, was president of his USC fraternity, and helped integrate the university’s Fraternity Row.

As the first African-American to play in an athletic event against the University of Texas in Austin in 1956, Roberts left the Longhorns pawing dust. He was in the game for only 12 minutes but rushed for 251 yards and 3 touchdowns in a 44-20 USC victory and was cheered by the home crowd as he left the field.

A sprinter and jumper in the spring , Roberts leaped 24 feet, 3 ½ inches, to beat favored Rafer Johnson in the annual UCLA-USC dual track meet. He played four seasons in the NFL with the San Francisco 49ers and also played in the Canadian League.

Between football seasons Roberts graduated from USC with a degree in business administration.

Many Spartans who faced Roberts in 1952 would face him again, including 16 lettermen entering the  season.

Veteran tackle Don Dickerson anchored the defense and running backs Bob Neeley and Benny Martin were all-league holdovers. Bob Franklin moved from defense and became a solid quarterback.

WHERE’S  FIRE MARSHAL?

Both teams were 7-0.The Chula Vista community was agog. Tickets to the game were tougher to come by than a seat for a  3-D movie at the Vogue Theater.

Rindone had bleachers installed around the Spartans’ field for an additional 1,200 persons. An overflow crowd that included rows of standees was said to be 10,000 persons.

Roberts was held to 35 yards.  Chula Vista won again 14-0 and clinched a second consecutive Metropolitan League championship.

There was one statistic, however, that reflected Roberts’ grit. He never stopped coming at the Spartans, carrying the ball  29 times, on each  pressured and hammered by  DeVore’s fast, hard-hitting defenders, who dominated the Oceanside forwards.

The victory not only clinched another Metropolitan League crown but meant that Chula Vista had defeated its principal rivals on successive weeks. Seven days before it took care of Sweetwater 28-13.

The Spartans earned a first-round, CIF lower division playoff bye with their 9-0 record. Rindone won a telephonic coin flip conducted in the CIF office in Los Angeles and Chula Vista was host to a quarterfinals matchup against 6-2 Corona.

The Spartans had beaten Bonita 54-7 in the season opener and Bonita later defeated Corona 18-13. It looked like an easy first test for the Metropolitan League champs.

CLOSE, BUT NO CIGAR 

Comparative scores meant nothing.

Corona scored first in the second quarter before another overflow crowd of 5,000. The Panthers kept the Spartans at a distance.

The Panthers led, 7-6, deep into the second half, before the Spartans braced and took possession with 4:39 remaining in the game, the ball on their 12-yard line.

Spartans faithful shifted nervously in the packed bleachers.

The scoreboard clock ticking away, Chula Vista slowly moved down the field into scoring position.

Bob Franklin’s four-yard touchdown pass to Carroll Clowers on the ninth play of the drive came with only 15 seconds remaining and pulled out a 13-7 win.

Chula Vista held on for a 19-18 triumph the next week at Fullerton Junior College in the semifinals against favored Brea-Olinda, which was 10-0 and averaging 31 points a game.

Deadlocked, 6-6,  at halftime, Chula Vista struck with the third-quarter kickoff.  Bob Neeley accepted the kick of his 17-yard line, advanced to the 30, and then lateraled to Benny Martin, who covered the remaining 70 yards.

A recovered fumble on the Wildcats’ 30 led to Ron Mesker’s 11-yard touchdown run and Bob Wilson’s conversion put the visitors in front, 19-6.

Chula Vista held off the Wildcats before 3,500 chilled observers and reached the championship game by the margin of one successful point after and three Brea misses.

Two Wildcat conversions were blocked, by Fred McLean and Wayne Eisenman, the latter after a made Brea attempt was negated by a penalty.

The Spartans then were awarded home field again against another team of Wildcats, Brawley, the 1951 and ’52 CIF champion.

Chula Vista’s 12-6 victory over the Imperial Valley Wildcats before a crowd guessed at 7,500 completed a 12-0 season that was the best by a County squad since San Diego High’s Wonder Team of 1916 went 12-0.

Could the Spartans have beaten San Diego or Kearny, the two powers of the mighty City Prep League? It was a question that wouldn’t be answered, but South Bay partisans pondered the issue long into the winter.

COACHES’ SONS MEET C.R.

Fast forward almost 60 years. DeVore and Roberts were among the inductees in the CIF San Diego Section’s inaugural Hall of Fame class. Two younger men approached Roberts as he entered the event at San Diego’s Joseph Jacobs Center on May 22, 2011.

“Mr. Roberts,” said one, “I’m John DeVore and this is my brother James.” The sons of Chet DeVore had heard their late father speak of C.R. Roberts so often while they were growing up that the introduction was more like a  meeting with an old friend.

“HATS” MOVE ON

Joe Rindone also supervised the creation of Southwestern College in Chula Vista in 1960. Chet DeVore, after retiring as coach following the 1955 season, followed Rindone as Chula Vista’s principal and later was President of Southwestern College.

DeVore was never far from football. He founded the Pacific Southwest Conference of junior colleges and worked for years as a football game official in San Diego County.

DeVore’s son John, was a longtime high school principal in the Sweetwater district and head football coach at Montgomery.

Chet DeVore’s won loss record in five seasons was 44-7-1, a percentage of .856, based on the formula of half game won and half game lost for ties. Duane Maley was 97-19-3 (.828) at San Diego High.

CANDIDATES?

Duane Maley and Don Giddings  had been so successful on the high school level  that they were among the first names mentioned when a head coaching vacancy opened at San Diego Junior College this year. Knights coach John Brose stepped down to become the school’s registrar.

Giddings and Maley, however, remained at their respective posts and San Diego JC chose ex-Hoover assistant and former Hilltopper George Schutte.

OMEN? WHAT OMEN? 

For the first time in three years the San Diego Cavemen made the right call… there was no call to make

The Cavemen earned the right to host a quarterfinals playoff game with Anaheim, after losing coin flips for City Prep League playoff invitations in 1951 and 1952.

The Cavers shut out Kearny, 27-0, for the CPL championship on the final regular-season Friday but bombed in the playoffs.

After a first-round bye the Cavers were knocked out by Anaheim, 21-7.

The Anaheim Bulletin reported that the small but quick Colonists defeated the favored but “bewildered San Diego team”.

The Cavers’ defensive line outweighed Anaheim’s offensive line by 24 pounds.

Anaheim tied Santa Monica 21-21 in the semifinal round the next week but was eliminated by the quirky CIF rule favoring the team with the most first downs. Santa Monica had 15 to the Colonists’ 14 and moved on to defend its championship with a 34-19 win over Whittier.

ZAMPESE FAMILIAR NAME

The Southern California player of the year was Santa Barbara tailback Ernie Zampese, who retired to San Diego after a long coaching career with San Diego State, the San Diego Chargers, Los Angeles and St. Louis  Rams, New England Patriots, and Dallas Cowboys.

Zampese scored two touchdowns as Santa Barbara defeated Point Loma 26-0 in the final regular-season game.

DON’T INVITE ‘EM

There was no love lost between San Diego and Point Loma, especially after Pointers football and track standout Herman Thompson transferred to San Diego.

Nor did Pointers coach Don Giddings, a San Diego High graduate, want to compare San Diego and Kearny as those two prepared for their CPL title-deciding contest.

Giddings did allow that San Diego was “not the toughest team we’ve played this season”. The Komets had whipped Point Loma 27-7.

The Thompson transfer was provoking enough but Giddings also had to live with another, bitter loss to San Diego. Point Loma outgained  Duane Maley’s team, 192-170.

San Diego was held to 102 yards rushing but still won 14-6, the Cavers’ defense stiffening in the fourth quarter, when Point Loma ran 27 offensive plays to San Diego’s five.

Point Loma tried a successful on-side kickoff and installed a four-man defensive line and called it the “Horseshoe Defense” against San Diego.  Tackles and ends were on the line, guards and linebackers three yards off the line.

Essentially the Pointers went to a 4-4-3 alignment, the object being to contain San Diego’s dangerous, open field ball carriers once they cleared the first line of defense.

SCHEDULES ITSELF

Grossmont’s game at Colton was canceled because a Yellowjackets player came down with polio.

Grossmont coach Phil Morrell then scheduled an intrasquad scrimmage, proceeds going to purchase of new band uniforms. “This is one game I know we’ll win,” said Morrell.

Wrong! The Foothillers’ Blue tied the Foothillers’ gold, three touchdowns each.

REGIONAL VENUES?

City Schools officials discussed an idea of constructing two regional, lighted, concrete stadiums, one in the West for Point Loma, La Jolla, and Mission Bay, and another in the East for Hoover and Kearny.  Lincoln and San Diego would share Balboa Stadium.

The idea was dismissed because of financing and fans’ desire to have their teams play on their own campus fields.

Improvement was made at Balboa Stadium, which introduced a new, electronic scoreboard that was 12 feet high, 25 feet wide, and 40 feet above ground.

BUILDING BLOCKS

San Diego’s junior varsity was undefeated and would provide the nucleus for the 1955 CIF Southern Section championship squad. Deron Johnson picked up a fumble and rambled 60 yards for the only score against the Lincoln “varsity” and was promoted to the Cavers’ varsity after that game.

Quarterback Pete Gumina passed 40 yards to Willie West for the winning touchdown in another game. Johnson, Gumina, and West made the all-SCIF first team two seasons later.

HONORS

San Diego guard Bill Patten earned a first-team selection on the all-Southern California squad.  End Lauro Saraspe of La Jolla, tackle David Lopez of San Diego and halfback Lee Buchanan were on the third team.

Small-schools all-Southern California selections were player-of-the-year C.R. Roberts, joined on the first team by guard Fred McLean and halfback Bob Neeley of Chula Vista. Center Stan Nichols of Escondido made the second team.

QUICK KICKS

San Diego quarterback Floyd Robinson was better known as a nine-season major league outfielder mostly with the Chicago White Sox…Robinson  had  a .283 lifetime batting average and drove in 109 runs and batted .312 in 1962… San Diego had six players score at least  5 touchdowns, with total points in parenthesis: Horace Tucker (40), Ermon Johnson (38), Floyd Robinson (36), Dallas Evans (36), Herman Thompson (36), and Tony Asaro (30)…Kearny’s 7-1 record was the best in school history…beginning in 1944, the Komets were 21-43-5 through 1952… Hoover’s season, which started with great promise, ended with a 39-0 loss to San Diego and 7-7 tie with La Jolla… the Cardinals played San Diego in the annual city schools’carnival on Friday night and were forced to travel the next day to Santa Monica, where the Cardinals played the defending champions tough, losing 28-20, with the Vikings’ final touchdown coming on the last play of the game… Hoover scored 24 points in the fourth quarter of a 44-0 victory over San Bernardino the next week and smashed Grossmont 60-6 in Week 3…East teams Helix, Kearny, and San Diego defeated the West of Hoover, Point Loma, and La Jolla 7-2 before a football carnival gathering of 18,000 in Balboa Stadium… with its new, campus stadium still under construction, Sweetwater’s home games were at Aztec Bowl on the San Diego State campus and preseason drills at Mar Vista, 10 miles South…  the new Lincoln High, with 10^th and 11 graders (and junior high of grades 7, 8, and 9), did not participate in the football carnival but took part in the pregame pageantry… Lincoln was 6-1-1 against predominantly junior varsity competition… another new school, Mission Bay, with 10^th and 11^th graders was 3-3 against a similar schedule…Chula Vista’s bus trip  to Fullerton for its game with Brea-Olinda began at 2:30 p.m…the Spartans stopped in San Juan Capistrano, a favorite  resting locale of local teams headed north, for their pregame meal…although favored, Brea-Olinda’s student body numbered only 225, compared to  Chula Vista’s, which was near 1,000…

…Art Luppino of La Jolla rushed for 95 yards scored two touchdowns and was named the “Star of Stars” in the annual Breitbard College Prep game before about 16,000 in Balboa Stadium…the game, marking the beginning of the 1953 season, featured a team of  graduated high school all-stars from the Los Angeles City Section and another from the CIF Southern Section…the L.A. City team scored a 24-13 victory…San Diego and Anaheim each lost to Redlands, which defeated the Colonists, 7-0, and San Diego, 14-7…The Cavers and Colonists also had lost coin flips for playoff berths in 1952 after tying for league championships….

The rubber didn’t hit the road.

So it was with the endangered 1942 season, buffeted by the winds of war that thrust San Diego to the forefront of the defense effort.

Gasoline rationing shortly would go from volunteered to mandatory.  Night football was out. So was travel.

The long-distance conference call became a popular means of communication in the CIF.

San Diego school officials were thinking long and hard and worried.

John Aseltine’s concern was magnified when he returned from the summer school break.  The San Diego High principal was greeted by telephone messages from principals at Compton and Alhambra.

Across town at Hoover, principal Floyd Johnson was alerted to a call from the Pasadena Bullpups.

The three Northern schools, located at least 120 miles away and members with the Hilltoppers and Cardinals in the 17-team Major Conference, were candid with their San Diego colleagues.

They wanted out of scheduled road games. As the days passed so did other Los Angeles-area clubs.  Uncle Sam had spoken.

San Diego and Hoover, the far South links of the league, suddenly were on the outside looking in.

Travel, always an annoying fact of life for teams in the “Border Town”, was now a problem that could not be overcome.

A shortage of fuel did not exist, according to “Mandatory Gas Rationing…lots of Whining”, in a historic review of 1942.

America had plenty of gas, but there was a shortage of rubber.

Defense plants in San Diego and elsewhere were badly in need of the substance. Imports had “slowed to a trickle”, since many traditional sources had fallen under Japanese control.

Jumpy and cautious after the Pearl Harbor attack, the government also enacted “dim-outs,” which virtually banned after-dark illumination.  San Diego and the numerous coastal communities on U.S. 101 from Mexico to Canada were considered vulnerable to Japanese air raids.

Backyard bomb shelters were being dug everywhere.

METRO TO RESCUE

Relief for the traditional powers would come from their so-called “county cousins” and   “little brothers” in the city.

The Metropolitan League, composed of the city’s Point Loma and La Jolla and the County’s Sweetwater, Grossmont, Coronado, Oceanside, and Escondido, invited Hoover and San Diego to join their league.

With a caveat:

Hoover and San Diego would be asked to split their squads  in order to bring the others more competitively in line with the big schools.

Coaches and administrators passed the proposal in a meeting at San Diego State that preceded the San Diego County Football Officials’ Association first gathering of the season.

The Metro went from a seven-team conference to one of 11 teams, including the San Diego Blues and San Diego Whites and Hoover Reds and Hoover Whites.

San Diego and Hoover divided their teams in a “choose-up” ceremony officiated by Sweetwater athletic director Vance Clymer.  Two leading players at each school selected players for their teams with alternate picks.

The White and Blue San Diego squads became known as the Cavemen and Hillers.  Hoover stayed with Whites and Reds.

City schools principals released a statement that said the proposed circuit was being accepted in  light of a wartime measure and it was their hope to cooperate with the war effort to the extent of conserving rubber and gasoline and relieving traffic on the highways.

Instead of three-hour-plus runs to the North, Hoover and San Diego  came into line with the others.  The longest trip now would be an occasional 40-to-50 mile, mid-day jaunt, usually when Grossmont or Sweetwater played Oceanside or Escondido.

The Southern League, with Vista, San Dieguito, Army-Navy, and Ramona, shared little travel.  League members Brown Military and St. Augustine, whose games did not count in the standings, played all their games on the road.

The Southern League’s breathing was labored.  Except for the Saints, teams played no more than 5 games.

Travel would be reduced even more in the future.

LESS GAS, MORE RUBBER

The best way to conserve rubber was to make it more difficult for people to use their automobiles.  And the best way to do that was  to limit the amount of gasoline purchased.

Americans soon were introduced to the ration card, which had to be presented on every trip to the filling station.

Class A drivers were allowed only 3 gallons a week.  Class B drivers (factory workers, traveling salesmen) were allowed 8 gallons a week.

Classes C, T and X were not subject to restriction.  Those classes included war workers, police, doctors, letter carriers, truck drivers, politicians, and other “important people”.

WHOA, NELLIE!

The Cavemen came out of the “draft” with the best player, quarterback Nelson Manuel, who topped all scorers with 86 points (14 touchdowns, 2 PAT) and led his squad to an 8-0-1 record.

One of Manuel’s teammates was tackle George Schutte, future USC lineman, longtime coach and instructor at San Diego City College, and legendary football game official.

Schutte also has a place in USC history.  His outstanding block sprung a Trojans runner for a touchdown in USC’s mighty challenge to unbeaten, No. 1-ranked Notre Dame in 1948.

Before 100,571 fans in the Los Angeles Coliseum, underdog USC led Notre Dame, 14-7, until an 82-yard kickoff return and pass interference penalty positioned the Irish to tie the game with 35 seconds remaining and extend their unbeaten streak to 28 games.

MANUEL THE FIRST?

Evening Tribune writer Bud Maloney, years later, suggested that Nelson Manuel may have been the first black T-formation quarterback.

The T was introduced in 1940 by Stanford coach Clark Shaughnessy, whose team upset Nebraska 21-13 in the 1941 Rose Bowl.

San Diego’s Joe Beerkle became a disciple and was among the first high school coaches to install the T.  Beerkle positioned the athletic and savvy Manuel behind the center.

CAVEMEN DOMINATE CARNIVAL

With Manuel passing for one touchdown and running for another, the Cavemen led the San Diego and La Jolla aggregations to a 21-7 victory over Hoover and Point Loma in the fifth annual City Schools carnival, with proceeds from the crowd of 8,000 going to the Red Cross.

Beerkle and Hoover coach Raleigh Holt stayed with their original plans not to combine squads. The Hillers and Hoover Reds were scoreless in the fourth quarter.

WHAT ABOUT THE BIG GAME?

There still would be the 10^th annual San Diego-Hoover game for city bragging rights.  The split squads would come together as one for a single game after the Metropolitan League season.

That the San Diego varsity defeated the Hoover varsity, 20-6, before about 8,000 in Balboa Stadium was no surprise.

In the season’s first “big game”, the Cavemen (5-0-1) met the Reds (5-0-1) in what the downtown media described as having “the earmarks of a real grid titanic.”

The visiting Cavemen made it no contest, winning, 41-13.  Nelson Manuel threw touchdown passes to Bill Nevins (2) and Jim Wallace and finished the day with touchdowns on runs of one and nine yards.

The Cavemen and Hillers posted a 3-0-1 record against the Whites and Reds, the Cavemen earning the championship with a 7-0-1 league record. The Reds were second at 6-1-1.

Operating under the new league setup an additional, “minor division” title was awarded to a pre-war Metropolitan League member, the nod going to Point Loma, which was 6-1-2 and third overall.

Point Loma clinched the title with a 26-6 victory over La Jolla as Larry Purdy threw two touchdown passes to Ed Klosterman and ran for another.

It was a somewhat pyrrhic victory for the Pointers, whose head coach, Bill Bailey, was leaving and moving downtown to become head coach at San Diego in 1943.

FIELD GOALS, ANYONE?

Until the soccer-style kicker emerged in the early 1960s, San  Diego teams would go years without even attempting field goals. Not this season:

–Carl Kruger, Coronado, 35 yards, in 6-3 loss to Hoover Reds.

–Neal Black, San Diego,  31 yards in San Diego Hillers’ 17-6 win over St. Augustine.

–Ted Smith, Grossmont,  33 yards  with five minutes remaining for difference in Grossmont’s 9-6 victory over San Diego Hillers.

–Don Sparling, Grossmont, 20 yards in 9-7 win over Grossmont.

SIGNS OF THE TIMES

Sailor Richard Thornbrue, 22, of the Naval Air Station lived a red-letter day on Nov. 20, 1942.

Thornbrue, whose duties included administering “boots” (recruits) their haircuts, filed for a marriage license with Bernice Hendrickson, 19.

Earlier in the day the tonsorial specialist said he “nearly passed out” when apprentice seaman Henry Fonda took a seat on Thorngrue’s barber’s chair.

Fonda’s wavy locks soon were on the shop floor.  “He got a regulation cut, same as the other recruits,” said Thorngrue of the award-winning actor.  “There wasn’t much hair left when I finished.”

THEY’RE CALLED KEY CANS

Every public school room in San Diego was equipped with a “key kan” for collection of discarded keys which contained metals necessary to the war effort.

Old keys included copper, nickel, and zinc.  Proceeds from sale of the metal would go to the United Service Organization.

TRUE GRID

Because of the war the Southern League’s Fallbrook High, located near the Camp Pendleton Marine Base, did not field a team and would not be back on the gridiron until 1944…Halfback Tommy Parker and guard Ben Edens were among Hoover’s key players and later made their marks as coaches, “Tom” at Sweetwater from 1954-60, “Bennie” at Point Loma from 1955-1997…it was a fine moment in Jack Mashin’s long coaching career at Grossmont when only 14 Foothillers went out to battle the powerful San Diego Cavemen but came away with a 13-13 tie at Grossmont… …not much offense in the Hoover-San Diego varsity game, the Cavers gaining 141 yards to the Cardinals’ 64…San Diego’s Jim Wallace combined with Manuel on a reverse and hauled 54 yards for a punt return touchdown…Manuel scored twice on runs of 20 and 7 yards…Tony Gerache ran 95 yards for a touchdown as the Hillers defeated Oceanside 21-7…end Fred Gallup of Escondido, tackle Bob Kaiser of Hoover, guard Carl Kruger of Coronado, and quarterback Nelson Manuel of San Diego earned all-Southern California third-team honors…local football coaches who responded in the spring to a call from Uncle Sam:  Charlie Wilson, Point Loma; Marvin Clark, La Jolla; Pete Walker, Hoover….

 

.

La Jolla’s Jim Prather was a member of the Southern Section team in the first College Prep All-Star Game against the CIF Los Angeles City Section and set up set up a touchdown with a 46-yard punt return as Prather’s side scored a 27-7 victory.

It was to be the last game ever for Prather, who was driving to Tucson four days later with Ellis Craddock, a Grossmont High graduate and Prather’s sponsoring-Breitbard Athletic Foundation-game teammate.

‘SUICIDE DOORS’

Prather, asleep in the passenger seat, and Craddock were to enroll at the  University of Arizona and turn out for football practice when they were involved in a two-car collision on U.S. 80 in Arizona between Gila Bend and Casa Grande.

Prather sustained serious injuries. Craddock and four persons in the other auto were killed.

Until they drove to St. Mary’s Hospital in Tucson from their home in Pacific Beach and saw Jim in the hospital, members of Prather’s family, who made the stressful, uncertain, eight-hour drive with members of Craddock’s family,  knew only  that one person in Jim’s car had survived.

Prather believed he was alive because the automobile in which he was riding was equipped with “suicide doors,” which are hinged toward the back of the vehicle.

Upon impact Prather was thrown from the car.  He would have been trapped inside if the car had the more modern passenger doors, said Jim’s son, David.

Jim recovered but did not play collegiate football. U. of A. coach Bob Winslow announced that the school would honor Prather’s scholarship.

Back home, Jim found another sport to his liking.

Brother Phil, childhood friend Delmar Miller, and Jim formed one of the top Southern California beach over-the-line softball teams and were fixtures in the Old Mission Beach Athletic Club’s yearly tournament.

CARNIVAL FAVORS WEST

The all-star game was followed by the 11th annual football carnival, presented by the San Diego City Schools’ Association, and marking the usual opening of the season.

The circus-like event featured about 200 football players and pageantry that included 1,000 cheerleaders, band members, flag twirlers, drum majors and majorettes.

The West, comprised of Hoover, Chula Vista (added entry from the county), and La Jolla, defeated the East, made up of Kearny, San Diego, and Point Loma, 7-6, before an official crowd of 25,096 persons and a Channel 8 television audience.

Each team engaged in one of three, 15-minute quarters.

San Diego and Hoover played to a scoreless tie in the final period. Compared to previous games the tie was a moral victory for the Cardinals.

It had been six years since Hoover had been competitive with San Diego, enduring blowout losses by scores of 72-0, 38-6, 48-7, 25-0, and 39-7.

Hoover would experience more success against the Cavemen later in the season as the course of San Diego football veered briefly from its normal direction but would take a radical turn in the coming decade.

The Cardinals claimed city bragging rights for the first time since 1943 with a 28-13 victory over San Diego and Point Loma won a Southern California playoff championship, the first for a local team since Grossmont in 1927.

The city was growing, as were the number of television sets and aluminum antennas above San Diego rooftops.

The coming San Diego 1950 census would declare a population of 334,000 residents, with another 123,000 in the surrounding area.

There were 20 high schools in the County, including Julian, which did not field a team, and its Laguna Mountains neighbor, tiny Mountain Empire in Campo.

The population growth was just one reason San Diego schools were taking the first step toward an eventual break from the CIF Southern Section.

ALL ROADS LEAD TO…

Another and perhaps more important factor was that for 30-plus years athletic rivals in and around Los Angeles and Orange counties had complained of scheduling problems and travel involving teams from the “Border Town.”

The modern automobile and U.S. highways 101 and 395, San Diego’s main south-north arteries, assured a faster trip to and from those distant locales but freeways still were years down the road.

A San Diego-to-Pasadena journey, through more than a dozen communities, stop signs and traffic signals, was minimally 3 hours.  Included were the 17 miles  from Oceanside to San Clemente that included dangerous stretches when the highway was three lanes and  shrouded in fog.

San Diego High had been a member of the Coast League since 1923 with exception of the travel-restricted years of World War II. Coast League membership in 1949 also included Compton, Pasadena, Pasadena Muir, Grossmont and Hoover.

The 1949-50 school year beginning in September would mark a final act for the San Diego group, with a local City Prep League being created the following school year.

Included in the changing landscape was the first Breitbard game, which drew 12,000 fans to Balboa Stadium and was played in early September.

Jim Prather’s teammate, San Diego High’s Charlie Davis, was the game’s “Star of Stars,” scoring two touchdowns, and Cavers teammate Granville Walton caught a touchdown pass in the Southern Section victory.

The game, featuring recent high school graduates, was the brainchild of Hoover graduate Bob Breitbard, a San Diego sportsman and businessman for almost 70 years.

POINTERS DON’T FADE

San Diego’s power and dominance seemed intact when the Cavers’ Darnes Johnson returned the opening kickoff 90 yards for a touchdown the following week in a  win against Point Loma.

But the Pointers spat back. They scored the only touchdown of the second half after falling behind, 28-6. A loss to Phoenix the next week had sportswriters saying the Cavemen could be had.

Hoover was waiting for the opportunity. Second-year coach Bob Kirchhoff greeted more returning lettermen and more returning starters than any Coast League squad.

The Cardinals lost one game, 26-7 to eventual Southern California champion Compton, but they slammed the Cavemen 28-13, rushing for 285 yards and never were threatened, leading 21-0 at the half, and winning the 17th annual battle for the first time since a 7-3 victory in 1943.

TUESDAY FOOTBALL WITH “MR. OUTSIDE”

Don Giddings, who was a  tackle on Hobbs Adams’ 1929-31 San Diego High teams and who would move from head coach to principal at Point Loma and later to Patrick Henry, had positioned the Pointers for a championship run in the so-called CIF Lower Division.

The Pointers rolled through the Metropolitan League after their opening-game loss to San Diego, stalling only once in a 13-13 tie with La Jolla, then winning three playoff games by scores of 48-7, 42-12, and 27-14.

Point Loma and Bonita High met for the  championship at Point Loma on a Tuesday afternoon. The schools had not been able to agree on where or when to play the game. Southern Section commissioner Seth Van Patten ruled that Point Loma could choose the site and Bonita could choose the date.

Among those in attendance was Glenn Davis, the legendary “Mr. Outside” of West Point fame and holder of the CIF  record for most points in a season, having scored 242 points for Bonita in 1942.

Davis beat a hasty retreat to the stands when he was swarmed by a covey of coeds.

LEAGUES PROPOSED

Three days before Point Loma’s season-ending victory, a December 11 meeting in Los Angeles threatened to derail plans for the re-leaguing of 19 San Diego schools (St. Augustine was a member of the Los Angeles-based Southland Catholic League and not in consideration for local membership).

Hoover principal Floyd Johnson, a member of the Southern Section executive committee, and leader of the San Diego group, proposed a six team City League of Hoover, San Diego, Kearny, La Jolla, Grossmont, and Point Loma;  seven-team Metropolitan League of Chula Vista, Escondido, Sweetwater, Coronado, Vista, Oceanside, and San Dieguito, and a six-team Southern Prep League of Fallbrook, Army-Navy, Brown Military, Mountain Empire, and Julian.

Johnson’s plan already faced opposition.

Officials from Vista, Fallbrook, Escondido, Oceanside, and San Dieguito had met in Carlsbad three weeks earlier to discuss formation of a “Northern San Diego County League”. Those schools suggested that their problems involving transportation and minor sports competition would be answered.

The CIF Southern Section denied the San Diego delegation’s proposal because of “divided reports.” The Johnson-led faction was told to “get its house in order” and come back in February.

Most of Johnson’s proposal eventually was approved by the Southern Section.

San Diego, Grossmont, and Hoover, as part of the new CPL, would say goodbye to the Coast League, which would reincarnate with Compton, Norwalk Excelsior, and the three Long Beach schools, Poly, Wilson, and Jordan.

Pasadena was expected to go into a league with Alhambra, El Monte, Alhambra Mark Keppel, Monrovia, and Whittier. Muir would align in a league with Bell Gardens, Rosemead, Covina, Downey, and Montebello.

Geography (i.e., travel) and school enrollment were principal factors in all potential realignment, which would be settled in February, 1950.

HONORS

San Diego tackle Frank San Fillipo was a first-team, all-Southern California choice. Fullback Eddie Silva of Point Loma and Grossmont’s Ellis Craddock were on the third team.

CARDINALS WITHOUT A NEST

Hoover’s 8-1 record was achieved under unusual conditions.

Fire destroyed the wooden bleachers on the East side of the campus stadium before the 1948 season.  A new, steel-framed seating area was ready but stadium lights still were in production as the 1949 campaign got under way.

Hoover principal Floyd Johnson announced that the Cardinals’ Coast League opener with Muir  would  be moved to Pasadena and the Rose Bowl.

“If the lights aren’t ready for the October twenty-first game against Grossmont (next opponent) I don’t know what we’ll do,” said Johnson.

What Hoover did was play its entire regular-season schedule on the road, with “home” games at San Diego State’s Aztec Bowl.

Hoover participated in a postseason charity game to help pay for 14 blood transfusions and surgery that resulted in more than $3,000 in hospital bills for injured Grossmont player Bill Finneran, who sustained a near-fatal kidney injury in an early-season game with Sweetwater.

The game was scheduled for Aztec Bowl, then  switched to Hoover,  which still had no lights. Kickoff for the Finneran game was at 10 a.m and Hoover beat the Foothillers for the second time, 12-7.

WHO HAS THE BALL?

Fog was a ubiquitous and frustrating companion.

San Dieguito coach Curtis French blamed the shroud for a 20-13 loss to Escondido after the Cougars returned the opening kickoff for a touchdown. “We lost track of the ball and didn’t know who to tackle,” said French.

Writer Jerry Brucker said radar was needed to follow the action, the fog being so thick in the Hoover-Pasadena skirmish at Aztec Bowl.

KIRCHHOFF ANGRY WINNER

Hoover coach Bob Kirchhoff would not forget  the season  opener against the San Bernardino Cardinals at the Orange Show Bowl in ‘Berdoo.

Hoover won 13-7 but Kirchhoff was sizzling, describing the game officiating as the worst he’d ever seen.

“Hoover High played an aggressive game, perhaps a bit too much, as they were sent back 95 yards on 11 penalties, four of them being for 15 yards,” wrote Sid Olin of the San Bernardino Sun. “The Cardinals (San Bernardino) took but two penalties for off-sides.

The term for officiating at road games often has been “Home Cooking.”   The Hoover mentor’s choice of words was much stronger.

BETTER THAN JOHNNY O

St. Augustine coach Dave DeVarona, detoxing from an 0-5-2 season, singled out running back Claude Thomas, who, despite the winless campaign, earned first team, all-league honors in the Southland Catholic circuit.

DeVarona said that Thomas was the league’s hardest running back and a better, all-around player than St. Anthony’s Johnny Olszewski, who scored five touchdowns against the Saints in 1948 and took his team  to the  Southern California finals.

NEW SCHOOL AT 49TH AND IMPERIAL

Lincoln Junior High, numbering first-day enrollment of 502 students, opened with classes for seventh and eighth graders.

Lincoln gradually became a high school.  A ninth grade was added in 1950-51. Tenth grade students were included in 1952-53, followed by an 11th grade class in ’53-54, and the first senior class in 1954-55.

Lincoln was a grade 7-12 school with split sessions in the 1954-55 school year, becoming an all-high school student body of three grades  in 1955-56.

QUICK KICKS

La Jolla  had new lights installed at its Scripps Field…Chula Vista dedicated its new football stadium, named after principal Joe Rindone, with a 34-6 victory over Oceanside…Grossmont earned praise for publishing a preseason “press guide” that compared to those of Pacific Coast Conference universities… Brucker on San Diego junior Charlie Powell, who had been moved from end to fullback in spring drills and who gained 99 yards in 14 carries and went 65 yards on a pass play against Phoenix: “The big boy (225 pounds) was a solid, uranium sensation for the Hillers, a blocking, tackling, stiff-arming and side-stepping terror”… Powell had 87 yards in 11 carries and Frank Johnson 88 in 10 in a 34-13 win at Pasadena, highlighting a long day for the two Cavers and their teammates… the team boarded buses at San Diego High at 8 a.m. and didn’t return home until after 8 that night…the trip was typical for Coast League road teams…Compton was officially declared Coast League champion by a 4-3 vote… the Tarbabes finished with a 4-0 league record, Hoover 4-1…the Cardinals wanted Compton to reschedule a previously canceled game with Muir… the cancelation was fallout from Compton Junior College’s suspension of relations with Muir’s upper level institution, Muir Junior College, over recruitment of a player by Muir J.C. the previous year… unsaid was how a vote against Compton would have helped Hoover’s playoff hopes, the Cardinals having lost the head-and-head meeting with Compton… Manny Gomes, Point Loma’s first-team all-Metropolitan League  end, converted 32 of 40 point-after-touchdown kicks… in the 13-13 tie with La Jolla one of Gomes’ attempts was blocked… Manny enjoyed a long career as a San Diego-area football and basketball game official and was a National Basketball Association referee….

Dan Berry passed recently at age 72, leaving a historic legacy at La Jolla High and of significant achievements at San Diego City College and the University of California at Berkeley.

When La Jolla met San Diego High at  Scripps Field in 1961, the Vikings had not beaten the Cavemen since 1951 and were reeling from 57-0 and 59-0 knockouts in the two most recent meetings.

Berry, an all-San Diego Section first-team selection,  rushed for 153 yards in 20 carries, scored a touchdown and passed for two, and charged a three-touchdown, fourth-quarter rally as the Vikings, trailing, 19-7, defeated the Cavers, 27-19.

The seaside team’s victory should have created some sports world buzz, but the game was played on Thursday night, a day earlier than usual.

Friday night was when the media spotlight was on the high schools.

The Evening Tribune did not send a reporter to the game and The San Diego Union‘s coverage of the contest was consigned to back pages of the sports section.

La Jollans were outraged.

Many of the  beach community’s residents flooded the nearby office of publisher James Copley with telephone calls expressing anger that Copley’s newspapers had given their team short shrift.

Copley got the message.

An order soon came down from the fourth floor at the Union-Tribune building on Second Avenue in downtown San Diego.

Henceforth the Tribune would carry a full page of prep photo coverage plus a full page of stories and reports each Saturday on games  throughout the County.

KNIGHTS THRIVE WITH DAN

Dan Berry and the Vikings had a lot to do with that emphasis on the exploits of the area’s prepsters.

Berry later led San Diego City College to a best-ever 9-1 record and come-from-behind, 28-24 victory over Orange Coast College in the 1964 San Bernardino Elks Bowl.

The 6-foot, 1-inch, 200-pounder was described by Orange Coast coach Dick Tucker as “the best junior college player in Southern California.”

MEMORIAL SCHEDULED

Berry went on to letter at quarterback and running back for two seasons at Berkeley, and was a fifth round draft selection of the NFL Philadelphia Eagles in 1967.  His career was short-circuited by injuries.

Berry’s wife, Kathy, said that on Feb. 18 a celebration of Dan’s life will be held at the family residence.

Services for San Diego High legend Cleveland (Smiley) Jones will be at 10 a.m. Saturday, Jan. 14, at El Camino Memorial Park, 5600 Carroll Road, San Diego, 92123.

Viewings are  scheduled from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 13.  and from 9-10 a.m. Saturday. A Repast will follow the funeral.

Jones, 77, a resident of Rancho Alamitos in Orange County, had been ill for several months.

Read about Jones and his achievements at San Diego High in 1955 and ‘56.

JIM GILCHRIST, WILLIE McCLOUD

Two of Cleveland Jones’s San Diego High teammates also passed recently.

Gilchrist, 78,  was all-City Prep League in basketball  and baseball in 1955-56 and teamed with Art Powell and others on the 1954-55 basketball team that reached the Southern California playoffs semifinals and finished fourth overall.

McCloud, 76, was a three-year starter and made all-City and all-Southern California second team as a .352-hitting centerfielder on the 25-4 San Diego baseball team in 1959.

Next month, on Feb. 14 [2017], will mark the seventh year since we undertook a challenge.

I wanted to write the history of San Diego County high school football.

That’s where my career started and where it will end.

Well, I didn’t write the history (that is almost infinite), but I gave it a shot.

I attempted to write a narrative about each season. More than 100.

I just counted.

The number includes all seasons from 1914 forward.  I combined the years 1891 to 1913.

Almost all of the narratives are broken into short subjects, vignettes and photographs (pictures mostly from rustic and ragged microfilm at several Southern California sources).

Some years, like 1955, include multiple entries and, starting in 2013, football was covered on a week-to-week basis.

Most seasons usually required an average of about 2,000 words, although there are some with less and many with more.

My superstar writing friend Dave Kindred told me, “It wouldn’t sell and it would be too long,” when I suggested to David that maybe I’d write a book about this parochial subject.

He was right on both counts. But thanks to Henrik Jonson, my cyber guru, we put together a web site:  Partletonsports.com.

Partleton was the name on my father’s birth certificate when he was born in Barbados, “Little England” as it was known.

Dad changed his last name to Smith after he entered the United States following service in the Canadian army in World War I.

I asked him often why he hadn’t been more inventive. He could have changed his name to Jones.

I’m going to continue looking for nuggets of information in football, basketball, track and field, and probably baseball.

It’s a labor of love and in retirement you have to have interests.  I’ve got season tickets to San Diego State basketball and I catch a prep football or basketball game every week.

That and trying to keep Susie happy and watching our 4 grandsons grow up.