Always time for nostalgia

 

     Let's start with this: People love nostalgia.

     I am one of those people, although I'd like to think that I very much am a "today" person. The great majority of my blogs have been nostalgic pieces.

      There are a couple of reasons why I send out (by e-mail or posts on Facebook) many photos and/or clippings from the past: 

      (1) People like them, and will react to them;

      (2) I either "share" many that are posted on my Facebook feed or that I find in researching newspaper files.

      Speaking of research, this blog has been dormant for three months, and here's why: Much of my time since mid-June has been spent working on my latest "project," which -- I hope -- will turn into a book or booklet.

      The subject matter -- Louisiana high school outdoor track and field records/results/history -- is going to interest only a certain segment. Picking up from 2004, when Jerry Byrd Sr. (Shreveport) did a book on it, and updating those records (2005-2020) plus going back in time to fill in many missing names has taken hours and hours.

      So not much time for blogging. In fact, I am interrupting the designing of pages, working (struggling) with Word and Publisher programs, to write this blog and another one that is a continuation/addition to my Dad's story (and related to the Holocaust).

      To be honest, I also have not felt much like writing about today's sports world (baseball, NFL, college football, NBA, NHL, college football, college basketball, golf). Figure there are enough opinions out there to satisfy readers' needs; you don't need or want my opinion. (And, surprise, I do have a lot of opinions.)

      You sure as heck don't want or need my opinions on politics and social issues; more than enough of that out there ... every day, every hour, every minute.

      Sorry, fed up with all of it. From all sides, incidentally.

      Tried that once a couple of months ago, with an out-of-character political opinion that, through e-mail and Facebook, was met with more than several critical "please don't do that again" messages.

      So there. Keep your opinions to yourself. Just go vote.

      OK, back to nostalgia. I can post stuff -- stories/columns, photos, etc. -- from today's world, mostly sports but also on a variety of things, such recent posts on eating fried catfish and doing a Trinity River trash pickup. Reaction to most of those is good but not resounding. 

      Well, there is one element that is gratifying. Get the most response if I post old or new Van Thyn family photos or photos of the four spectacular grandchildren.

       But what I find gets the most reaction is photos from the Shreveport high school sports heroes of the 1950s and 1960s and some into the 1970s. My Facebook and e-mail friends really do love those.

       Most of them are aimed at Louisiana readers, and many are -- of course -- Woodlawn related. But we try to mix in some Byrd, Fair Park, Bossier, Jesuit and others.

       One popular recent post: photos of four of Louisiana's best 1950s high school athletes: Billy Cannon, Bo Campbell, Charles "Cotton" Nash and Jerry Dyes.       

     This week we posted another Bo Campbell photo, taking the baton from Byrd High teammate Pat Studstill for the last leg of a 1957 mile relay. Both went from there to football stardom in college and, for Studstill, a 12-year NFL stay as a punter and wide receiver. For Campbell, a very successful business career, primarily in banking in Shreveport.

       People liked seeing this photo.

       I'm frequently asked where I find these clippings. Easy answer: newspapers.com. Having access to many Louisiana paper files (other cities/states, too) is a big plus for research, and what's helped even more recently is having temporary access to the Baton Rouge Morning Advocate and New Orleans Times-Picayne files (thanks to the East Baton Rouge Parish library).

       So while I'm researching track and field, I happen to come across some clippings and photos I think people might enjoy seeing again.

       (For much of two years, as I researched Shreveport and Northwest Louisiana pro baseball, I would post stories and photos tying into those teams and players. That material went into a book form -- That's The Old Ballgame Shreveport -- that is available online.) 

       But it is the Woodlawn posts, because so many of my old friends are from 1960s school days, that prove most popular.

        Two examples:

     -- On August 30 (again found while looking for track stuff), I came across the clippings of Terry Bradshaw and Tommy Spinks -- our great QB/receiver team signing their scholarships to Louisiana Tech, with Coach Lee Hedges (one of our all-time favorites) in both photos.

      -- On July 1, we posted a photo of Bradshaw with Coach A.L. Williams (another all-time favorite) in a posed shot on the Woodlawn track during the national-record javelin throw spring of 1966 for Terry. That photo keeps repeating on my Facebook news feed because it is so popular.

      Who knows what I'll find next. But if the Facebook and e-mail friends keep liking them, I'll keep trying ... if you don't mind.

An inspirational story: Connie Smith has made his life meaningful

          Connie Smith has been an inspiration to anyone who knows him, and the story linked below bears that out.

     He has been partially paralyzed since a swimming accident in 1971 -- the first two vertebrae in his neck were crushed -- but he has made a life for himself.

     It is a story much like that of Kenneth Harvey (Logansport), subject of a series of stories/posts on my blog and on Facebook. Their courage, and faith, and the lives they have lived since each had a horrific moment as  young men are testaments to strong will.

     Both were outstanding high school athletes, and Connie went on to compete in college for three years. But their dreams of athletic fame were shattered.

     Researching baseball history in North Louisiana brought a reminder of Connie Smith, who starred at Spearsville (La.) High School and in American Legion baseball for the T.L. James Contractors of Ruston, and then at East Texas Baptist College.

     He was a versatile baseball player, a leader, an All-State catcher in high school (Class B, 1968, .427 average, four home runs in 15 games) who played first base in Legion baseball, and then after a year at Louisiana Tech in which playing time was more sparing, a pitcher and shortstop after a transfer to ETBC.

     He also was a good high school basketball player, helping Spearsville into the state regionals, and was one of the top scorers on the La. Tech freshman team in 1968-69 (my senior year there). 

     "But baseball was my passion," he said. 

     His talent was impressive enough that he was selected in the 1971 Major League Baseball draft by  the San Francisco Giants. 

     MLB at that time did make the draft-pick lists public instantly, nor did we at The Shreveport Times cover it closely. So, unless you were around Spearsville and Ruston then, the news of his being drafted did not make The Times until three weeks later. 

     His accident occurred two weeks later, seven days after his 21st birthday. Life changed forever.

     After a long rehabilitation period, Connie -- in his wheelchair -- worked in law enforcement for some 35 years.

Connie and Linda Smith (from his Facebook page)

     And then he had a calling to serve the Lord. For the past 15 years, he has been pastor of Fellowship Baptist Church in rural Dubach, La. -- 13 miles north of Ruston. It is another 19 miles north to Spearsville (also rural), which is in upper Union Parish near the Arkansas border.

     Spearsville -- many familiar with North Louisiana athletics know this -- is a basketball/baseball town. Among my friends from there, athletes all, were the late Cecil Upshaw, Ike Futch, R.V. Lockwood, Joey Barron and James Smith (Connie's older brother).

     James is back living in Spearsville after 25 years as a women's basketball coach at Northwestern State University, where he became a legend. After eight seasons as top assistant coach, he was the Lady Demons' head coach for 17 years, and his teams won 340 games and played in four postseason tournaments (two NCAAs). 

      And you know he is as proud of his younger brother, as Connie is of him.

      Connie and wife Linda built a home with a Farmerville address and lived there for 35-plus years. When he turned to his second career -- as a pastor -- they moved to a home a quarter-mile from the Fellowship church.

      "I love it here," Connie said Monday when we talked by phone. "This is one of those things God just opened up for us."

---

      Here then is a story written by Brian Blackwell in July 2006 and posted online on  baptistmessage.com.:

     Wheelchair not a handicap for this pastor

     DUBACH -- Pastor Connie Smith may be confined to a wheelchair, but his congregation has never considered his disability a hindrance to their leader's ministry.

      "Since Brother Connie has been here, we don't even notice that he has a limitation," Deacon William Green said of their pastor, who was called to Fellowship Baptist Church in Dubach last month. "His good qualities outweigh that."

     Before Smith became pastor at Fellowship Baptist, Connie Ward said the congregation was struggling with transition. Since then, Fellowship Baptist and Smith have been the perfect fit for one another.

      "The people's attitude toward Connie (Smith) is what Fellowship Baptist is all about," explained Ward, pastor of Zion Hill Baptist Church in Farmerville. "To see God bring these two together has been a joy to my heart."

The Shreveport Times story, Aug. 1, 1971

     Smith's journey to Fellowship Baptist is an amazing story, indeed. If not for an accident on July 11, 1971, Smith may never have entered into the ministry.

     A former draft pick of the San Francisco Giants, Smith was spending that afternoon in 1971 with some friends at an East Texas lake before he was scheduled to report to camp in a week-and-a-half to play for the baseball team's A farm club.

     But in the blink of an eye, the Spearsville native's life changed.

     Smith attempted to skim just beneath the top of the water. However, in what Smith calls a "freakish accident," his forehead hit the bottom of the lake, three feet deep, leaving him paralyzed.

     Smith's next one-and-a-half years were spent in Denver and New Orleans hospitals and rehabilitation centers.

     Soon after he completed his rehabilitation in 1971, Smith married his high school sweetheart, Linda, and entered the workforce.

      "I couldn't have made it without Linda," Smith said. "She has been such a help to me as a spouse and pastor."

     After working as a dispatcher at the Union Parish Sheriff's Office, he moved to the Lincoln Parish Detention Center to become the control room operator. By the time, he retired from the detention center, Smith had worked himself to the position of assistant warden.

     Since he was retired, Smith devoted more time to service at Zion Hill Baptist. It was there that Smith discovered his need for Christ and, in 1995, he made a profession of faith.

     For the next eight years, Smith was an active member of the church, serving as a deacon. Eventually, his heart for Christian service led to a call to full-time ministry in 2004.

      "I had been feeling God dealing with me for some time," Smith said. "For years I had run from salvation. But I told Connie Ward that I wasn't going to run from this call to preach."

     One year later Zion Hill Baptist called Smith as its associate pastor.

      To support his call to preach, Zion Hill Baptist allowed Smith to preach monthly one Sunday there and two Sundays at other area churches. One church he preached at, Fellowship Baptist, extended a call to serve as its interim pastor in August 2005.

     For three months, Smith struggled with the decision.

     "Each day my family, which now included a God-given 15-year-old daughter, Heather Elizabeth Meredith, and I passed by Zion Hill as I was on my way to preach at Fellowship," Smith said. "It hit me that the Lord was leading me away from Zion Hill to be the pastor of Fellowship. We felt like if it was God's will, I wanted to be at the center of His will."

     In December 2005, Smith accepted the call as interim pastor. Six months later, the church called Smith as its pastor by unanimous secret ballot votes.

     "I had struggled with the possibility of 'no' votes," Smith recalled. "For my assurance that this was God's leading, I wanted there to be unity among the members.

     "When I found that 100 percent of the congregation voted to call me as pastor, it reassured me that this was the place for me to serve."

     For Smith, Fellowship Baptist has been like a second family.

     "God couldn't place me in a better situation and church," Smith said. "From the time I was here, I felt at home immediately."

---

     He is still serving today.

     "God has truly blessed me," Connie said Monday. "A lot of people died from accidents like what happened to me. I was able to work all my life, and I have not had any major health problems.

     "It was definitely a change [in lifestyle, after the accident," he said. "But it has been a blessed life."

     And the kid baseball player -- who was a player -- added this: "When spring is near, I can still feel the spring of the ball coming off the wooden bat."        

It's true: I am a tired old sports fan

      Stress has become a huge part of my sports life.
      It always was there, and people who know much about me know nervous energy -- not peace and calm -- is part of the explosive package.
      Now it has come to this. I never imagined that some day I would write: I am a tired old sports fan.
      That might surprise some because passion for athletics has defined me. Other than the love for my wife, kids and grandkids -- and, yes, friends -- sports has driven me every day in every year.
      But I'm fed up. I addressed this in a blog almost five years ago -- http://nvanthyn.blogspot.com/2012/10/stressed-out-dont-like-it.html, and now it's worse.
      In most of my blogs, I try to stay upbeat, although that is difficult when writing about Nazis and the Holocaust. I have taken my shots in some sports blogs -- hello, Jerry Jones, and goodbye forever, George M. Steinbrenner -- but mostly the focus has been positive.
      This blog isn't going to be positive.
      I can hardly stand to watch sports anymore -- in person,  on television or on computer.
---
      Stories are more difficult to read, to digest. I hardly ever look at a newspaper these days, and I can do only so much reading sports news on the screen in front of me right now.
      When I see breaking sports news, I cringe. When I watch games or events, I mostly can't stand the athletes' behavior, and I don't like their looks. I am repulsed -- really -- by most  college and pro coaches.
       I strongly believe there is so much hypocrisy in college athletics. For instance: recruiting. So overdone, overblown; kids' egos far out of control. The media and recruiting services/web sites' obsession with "verbal commitments" is part of the problem.
       Colleges "offering" scholarships before kids even qualify academically for school should be prohibited, nor should kids be allowed to sign before their senior seasons in a sport are completed. Yes, I have some radical ideas.
       College athletes are spoiled, pampered -- and no way like "normal" students. Pay them for playing? My view: A free education is pretty darned good pay.  
       Far too much money involved in all college athletics, and that's even more true in pro sports. It's so out of whack with the rest of society, it's not right.      
       Salaries, for players and coaches, are outrageous. Ticket prices? It galls me to even look at them. Public financing for stadiums, ridiculous (that's you, Arlington, Texas).
       I see people who are excited about the NFL preseason games. People, read this: biggest ripoff in sports today, period.
       For the first time, I am not looking forward to football season. Nope, not even college football.
       I used to count down the weeks until opening kickoff. Not even nervous this year. Maybe next week, I will feel the anxiety of another LSU season, another Louisiana Tech season. 
      Really, I try to avoid anything NFL. The Cowboys are just a soap opera; so many sideshows; so much Jerry Jones in our face. So much boring Jason Garrett. If QB Dakota Prescott -- with his Bossier Parish ties -- wasn't there, it would be a total wash for me. I can root for Dak.
      The violence of the game never has been appealing. And it's a violent game, no way around it. So many people relish the "big hits," but celebrating them -- as if often done -- is a poor message.
      The injuries -- concussions, threat (and reality) of paralysis, multiple surgeries for so many -- are awful. Worse: the more frequent deaths/suicides related to CTE (brain damage).
      If they never played another football game, my life would be OK. Feels strange because the sport has been so important to me for so, so long.
      No longer watch the NBA. Just as in the NFL (and college sports), it would be a lot better if the athletes did not celebrate after almost every good play they make.
      Stopped following tennis years ago, about the same time as boxing (after Ali, I did not care). Do like track and field, especially in OIympic years; same for swimming. Olympics,  as a whole, are far too commercial. 
      Never much of a car-racing fan or horse racing, but I watched and read about those sports when I was working because I needed to know enough to edit stories.
      Still like watching golf, but limit it to the majors and the tournaments I love most, on courses with which I am familiar (Colonial, right here by the apartments, and The Players Championship). And it usually takes one of the great young players on tour now to be in contention and draw my attention.
      First love, soccer, boring as it is. Love it lots more when The Netherlands' men's team is playing well. But that was one World Cup ago.

The Texas Rangers pour it on after a victory (Getty Images photo)

      Bored even by baseball, a sport I have been passionate about for 60-plus years. The games are just too darned long, the players act out too much (but not quite as much as in the NBA or NFL).
      Really can't stand the walkoff victory celebrations -- the team-jumping exercise, the pouring of Gatorade (see this week's Sports Illustrated cover -- the Dodgers), water, powder on the "hero," even if the other team made an error that allows the winning run to score. Especially don't like the pileup and the ripping off of the game shirt.
        Throwing pitches at batters or behind them, on-field skirmishes (as in Yankees-at-Tigers on Thursday): dumb and dangerous. Play the game the right way.  
      So stupid all of it. Young men acting like kids? A whole bunch of spoiled, overpaid brats.
      You really want me to go on a rant, let's go back to college football coaches. Ah, never mind. I don't have enough time or space or energy. But I am so, so tired of them especially -- our great role models.
      Just a sample, consider the scandals. Hugh Freeze and Ole Miss, North Carolina and academics, Art Briles and a rape culture, Bobby Petrino and the motorcycle mistress, (unfortunately) the late Joe Paterno. I could list dozens.
      Our son-in-law, who is host for a radio sports talk show, tweeted this a couple of weeks ago:
      "I'm so over these coaches. Butch [Jones], [Ed] Orgeron, [Brian] Kelly, [Tom] Herman ... all paranoid, self-obsessed dullards."
      I agree totally. Let me add sanctimonious and obsessive (Nick Saban), control freak (Gary Patterson), brash (Jim Harbaugh), whiner (Urban Meyer), cocky (Jim McFlorida), zany (the out-of-work but well-paid Les Miles), slightly berserk (Dabo Swinney) and unintelligible (Orgeron). 
      And at Louisville, angry-man Petrino. It is a scandal double-play when you add basketball -- Rick Pitino (a friend says that when he goes to a restaurant he orders "a table that will hold two") and his staff runs an escort service, but of course he had nothing to do with that.
      I never was much of a sports-talk show fan, be it radio or television. But I know several radio show hosts -- son-in-law and some friends -- who I respect and who know their stuff, and I am glad they're on the air.
      And I am happy for my friends and former co-workers still making a good living in the newspaper or online sportswriting business.
      When I do watch games, I seldom have the sound turned on. I will listen only to a few announcers. Mute is good. I usually can figure out what's going on.
      I have a friend who, went I told him how I'm feeling, said, "There is nothing like walking into a full college football stadium." True, if that's what you like. To me, it's a pain being in a big crowd and waiting out massive traffic jams.
      Millions of fans in all sports do like what they pay big prices to see. Good for them. I'm out.
---    
       But, but, but ... two qualifiers.
       (1) It's not that I do not care about my teams; I am just as intense a fan as ever. When they win, great (but better when they play well). When they lose, it still feels bad. It always will.
       I must remind myself: It's a game; the results are fleeting.
       (2) Because I am addicted to LSU football, and addictions are hard to break, and because I am interested in Louisiana Tech athletics, I will pay attention. I might even watch the games live on TV (when available).  
       Might watch. But I might just follow on computer. Or, as I did with LSU's early kickoff bowl game last season, I will  record the game on U-Verse and watch it later. I did that all last season with the Cowboys' games, and the Super Bowl.
       Cuts down on the stress level, and don't have to sit through the commercials.
       I don't intend to watch games in person, not for the time being. I did attend three college football games and one basketball game last season, more because I enjoyed being with friends who invited me. Hey, I even paid for one ticket.
       So, for my friends, don't even ask. And don't call to talk to me about athletics. I'll let you know when I'm ready. Until then, I am stressed and I am tired of it all.
 

Holy Cow, Harry! Cubs are in the World Series!

No one has ever seen a sign like this before ...

       "Write about the Cubs," a friend suggested in a text message late Saturday night. "Wonderful young team."
     The Cubs? C'mon. They never win. Always the Lovable Losers.
     If you know anything about baseball, if you care, you know it ain't so no more. What a great story the 2016 Chicago Cubs are.
     As we begin this Sunday morning, they are headed for the World Series. If you love baseball -- and I love it as much as anything in athletics -- you know how great this is for the game.
     Two Sundays from now, the Cubs might be World Series champions. If not them, then the Cleveland Indians will be. Again, a great story.
     Let's hear it for Ernie Banks ("Mr. Cub) and Ron Santo. Wish they  were still here to see this. They showed Billy Williams watching Saturday night's National League pennant clincher at Wrigley Field; what a magnificent Cubs player he was.
      Somewhere Ferguson Jenkins must be happy. Ryne Sandberg, too (he was at the ballpark last week). And in heaven (or otherwise), Harry Caray is yelling "Holy Cow!" Jack Brickhouse is saying, "Hey, hey." The longtime Cubs' owners -- Mr. Wrigley, Phil or Bill -- would've liked chewing  on this. 


... Or one like this.

     I am happy today for Mark Finley, Roy Lang III, John Dittrich, Dave Olson and even Cubs fan-turned-Rangers fan Keeli Pointer Garza -- my friends, all those long-suffering Cubbies fans.
     Thinking of the media friends with Chicago ties -- Jeff Rude, Joel Bierig and Phil Rogers, who have written about the Cubs (and White Sox) and tried to remain impartial publicly (but privately probably suffered with them, too).
     You are in the World Series. Your dreams have come true.
     If you know baseball, you know this hasn't happened since 1945, so unless you're older than me, not in our lifetime.
     And the Cubs haven't won the World Series since 1908 -- 108 years. Likely not in anyone's lifetime now that they can remember.
     When you consider that the Cleveland Indians haven't won a World Series since 1948 -- when I was 1 -- there's the other half of the great story. 
     For Cleveland, at least there were three American League championships since then (1954, 1995, 1997), followed by heartbreak in the Series.
     But the Cubs have been Team Heartbreak. Most years since 1945, they were terrible. And when they did come close to winning a division or a National League title -- 1969, 1984, 1989 and 2003 -- fate always dealt them a cruel ending.
     (My favorite Cubs player was Lee Smith, the large relief pitcher from Castor, La. -- he lives in Jamestown, my wife's hometown -- who was the Cubs closer for the first eight years of his MLB career. But even Lee was part of the 1984 heartbreak, giving up a crucial playoff home run.)  
       Only the Boston Red Sox were in the Cubs' league for Heartbreak. But we know -- and some of us try to forget -- that the Red Sox ended their "curse" in 2004, then to rub it in, won the World Series again in 2007 and 2013.
       The Red Sox and Cubs, of course, have this in common -- the oldest, most quaint (and, in my opinion, outdated) ballparks in Major League Baseball. OK, I'll give in: There is such charm about Fenway Park and Wrigley Field. 
       Any real baseball fan has to have made a pilgrimage to those places. Mine came in August 1975. 
       Getting to Wrigley isn't all that easy; it's stuck in the middle of an old North Chicago neighborhood -- "Wrigleyville" where finding parking is as big a challenge as, say, the Cubs winning the World Series.
       Best way to go is to ride the "L" (or is it "el) -- the train that stops right behind the right-field bleachers at Wrigley. We did that one day.
       We saw a Cubs-Cardinals single game, then a doubleheader the next day. Doesn't get much better in baseball rivalries (except maybe Yankees-Red Sox, Dodgers-Giants). St. Louis always has lots of fans at Wrigley, and most years the much better team.
       But not now. These Cubs have been built through crafty scouting, drafting and player development, some big-money free-agent signings (well, it's all big money; this is bigger money), and successful trades.
       It's a team with spectacular young talent, and enough seasoned, accomplished veterans for balance, and a daring, upbeat, new-school type baseball manager in Joe Maddon, who keeps it fun for players, fans and the media.
       This is a Cubs team that could be extremely competitive -- champions, perhaps -- for the near future.
       Even Yankees fans like me are a bit jealous of this young talent and this success. We do know what it takes and how it feels to win the World Series ... often.
       This season's mediocre Yankees, at least, can be credited with aiding both the Cubs and Indians, giving up their top relief pitchers in trade-deadline moves (Aroldis Chapman to the Cubs, Andrew Miller to the Indians). Good luck, guys.
       The Indians, too, have a good young team and deserved the AL championship. Most years they'd be the feel-good story.
       But this year, the Cubs are the sentimental favorites. They won 103 regular-season games -- eight more than any other MLB team -- and seven more in the playoffs ... with four to go.
       It was fun to see Roy Lang III -- The Shreveport Times' sports editor and traveling man in search of good stories and events, and the main Cubs' cheerleader on my Facebook news feed -- count down the number of outs they needed to clinch the pennant Saturday night. I have done a lot of those countdowns for my team.
       Part of Wrigley's charm in 1975, and from 1914 when it opened, was that it did not have lights. Only ballpark in the majors without them; the Cubs were the only team to play all its home games in the day. That changed -- for the better, I guess, in August 1988.
        Wrigley looked beautiful in the overhead TV shots Saturday night, and it was packed, and rocking.
         Roy Lang, of course, was there for this one. He's taken up residence there at Wrigley this October, between stops in Shreveport. Good for him.
        Good for the lovable Cubs and their fans. Wave that white flag with the blue "W" proudly. Soon you might have a World Series championship banner to go with it. The one from 1908 is a bit worn.
                          
                        

In Natchitoches, a macho man with a soft heart

       The calls still come in, not quite as frequently and not quite as boisterously, but once in about six weeks, I hear the familiar voice.
    "Chinaman, [blank] [blank] you," he says. "You little [blank]. Why don't you ever answer your phone? I can't ever get you. ... When are you going to come down here and see me?

Bettye and Jim Bruning, in good times

    Few have ever said Jim Bruning was subtle, or politically correct. And, yeah, you can fill in the blank-blanks.
    It has been almost three decades since he was Coach Bruning -- the head football coach at first Natchitoches, La., High School and then, after integration, Natchitoches-Central High.
    And he was a darned good football coach. He coached at those schools for 20 years -- the last 12 (1966-77) as head coach. He spent practically his whole life in Natchitoches, and those were his only coaching jobs.
    Most years, he was a big part of winning teams. But one year was special -- 1969. Natchitoches High, in its last year, won the only state championship (Class AA) in the program's history. 
    The people in that mid-sized North Louisiana city remember that. Bruning's players that year still relish it, still get together to celebrate the good times.
    Bruning was a big man in Natchitoches, and still is. More than football, what people know, what his players and ex-students know, is he was a true friend, an endearing personality.
    He was gruff and tough, an old-school disciplinarian ... and he was funny, and fun, and full of mischief.

The young couple, with baby Janyce

    He is 83 now, and his health has been -- is -- a concern. Walking is difficult and even breathing is a problem. I'll spare further details, but being in an assisted-care facility and in a hospital isn't his choice.
    It's been a lonely existence of sorts since 2009 when Bettye, the attractive dark-haired girl he married in 1956, died of breast cancer, eight years after the first diagnosis. They spent a lot of their last two decades traveling together.
    The three children -- Janyce, 59; Harryette, 55, and Jim Jr. ("Bubba" to everyone), 52 -- are long gone from Natchitoches. Two live in Texas, one relatively closeby in North Louisiana, but they check on Dad often. So do his many friends. 
    And he'll call those friends, anytime he feels like it. One of those is a retired sportswriter -- also in Texas -- who he entertains with, well, a practically one-way conversation -- Coach's hearing is almost nonexistent -- but so what?
    I'm expecting analysis of LSU football and the Northwestern State Demons in the coming weeks. Because Bruning is not shy of [blank-blank] opinions.
---
    Covering high school athletics for The Shreveport Times or Shreveport Journal in the '60s, '70s and '80s meant lots of visits to schools -- particularly in the immediate area -- and phone calls to coaches, particularly those farther from Shreveport-Bossier. 
    So I covered games involving Bruning's teams only a few times, but the first was memorable -- the 27-7 Class AA state-title victory against Tallulah at old Demon Stadium in Natchitoches in December 1969. That was at the end of my first football season as a fulltime employee at The Times. 
    I'd see Bruning and his assistant coaches scouting games, and he'd always have some clever things to say (OK, some BS), and we'd laugh. 
    But our friendship became more than writer-coach because of a story I did before the 1973 season opener. Because Jim Bruning was bold and brash in a hilarious way.
    His 1972 team had been 10-2 and shared a district championship, but the 1973 opener was a real challenge -- at Neville (Monroe).
    That was never an easy game for any visitors (and still isn't). But Neville then was the defending Class AAAA state champion and, as always, a formidable opponent.
    So I called Bruning early that week and asked how he felt about his team going to play at Neville.
    "We're going to beat their butts," he said (don't think he used "butts"). Of course, I laughed and said, "You want me to print that?"            
    "Yeah, I don't care," he replied, and then went on to say that his guys wouldn't be scared, wouldn't be intimidated, that they had a game plan to win, that Neville was just a good opponent but could be had, etc., etc.
    Disbelieving -- and laughing -- I asked again if he was sure that I could use these quotes. Sure, he said.
    Neville's coaches always loved using the "us against the world" hype to pump up their players, so this bulletin-board stuff was perfect for them.
    "Hey, next time you're down here, stop by and I'll buy you a steak," Bruning said.
    The story ran -- on a Wednesday, I think -- with the quotes, a little toned down. 
    On Friday night, Neville beat Natchitoches-Central 42-0.
    On a trip back from South Louisiana to cover a playoff game late that season, I called Bruning ... and he (and Bettye) bought me a steak dinner.
    "If you ever need a place to stay when you're coming this way, you can stay with us," Jim said. (Their new home was big enough to house his starting lineup.)
    Took him up on that -- several times. I was single and hungry, and so Bubba -- then about 10 or 11, but already bigger than me (there's a laugh) -- was my roommate.
    It was during one visit that he said, "What kind of name is that you have? Are you from China?" And, from that point, I was "Chinaman." (Who knows why? I think Dutchman would have been more accurate. But not for Jim.)
    Let's see, I think the steak or catfish dinner count is up to about a dozen. I have been reminded of this, oh, about 150 times over the years. But there is no way that Bruning would ever let me pay, even if I offered.
    Of course, I reminded of Neville, and 42-0, and butt-beating a few times.     
    And the phone calls -- when I was living in Florida, Tennessee or Texas -- always came. Coach Bruning liked talking about sports, and life.
---

The coach and his kids: Janyce, Jim Jr. ("Bubba")
and, at her wedding, Harryette 

           His children will tell you that the coach was much the same at home as in football.
    "He was pretty demanding," said Janyce Bruning Kinley, a social studies/world languages coordinator in the Bryan (Texas) school district. "He was very loving and crazy, doing stuff that drove mother crazy, like when it was snowing and the roads were icy, and he's doing donuts in the street.
    "He was the disciplinarian of the house, but also the fun one."
    On Janyce's Facebook page, a friend -- Danelle Moon -- posted this: "Your Dad wore a football helmet on the day I started driver's ed and he made a statement in front of other students, 'Well, Lusby" is driving today, looks like I'm gonna be eating my knees!' He was the best instructor ever ... and a hoot!"
    "A great daddy," said Harryette Tinsley, who lives near Arcadia, La., and teaches computer classes at Ruston High School. "He was there to support us, no matter what I did or screwed up. He was very stern, believed in right or wrong.
    "He loved my mother with all his heart. He might act rough and tough, but he had such a big heart."
    And, as Harryette noted, one of Jim's fondest wishes is that all four of the Bruning grandchildren earn their college educations.
    "Caring," said big Bubba Bruning, a tax accountant for an oil company in Humble, Texas. "He'd do anything for you, but he wanted you to learn to do things for yourself. He was a disciplinarian; he wanted you to do things right.
    "I learned to iron because of him," he added. "He wouldn't let me out of the house (for school) unless I was neatly dressed."
    Bettye and Jim loved to travel, always, so they hitched the trusty camper to Jim's truck and "they showed us much of the country," Bubba said. "Mom being a librarian (research librarian at Northwestern State, then school librarian for a dozen at Natchitoches-Central), we had to learn all that [history]."
     Son-in-law Allen Kinley, who played and coached at Woodlawn High in Shreveport, played at Northwestern and for a couple of decades has been a weight-training coach for Texas A&M athletics, said Bruning "has been like another Dad."
      When Allen met Janyce in his first week at NSU and they began dating, Coach Bruning soon pulled out the game film from a Natchitoches-Woodlawn game and checked out Woodlawn's No. 84 at linebacker, "and then he called [Woodlawn principal] Bubba Cook" for a scouting report.
      He received approval. "If I had not gotten along with him," Kinley said, "I don't think his daughter would have stayed.
      "He's been very accepting of me. He gave me a hard time about being from Woodlawn, but we've always had mutual respect from the beginning."
      Kinley said that he "amazed that every time we visit, there are a lot of his ex-players there to visit with him."
      And even in the assisted-living facility and the hospital, Janyce said, "He's very social. The more people around, the more he likes it.
      "He cares about people. He'll tease them, get on them about their bad habits, and so on, but he has a bigger-than-life personality.
       "At the hospital, a nurse asked him, 'Is there anyone in town who doesn't know you?' "
---
    James Lindwind Bruning grew up in Clarence, a village seven miles east of Natchitoches. He was known there as "Sonny" and he grew tall and slim, and was a talented athlete -- especially in baseball, and good enough in football at Natchitoches High in about 1950 to earn a scholarship to LSU.
    But when LSU wanted him to redshirt as a freshman, after about a week he went home to Natchitoches -- and to Northwestern State. He lettered as an end in 1952, but messed around in school and ended up in the U.S. Army and a stint mostly served in Germany.
    He came home, back to Northwestern, and Bettye -- engaged to someone else -- soon was his wife. He lettered for the Demons in 1955-56-57, and his field goal to beat McNeese State 23-20 in 1957 helped coach Jack Clayton's first NSC team share a conference championship.
    The next year, with the Bruning family growing, Jim joined the coaching staff of his own coach, Trent Melder, at Natchitoches High. He was there to stay.
    In 1958 and '59, the Red Devils were district champs, with a 10-0 regular season in '59 but a state semifinals loss. In 1960, a 9-1 record wasn't enough to make the playoffs (only the district champ qualified then).
    Then came a decline, and Melder stepped out of coaching after the 1965 season. Bruning took over the program, and the first year was rough -- a 2-8 record.
    But he was building discipline, and a stable, loyal coaching staff, and what followed was six playoff years in succession -- records of 9-2, 9-3-1, 14-0, 9-3, 8-3, 10-2.
    After four district titles (or shares) in six years, Bruning's last five seasons of coaching were so-so. Still, he got out -- into a decade of work for an oil distributor in town -- with an 80-50-3 record over a dozen seasons ... and a lot of respect.
---
    The 1969 Natchitoches High team produced a magical, once-in-a-lifetime season.
    Led by a talented backfield -- All-State quarterback Gene Knecht Jr., tailback Rand Dennis and junior fullback Jim Knecht -- that was as big as the Red Devils' linemen, the team survived a close call in the season opener (7-6 vs. Mansfield), routed its next seven opponents (scoring 28 to 42 points each time), then survived five close games in a row (its first three playoff games) before dominating the state-title game.
    Gene Knecht made All-State; so did center Steve McCain (also the next season), linebacker Ricky Whittington and defensive back Joe Beck Payne. 
    Dennis and Jim Knecht went on to play at LSU; Gene Knecht also signed with LSU, but after a year there, transferred to NSU, which Gene Knecht Sr. was the longtime defensive backs coach.
    Bruning was selected Class AA "Coach of the Year."
    "He was an exceptional coach," said Jim Knecht. "A good motivator. He motivated you to go beyond what you thought you could do.
    "He expected you to do your best. If you didn't, he'd let you know. He got the best out of his players."
    Dennis said Bruning was "a figurehead type head coach" who let his assistants handle the details, such as Levi Thompson devising different offensive schemes each week.
    "We had kids who had brains," said Jim Knecht, "... who were smart, fast and strong. We lined up in slots and trips (formations); no other teams had seen those then."
    "We had good players across the board," said Dennis.
    "Smartest group of kids I ever coached," said Dan Poole, for a decade the school's defensive backs and track/field coach until -- in his words -- he was "demoted" to school principal. "It was the whole team, and they were also very competitive, adjusted to changes very quickly."
    And he credits Bruning for this: "I don't know how he could read the kids so well. We had kids who didn't look very good in practice, but Jim would play them. He knew which ones would come through in critical situations; he would pick the right ones. He was just great at picking personnel.
    "He grew up here, so he knew the families and the kids."
    The connection started early. Stuart Wright, Natchitoches-Central's starting quarterback for three seasons (1970-72) and as a freshman the backup to Gene Knecht in 1969, remembers that "what made a difference in our program (in high school) was that he was at every one of our junior high games. He knew us better than we knew him."
---
   His kids, and his players, will tell you: Coach Bruning kept up with everyone.
   "The main thing I remember," said Wright, "is he'd get on your case in a heartbreak; he got on everyone. But he was a really genuine great guy. His bark was a lot worse than his bite. He really loved the kids through the years. He's been like a second father to all of us."
   Same from Jim Knecht: "He's a guy who was almost like a father. He's kept up with all of us; showed true interest in our lives. He really cares, and that makes a difference."
   Wright is an attorney in Natchitoches and was first assistant district attorney in Natchitoches Parish. Knecht has been a family medicine doctor for 30-plus years in Natchitoches, and a team physician for Northwestern State and Natchitoches-Central's football teams for decades.
   "He really cared about his players; he would do anything to help them in their lives," added daughter Harryette.
   "What we remember is he always had such a gruff exterior," said Rand Dennis, for 35 years a litigation attorney in Baton Rouge and now living in San Antonio. "He would bark at you, but you know there'd be a smile right behind that."
    Knecht and Dennis played together at LSU in the early 1970s, giving Natchitoches half of the Tigers' starting defensive backs -- a proud Coach Bruning watching them often.
    What the players also knew was that their coach's concern covered more than football.
    "If we were playing hooky from school," recalled Dennis, "he'd come out in town and find us. He'd watch out for us."
    "I remember him many nights calling parents to check on the players, make sure they were home," recalled daughter Janyce. "Same on the weekends. And if they weren't home, he went into town to find them."
    Wright, who often has treated the coach to meals in recent years said Jim's memory " is better than mine. He remembers games, and people. You go in and he recognizes you immediately."
    He credits Bruning's influence for helping pave a smooth transition in a rough period when court-ordered integration forced the merger of practically all-white Natchitoches High and all-black Central High in 1970.
---
    The new school emerged on the west side of town on the Highway 1 bypass. The old Natchitoches High, located on the Northwestern State campus along University Parkway, became the Louisiana School for Math, Science and the Arts.
    With that in mind, Bruning felt as if the 1969 state championship trophy belonged to old Natchitoches High and the team players. For years, that trophy sat in the Bruning home, in the large recreation room/den; I kidded him about it often. Later, it began being rotated among the players. Word is that John Williams, in Tyler, has it now.
    That '69 team, with some from preceding and succeeding classes, reunites every June for an outing at nearby Toledo Bend.
    "It's been a wonderful thing," said Dennis, saying that while he was able Bruning brought crawfish to the Friday night gathering. "He thinks of us as his boys, and we like that he does. It's been rewarding."
    The 1978 Natchitoches-Central yearbook includes a copy of a letter written on behalf of Bruning's players in his final season of coaching. Harryette provided it, it is entitled "Coach" and it reads:
    "In the past years the senior football players have given our head coach an award. This year's award, which represents our love, respect and admiration, has been, and is, much more meaningful because we are coach's last group of seniors.
    "Coach Bruning's overall record speaks for itself; however, no won or loss record can ever reveal the success that this man has had in the growth and development of young men. Records are for statisticians or spectators and never can be used to judge the value of a man. No won or loss record can ever picture the father image of Coach Bruning. Prints are just numbers on a scoreboard and are short-lived, whereas Coach Bruning's image of a man will live with us forever.
    " 'Macho' is a Spanish word meaning 'all man.' Until eternity, we seniors will remember you as our coach who was, and is, 'macho.' "
    My friend, macho.
    I am waiting for the next call, the next blank-blank politically incorrect opinion ... and the next steak dinner.   
        
 
         
         
         
    

In today's world, it's all about ... me, me, me

     Watching and listening to today's politicians is about the only thing more difficult than observing today's athletes.

Personally, I don't care what Cam Newton says or doesn't say ... win or
 lose. But the media gives him a lot of attention (photo from nfl.com)

     I have written -- and railed -- about this previously. It came to mind again after  Super Bowl 50.
     Cam Newton's lack of humility, his showoffness (how's that for coining a word?), his outrageous celebrations, and then his postgame petulance -- pouting, sulking, whatever -- is too much. But even the sainted Peyton Manning sank to the occasion afterward. I mean ... what's the deal with repeatedly telling us he was going to drink a lot of beer, a lot of Budweiser?
     Really, I didn't want to hear that.
     But I'm not here to pick on Cam Newton. There's been enough of that, and I'm not piling on. He's a wonderful athlete and when, a day later, he explained that his brief, moody postgame session with the media was because he is a "sore loser," I can identify with that.
     My old friends from Shreveport can vouch that I've long had that trait. And I'm not apologizing.
     Sure, Cam could have been more accommodating for the media. But -- this is a sign of being an old ex-media person -- I no longer pay attention to what coaches and/or athletes have to say. It's all BS to me now.
     I have friends who write about the NFL and deal with the athletes, and I'm happy for them because they love it and it keeps them employed. But ...
     There is a reason I haven't watched an NFL game live in 2 1/2 seasons. Can't stand the on-the-field behavior; can't stand the off-the-field crap. If this sounds as if I've written it previously, I have.
     I did record some games a year ago when the Cowboys had a contending team, and watched them late at night -- sometimes knowing the result, sometimes not. But the past season's Cowboys were a lost cause; didn't record the games, didn't listen to the radio play-by-play.
     If I never see another interview with the Cowboys' owner/(ha) general manager, that's OK.
     Last NFL game I watched live, it actually was a matchup of the Super Bowl 50 teams -- Panthers vs. Broncos. But this was the 2013 season and in the first five minutes, two players -- a Denver cornerback and a Carolina receiver -- had three fights. With that, I turned off the TV and I haven't been back to live action.
     Still haven't seen Odell Beckham Jr.'s ugly incident vs. the Panthers this past season -- and don't want to.
     Confession: I did record this Super Bowl and -- not knowing the result -- watched it starting at about 11:30 that night. Only reason is I wanted to see how Peyton Manning did. Fine. Glad he went out a winner. But those beer comments afterward?
     But this is not just about the NFL. Take just about any sport, and athletes are acting out. Tennis stars are screaming after winning points; pitchers are screaming after key strikeouts; bats are being flipped after home runs; basketball players pose after thunderous dunks; a college basketball player I watched two weeks ago hit a hot streak and, after his third 3-pointer in about a minute, strutted around like a peacock.
     Even golf, in my opinion the most genteel of the major sports, has its characters that I am sure fellow competitors find hard to tolerate. (Hello, the former Tiger Woods and Kevin Na.)
     The on-field celebrations by baseball teams are ridiculous, especially for "walkoff" victories; so is the pouring of the Gatorade/water coolers on the players being interviewed, and bless the media people that are doused as they do the interview.
     (The always cutting-up Texas Rangers' shortstop who loves doing this and soaked the woman interviewer early last season should worry more about his defense in the decisive playoff game that ended his team's season.)
     The championship celebrations, with the champagne and the goggles, are off-limits on my television. Hey, win the World Series ... and then go for it. The Kansas City Royals deserved it.
     Love seeing the old stars -- for instance, Bill Russell (NBA) -- be part of the title-trophy presentations. But that's for nostalgia's sake, and I like nostalgia.
---
     Yes, I'm sounds like a bitter old man who has seen better days. My view: sportsmanship and humility are dormant; brashness and ugliness are in.
     Nowhere is that more true than in this Presidential campaign. Politics -- the "sport of politics" are you hear so often (I heard it on the nightly news just a week ago) -- has become name-calling and trash-talking. It is absolutely worse than ever, and I am sick of it ... with nine months before we vote. Heaven help us.
     But back to athletics. Used to be, many years ago, that you never "showed up" opponents. It was taboo. Athletes were acted out, or were all about themselves, were considered "hot dogs." Now there are so many hot dogs, there is not enough relish and mustard in the Western Hemisphere to cover them all. We'll have to borrow from China.
     My wife says that my view of athletics, and today's athletes, and the way I react to them is a personal problem. Maybe. So I checked with some friends, and some feel the same way. But it's not a problem for some. They feel it's a generational gap; the older you are, the more you resent athletes acting out.
     And then I think, we had athletes in the 1960s and '70s who were pretty darned confident, pretty brash. Muhammad Ali set the standard; he was "The Greatest" at trash talking. Joe Namath. Thomas "Hollywood" Henderson. Elmo Wright, at the University of Houston in the late 1960s, started the touchdown-dance revolution. Mark Gastineau was the NFL's first "sack dancer" in the mid-1980s. Darryl Dawkins and others began tearing down backboards with thunder dunks in the NBA.
     Now many more athletes than not have their own "celebration" moves. Yeah, there are now rules in place against "taunting" the opponent ... but it still happens.
     An example: Some of my favorite basketball players -- Wesley Matthews, Chandler Parsons and even the great Dirk Nowitzki, all of the Dallas Mavericks -- let the world know whenever they pump in a big 3-point shot.
     Not much I resent more than watching an LSU wide receiver signal first down after his catch or an LSU defensive back wave his arms after a pass breakup ... and LSU is behind by 20 points at the time. That's really awful. I have complained about that before.
     Today's world in sports and politics (and other areas): Look at me, me, me. A friend says that's what Facebook is about.
---
     But here is a disclaimer. Look at this blog: A lot of it is about ... me. It's about my family, my opinions, things that interest me (and hopefully the readers). I try to put my spin on it. I have had people, friends, make suggestions for blog  pieces -- good suggestions -- and I told them I didn't want to do those because I don't have a personal connection.
     Truth is, I could not, would not have done this blog until I retired as a full-time newspaper journalist. But the time to begin, at my wife's urging, was right four years ago.
     So as I was thinking of writing this piece, I was reading the book The Time of Our Lives by political analyst Peggy Noonan -- one of President Ronald Reagan's main speechwriters in the 1980s -- and came across a segment of her writing about her son's eighth-grade confirmation class in the Catholic Church in 2001.
     She writes how much she loved some of those children, how kindhearted and brave and "deep inside good" they are. But then she writes:
    "Some are victims of the self-esteem movement. They have a wholly unearned self-respect. No, an unearned admiration for themselves. And they have been given this high sense of themselves by parents and teachers who didn't and don't have time for them and who make it up to them by making them conceited. I'm not sure how this will play out at they hit adulthood. What will happen to them when the world stops telling them what they have been told every day for the first quarter century of their lives, which is: You are wonderful."
    All about me, even in an eighth-grade Catholic confirmation class.
    Makes me think of Cam Newton. Even more, it makes me think of college football's National Signing Day. I think that college football recruiting -- maybe more than anything -- is overblown, overpublicized. This is a blog topic to itself, but the glorification of these young men is magnified so greatly on that day.
    It is such a spectacle, and this year one recruit took to skydiving to reveal his college choice (Ole Miss). What next?
    My opinion -- and it's in the great minority -- is to do away with National Signing Day for football. Instead let's have a National Signing Day for kids signing scholarships for real educational subjects.
    I digress. Back to Cam Newton. The other side, as a friend pointed out, is that the pouting Super Bowl-losing QB has -- and I looked this up -- three times in the past year or two done something really special for young men stricken by cancer.
    Another point: When Peyton Manning was the losing Super Bowl QB with the Colts, he walked off the field and did not congratulate any players from the Saints (the team in his hometown). So consider that.
    Finally, I saw a wonderful moment a few weeks ago when Dirk Nowitzki made the game-winning basket against the Los Angeles Lakers and, after he shot, wound up right in front of Kobe Bryant (injured and not dressed out) on the Lakers' bench. Kobe tapped Dirk on the behind in a sign of congratulations, and Dirk turned and tapped Kobe on the shoulder -- mutual respect from two of the NBA's biggest current stars.
    That's the kind of sportsmanship that still plays well. Nice to see. I'm not bitter about that.