Disheartening memories from MHS Tigers' past

RIP "Butch"

People my age can remember certain of our peers "getting caught drinking" and thus having to step aside from sports. No one would much care about this indiscretion if you were a non-athlete. Sometimes it wasn't just athletes that were caught, my goodness it was the "star" athletes.

So, did our Morris have this happen more often than the typical school through the '60s and into the '70s some? I was in school through 1973. We were made very aware of the custom of alcohol consumption. It was such a no-no for us. It seemed rather the opposite for many of our parents. Naturally the young people of the time came to associate "booze" with being "mature." How could we not? 

So many members of the "greatest generation" from WWII would gravitate to bars on weekends. They'd come home in an impaired state. The clamp-down on DWI had not yet started. An erratic driver late at night might have an officer come up to the window and say "are you sure you're in good enough shape to get home?" Today's young people might be incredulous about this. 

But our culture can change in substantial ways over time. "Social drinking" was once quite the thing. Not long ago I heard some commentary on the Natalie Wood incident where she fell off the boat and died of course. Off Catalina Island. What wayward habits these people developed. It was observed that her party had been sloshing down the alcohol. Just to give the cultural context, a commentator said "that's what people did back then." 

And I was 18 years old when Minnesota lowered the age for alcohol consumption to 18. I had my first drink at a place called the "Broken Wheel" in Detroit Lakes. These places would have live bands. We might remember that virtually all of these bands played the Doobie Brothers' "Long Train Runnin' ". 

And what did we get out of all that, my generation? Nothing. It was totally regressive and even dangerous behavior. Society felt 18 year olds had been drafted to fight in Vietnam. Ah, two wrongs do not make a right. So much dysfunction in our lives then, the opposite of today where health and safety have the highest standards. Let's omit the subject of smoking for now. 

I am prompted to think about all this because of an obituary that recently appeared in our Morris media. It was for a fellow who had been a sports standout here. He was a standout during yours truly's junior high years when I became a "fan" of the high school teams. I was enough of a fan to sign up for the bus to Fergus Falls for the season-ending tournament games. 

It broke our hearts when a prime athlete would get suspended, when he'd get "busted" for drinking. 

Seems strange to think back on this now. 

Punishment is supposed to bring some sense of shame. Shame that would help the kid get turned around. But my goodness, with alcohol associated so strongly with adult life and adults' sense of "propriety," how could the misbehaving kids feel shame? I'm sure they didn't. I doubt they even missed their time on the basketball court. More than ever I think they felt like "big men on campus." They knew they'd be missed competitively speaking. Made then thump their chest even more I think. Now their talents would truly be appreciated. 

Meanwhile the team would have to "make do" and more than likely struggle to a degree. And what fun was that for anyone? 

 

Accountability

The problem wasn't with the misbehaving kids, it was with our societal norms that had "booze" associated with adulthood. But instead of accepting blame for this type of standard, society tried to make underage kids feel terrible if they wanted to experiment with the behavior that the adults bathed in. Bring up the subject of drinking in any way, shape or form and you'd surely induce smiles, right? Guaranteed. 

Comedians made hay out of this. Remember the image of Dean Martin? Legend had it Martin would circulate at cocktail parties with his glass of booze-appearing refreshment but it was actually apple juice. He needed to take care of himself to stay on top in his entertainment profession. 

The recent obituary was for a guy who was one of those natural talents in sports. Great on the basketball court even though he was not tall. I remember vividly his first night back after his suspension. I actually felt a jolt of resentment toward him. I thought it as so totally unnecessary for a young person to risk getting kicked out of sports for such a stupid reason. 

Let me add with emphasis that I can remember at least two other prominent Morris athletes in later years who got sidelined. I remember in both these cases the game in which they came back. And my the kids cheered. They cheered as if those kids were heroes. 

Morris legend has it - I emphasize this is mere legend - that an athlete caught a break once when having to deal with law enforcement because of - ahem - his father being a prominent local banker. Oh my we hearken back to the days when the local bank presidents in our outstate communities were bigger than life, icons. The public sensed these individuals could throw their weight around. The son of the bank president of whom I write was one year older than me and was a good guy, not self-important or anything like that. 

Did he catch a break? Stuff of speculation. That's quite beside the point of what I'm writing about here. My thesis here is that society was errant in how it 1) gravitated to social drinking in the first place, and 2) decided we needed "punishment" for kids who felt they needed to sample the forbidden stuff. 

IMHO you couldn't blame the kids at all, their curiosity. And the suspension of star athletes for the supposedly "egregious" behavior of having some booze was terrible. It was demoralizing for all the kids. It was counterproductive. Hey it was stupid! 

But in a time when our government felt it had to fight the Vietnam war, well I guess "stupid" could be the status quo, pilgrims. Here's a toast to our present-day values. Now we'll see if Donald Trump leads us to the promised land. We have to root for him, would be folly to root for the contrary. I have doubts but am ready to just stop discussing politics. Good luck, all.

 

To further elaborate

The recent obituary for Paul "Butch" Ersted got me sharing a recollection or two with a friend who graduated two years before me at MHS. He had all the same memories. He was able to flesh out some in an email he sent to me. Let history be clear on all this! To quote:

 

In addition to Butch being suspended from basketball that year, Rick Lucken was also included in that. Was Steve Loge? I can’t remember. All I know is that the only senior we had left was Mike Schroeder, who was good but couldn’t carry the team. If I remember correctly, that team was supposed to go well into the post-season, but . . . I was at the last game that year (maybe the first playoff at UMM?) and remember Mike fouling out and sitting down with a towel draped over his head. When Scott Groth and another classmate were suspended for the same reason the spring of ’71, Scott and the other guy weren’t allowed to be in band because Wally [Behm] considered band an “extra-curricular” and not a regular class, even though we got credit for it. John Woell protested as those 2 were pretty “instrumental” in our band’s large and small group contest participation that spring, but to no avail.

 

- Brian Williams - morris mn minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com