EAST FAREWELL
NEWS
Thursday, January
16, 1958 Vol. C655
LOCAL
NEWS
MASSIVE SNOWBALL FIGHT ENGAGES
WHOLE TOWN
East Farewell – It is rare that the Regional Schools are closed
for a snow day but a huge snowfall on Sunday night paralyzed all traffic
including the school busses Monday morning. Some students still walk to school
but a large number now ride the bus and they were not going to make it to
school on Monday. At 6:30AM Principal Donnelly decided to call the day off for
the entire district. Announcement went out to local radio station WEFL and was
broadcast every ten minutes along with the other area schools that had closed.
Slate Mountain, Fort Lee and Cedar Creek all were cancelled. The alert system
has not been used in four years and no one was sure if it would work, but it
did and it seemed that everyone got the message because the schools were empty.
The schools were empty but the town was not. While many of the high school
students took shovels in hand and tried to earn a little spending money by
shoveling the sidewalks, many others spent the day on their skies and sleds.
About midday on the Lakefront Plaza a group of skaters and snow sculpture
builders started a “friendly” snowball fight. Snow was tossed willy-nilly at
first but then escalated into a full blown snow ball battle. The snow sculpture
kids went on the offensive and the ice skaters tried to out flank them and the
fight spread out down Main Street. Soon the battle had spread up Main Street
and down Lake Shore Drive. Even some of the shopkeepers became involved. Since
business was extremely slow they came out their front doors and joined in the
insanity. “It was all in good fun,” said shop owner Bill Swan, “The
kids were laughing and running all over the place. When they ran by my
front door I looked around and since there was no one in the shop I ran out and
joined in. They were all kind of surprised but they just laughed and started
throwing at me and me at them.”
Most people
took the tomfoolery in stride there were some curmudgeons that were not amused.
“Those hooligans were causing a lot a trouble right on Main Street. If there
were any cars or trolleys they could have been hurt. They were noisy and
boisterous, why they were laughing and shouting so loud I had to close my front
door so I could get some peace,” complained Geraldine Decatur who owns Sew
What, a needle and thread shop on Main.
The snowball
fight played itself out as the participants tried themselves out and returned
to the Lakefront Plaza laughing and slapping each other on their backs. There
was no damage and the police seemed to be content to let the children play
partly because their cars were snowed in and the couple of beat policemen were
keeping an eye on the whole shenanigans.
The Great
Snowball Fight of 1958
SPORTS
HAWKS CLAW COUGARS – McGILL HURT
East Farewell – On Friday night before the snowstorm the
Southport Hawks came into the Regional Gymnasium as the League leading team and
left the same way. The Hawks were able to fly out of the gym with a 50-46 win
and the Cougars wondering how they were going to stop them at their next
meeting. The evening game was sold out and both Cougar fans and Hawks fans
filled the gym. The Hawks started off quickly with a 8-0 run right after tip
off. The Cougars were finally able to get going and tie things up at 14. Cougar’s
center, Dave McGill started out strong matching up against Hawks center, Mike
Reilly, one for one but at the end of the first half turned his ankle coming
down with a rebound and had to leave the game. After the game Coach Wilson said
that luckily nothing was broken and McGill might be ready to play next week or
the week after that. Sophomore, James Hawkins took McGill’s place but struggled
against the experience of the Hawk senior, Reilly.
Without McGill
the Cougar’s backcourt tried to pick up the slack but the Hawks were able to
contain both Fox and Conner. This left the Cougars forwards to try to make a
difference. Both Tasker and Mitchell played very strong games taking a lot of
the pressure off Hawkins. Tasker was able to really run the court and direct
the offense while Mitchell helped Hawkins on the defensive side. Together they
were able to contain Reilly in the second half.
Even with the
adjustments the Cougars were coming up short. The Hawks were just too strong
and their experience was evident as they broke down the Cougar’s press and ran
up a 42-32 lead in the third quarter. The Cougars were able to regroup and
battle back and take a slim lead, 44-42 with three minutes left. Unfortunately,
Mitchell fouled out with 2:20 left and Reilly was able to take command of the
center again and force Hawkins into a fourth foul with 1:30 left. Coach Wilson left
Hawkins in but Reilly was able to score the last six points almost unguarded.
“We had a tough
night, with the loss of Davey, we tried to rally and young Jamie, he tried like
heck but he is still young, he will be good but he is still learning. The other
guys did a really good job but it wasn’t good enough. You can’t expect to beat
the Hawks if you aren’t running on all cylinders,” said Coach Wilson after the
game.
The schedule
does not get any easier for the Cougars next week as they travel up to Slate
Mountain to take on the Miners, the south side of the mountain team. The Miners
are also at the top the league standings and will give the Cougars all they
could ask for. The game begins at 7:30PM in the Slate Mountain Municipal Arena.
NATIONAL NEWS
CONGRESS OPENS, IKE ASK FOR MISSILE MONEY –
KWK RADIO BREAKS ROCK & ROLL –WEST WINS PRO-BOWL
Congress opens and almost immediately,
President Eisenhower asks for an extra $1.26 billion this year for missile
development, additional government, scientists and defense of strategic Air
Command bases.
Radio station KWK St. Louis will play
each rock record in its library once - then break it with a sharp snap clearly
audible to the listeners. The supply is expected to be exhausted in a week.
Robert Convey, KWK president who gave the order after conferring with his DJ’s,
said they were in agreement that rock ‘n’ roll “has dominated the music field long
enough.”
Football News - The West beats the East
in the Pro-Bowl 26-7.
Many, many
thanks to www.mrpopculture.com for
contributing to this section of the East Farewell News.
