Well, I guess it is a labor of, maybe I'm a little bit too sentimental in many ways, but I spent a lot of time at that park growing up back in the 50s and the 60s and played a lot of baseball.
on the old diamond that used to be there.
I guess a couple of years ago when I was home visiting my mom and my sister, I had happened to stop at the park, and I've done that before as well, but I walked out to where center field used to be.
That's where I played an awful lot of ball.
And I just got to, you know, trying to visualize what the old diamond used to look like and kind of wondering, okay, now where was home plate originally there?
And so that kind of got me started to look at finding out exactly where that was located.
So I started looking for pictures, any old pictures I could find and even my mom's old home movies.
She has one set of movies that was taken from a family reunion back in the mid-50s when we were up at the old park and having a big picnic and playing softball.
on the West Diamond, but there were pictures there of the city team warming up on the baseball diamond behind us there.
So I got to look at that and I found some other pictures, but I could never really place where home plate was.
And so it kind of became a little bit of a struggle for me to figure out exactly where it was.
And then I got to thinking, you know, if I can't find it, there are a lot of other people
who probably don't remember anything about that ballpark, especially the younger generations.
And I thought, you know, that's kind of a shame because it plays such a big role in the lives of a lot of us who grew up in Richardson Center, you know, playing ball there and swimming and doing all kinds of other things at that park.
So I got to thinking, well, I know Pat Elliott, you know, and I knew Pat was a part of the park board.
I got a hold of Pat and I said, Pat, what do you think people might say if I tried to get some type of a memorial established here near where home plate might have been just in commemorating the old park?
I wanted to do something for the park and for the city and for the guys, all the guys that played ball there over the decades.
And Pat said, you know, that sounds like a pretty good idea.
So we tried to still determine where home plate was, and we kind of came to the conclusion that it must be in that parking lot, the west part of the parking lot, at the community center that was there.
So there was no way that we could put something right there where it had been located.
So I thought, well, how about a memorial stone just off the edge of the parking lot?
And Pat said, you know, that might be something.
He took it to the board and they said, yeah, that would be kind of neat thing to do.
But then the public works people had to approve it too.
And as it turned out, some of the provisions and things that they have to follow, the public works people said, no, we can't do it like that.
So I said, fine.
And I almost gave up on the idea.
except for the fact that they had said that they were in the process of building dugouts on the softball diamonds, and maybe we could put something up there on the edge of one of those to commemorate it.
And I said, no, I didn't think that that was appropriate for what I wanted to do.
And so it kind of gave up on the idea for a while.
And then this spring I got to thinking, you know,
What if we just did a plaque and put it out of pole?
I guess what happened was I saw the dedication to Governor Thompson, I guess it was at the park.
And I think they have something there that's pretty nice for him.
And I said, could I do something and put it on a post or something near that?
And they said, well, we could think about that a little bit.
And as it turns out, they eventually approved me to do a plaque that would have to be attached to something that was already there.
And so that was Dr. Meyer's building that's there.
And they restricted the size of it, which was fine, so 18 by 24.
And so then I went ahead and I contacted some people here in Nina.
And we talked quite a bit about how this could be done.
And at first I know that back in center they were talking about maybe just some type of a plastic type of thing.
And I said, no, I want something that's going to last a long time.
And so I have a bronze plaque made up.
And we're going to try to dedicate it on Friday.
Well, there are all kinds of them.
The more I set out there and sent a few of that one day and thought about things, the more memories that came back to me.
I can remember...
running into the old light poles out there chasing a fly ball once and I thought I broke my ribs.
And I can remember playing city ball there besides legion ball and high school ball, intermediate ball.
They're just all kinds of memories, just playing with guys.
I think one of the neatest things was that when I was a freshman, Russell Gald and I had just finished practice down on the
West Diamond, and we came up by the varsity who were practicing on the baseball diamond.
And we were just taking a drink from the old fountain there.
And Mr. Wheelock said, how do you guys want to be on the varsity team, too?
Russ and I said, oh, yeah, we will.
Well, we ended up kind of being more managers.
And we got to play a little bit.
But you have to remember, that was the team that went to state in 63 with some very good ball players.
Vern Geysert was a part of that, Lance Meyers, Gerald Hoskins, Tom Beatty, Monnie Slapack, I'm thinking Gary Patch and Bunny Fowler, all great ballplayers and great role models for guys like us.
Yeah, they're lots of good memories.
Bob?
We're going to do it at about 11 o'clock.
You know, I know that, you know, 9-11 is a very special day for our whole nation and 25 years since that awful morning.
But just going to maybe add one positive type of remembrance to this day.
besides remembering what happened then.
Well, it's called Our Field of Dreams.
That's the title on it.
And I have a home plate on it.
And within the home plate, there's a dedication to all the boys and men who have played baseball on that field over the years.
And then I wrote a little poem that went along with it.
It's over on the side.
So I think I won't tell you what that says.
Maybe they'll draw some people to come in and take a look at it.
Thank you.
Thank you, Phil.
And thanks for all you do for our community, too.
I know I've been up here since 1972.
You know, this is my home up here now, but, uh, uh, really recent center will always be my home, no matter where I've gone, where I've, where I take myself in my life.
Uh, it, uh, I can't think of a better place to have grown up, uh, as a kid.
So thank you.
a good time period.
We talk about it all the time, but things were good back then.
You know, we look back now, and we can ask our parents, but then for our children also.
Those were good years, now that we look back on them.
that.
Completely, and people say, oh, that must be tough, because we're now in, we're hitting 250 for the episodes that are being taped.
In fact, I'd ask you this question, here's a simple one, because as we reminisce, if we were saying it in Richland County, would we say
Crick, C-R-I-C-K, or would we say Creek, C-R-E-A-K?
Is it Crick or Creek?
Well, I
Crick.
Well, and I'm there as well.
And we have so many, you know, bodies of water.
That'll be a history moment, by the way, if you want to go and check it out.
But when we talk about that, that's the little things because it's down by the crick.
Yeah, exactly.
Still the same body of water, though.
Lots of things that we've talked about through the years that young people today have no idea because they've got a phone instantly in their hands.
We all do.
We all do.
Not just young people, but back in the day when you had to make an appointment, basically, to make a phone call because there were other people on your line.
Were you on a party line?
Oh, absolutely.
And at one time, I was counting this the other day, there were like six families at one time.
Was
that up the valley then or was there a certain, so for our party line, it was in the neighborhood.
So we had four.
And then there was another party line just down the, and you'd pick it up and somebody'd be on the phone and you
So from our house, and then they went to Aubrey Corners, there was at least one person on there.
It went over to Huffman Lane, 58, and then people up Huffman Lane.
two or three houses up that way, and then there was just across the creek from us, and they were on there as well.
So yeah, if you had to make a call to get a date for a girl or something, other people could be listening.
Well, mine was, and it happened with my daughter, and it was 10 years ago, but went to make a phone call, and we were at a location that had a rotary dial phone.
And my daughter picks up the phone.
She goes, Dad, what is this?
I said, it's a telephone.
You can make a call on it.
What do I do?
I said, put your finger in and just turn it clockwise as far as you can go until it stops and leave it go.
And the first time she did it, she squealed because you know how it gives that little kick back as it comes.
If you haven't used one before, that's really, and then do you remember if it was a rotary dial, there was the phone that sat with a handle, but then they had the one that was kind of a compact model.
It was a little bit more modern that you pick it up and it was right inside between the airpieces.
Sure,
was there.
And for someone that's never used it before and tell me it isn't true and you're dealing it now with your grandchildren.
but telling time digitally?
And what time is it?
And is it a quarter past or 15 minutes to?
Or is it military time?
You know, the clock
Oh, yeah.
Little things like that we lose sight of because analog, everything's there for us.
And I've even said when I'm subbing, I'll say to the kids, it's supposed to download at 1230, but it will probably download at 1233 because you get that little, you know, rodent in the wheel that's turning, turning, turning, turning and it finally kicks in.
Well, and what they don't know here at WRCO, having four lines coming in and it lights up, that's something different.
I mean, you don't have that with a cell phone.
You'll hear a beep and you can take another call.
And that's what amazes me because I'm not that techno savvy that you can check out things in your phone just a second or you can photo.
shoot it and do a message or a picture, that's way beyond me right now.
I had friends say, when I got a cell phone and then I started texting, they were fearing that the world would come to an end because Mr. Thede is actually texting people.
The first texting I had was I had a flip phone, one of the initial ones, and you had to hit the uppercase, and then you had to figure it out.
You hit the numbers.
It was actually hot and packed.
It really was.
It was hard work, that's for sure.
And then going back to television, you and I both grew up with television.
And when I was very young, we had just the VHF antenna.
So we had channel three or channel eight out of the cross.
Out of
the cross came you.
On a good day.
But that was only CBS.
And people would talk about, oh, you know, these other cool shows that we couldn't get.
So finally, finally, dad, we convinced him to get another antenna.
And we were able to get Madison.
But on a good night, you know, he had to go up on the roof and actually turn the antenna sometimes.
Well,
we did that.
And as soon as we left, go over the antenna, we lost the reception because that gave it a little bit extra.
So I actually had a sister that said, would you stand up there and hold it while we watch the show?
But that.
Oh, did you have a rotary box where you could rotate it to get a better reception on the rotary
Because we had, down by the river, live along Highway 60, KBT didn't come in as well because that was north of the hills.
But we could draw in some Iowa stations, depending on the weather and in the cloud cover.
And I know I've even called in to you and I've been nearly to Stephen's point, but because obviously the connections were still there, we had good reception.
to get that rotary box to rotate it just right so we could bring it in.
So you watched primarily Channel 3 and CBS, but did you have those shows that you went to?
They were the go-to shows that you watched.
What was your era of TV?
your favorite shows?
Everybody talks about Gunsmoke, but my favorite show as a young kid for Westerns was a show called Lancer.
Do you remember that?
I don't.
Who was in that one?
The Lancer, you're gonna put me on the spot here a little bit.
It was only on for about two or three seasons.
But it was two brothers.
One brother was a lawyer, I believe, and the other was a cowboy, and they're in the Old West trying to right wrongs.
I really like Chuck Connors and the Rifleman.
I think it was more because he didn't wear a gun, and they showed him using it, and he had his son.
And you pick up on certain, the big valley, I remember that.
Well, and of course, when we watched
TV in our era that was what was predominantly on and Saturday afternoons and except I'm old enough to tell you that there were tooth programs that we regularly watch especially in the wintertime hockey was on and they didn't have that little orange disc that followed the hockey puck around but do you remember roller derby on Saturday afternoons I do Charlie O'Connor in the San Francisco
Bay bombers and Joni Weston, and they were blockers and jammers.
And we really got exposed to a different sport.
That would be your vintage WWF, I think, back in the day.
And it was a, you had to be pretty good.
But that was out of an offshoot because if you think about it in the 1950s, our parents.
would have socialized by going around to different roller rinks.
I can name every community in this area, and I can tell you where the roller rink was.
For example, I'll use muscaday, Riverdale egg, but it was Floyd Fleming had lived across the street, and it's got a little archipelago.
Pelago shed and that was the roller rink in muscaday and you had keys that you would actually key on your shoes People carried like you'd carry a bowling bag with your bowling ball They would carry their roller skates in a little suitcase Then they always wanted to make sure you had extra key in case you lost it or set it down or misplaced it But that was the social time in the 1950s and early 60s.
I kind of faded out.
It was a fad.
It was a phase
well I'll give this river view not far from me it was the river's edge well known because they had a large dance floor and I know you've had on before and a shout out to Galaxy Skate Center that they still maintain that and I do know they even offer it to the youth with some fied programs because it's an excellent sport great exercise but the fact was that roller skating was really popular in that time period.
Yeah it was I believe Virgil Center
three.
Okay.
Yeah.
And you see, I go up and I'll go back to the Clarkson's had the rink there for a while.
And of course, double Cola, you got to remember double Cola soda pop at that time was actually in returnable bottles.
You got to remember the wood cases and especially for double Cola because it was in this area and everybody talks about ski and I know you're a big fan.
I date back to the 10 ounce Hillbilly.
bottles.
Do you remember the green with yellow?
And there was a guy coming out of the woods, you know, he was your hillbilly, and he had a whiskey bottle up over his shoulder and Yahoo Mountain Dew.
And I
like ski, if you actually held it up to the light, I think you could actually see some of the citrus floating around
Well,
I remember well, and of course they all had distinct hires, dads, distinctive flavors and
really marketing right now for an alternative to alcohol.
A lot of companies, I know Nuglaris does it, and I can name several, that they have their root beer, 1919 root beer is the one that's most prevalent to me, non-alcoholic, but of course it's got that sweetener in it, and it's an offshoot of A&W.
We're talking with Kim Thied, Richland County Historical Society, talking about reminiscing about some old times and those pop bottles.
I remember the old pop machines, too.
Oh, did you have to slide it out?
Slide it out.
It's a wonder some of those bottles didn't break.
Was it a quarter
or was it 10
Richland Center High School, when I first started there, realized that was 1983.
and they had the cases there, and it was 10 ounce bottles, and you had the machine, and you would actually slide the bottle into location, and then you put your change in, and you pulled up and it would release the bottle.
a double stick fan for popsicles?
anymore?
I gotta think they do I Honestly haven't went to the store to check.
I know they do have the single stick
Well, that's just it.
And well, and what we did is we would take different flavors because you could get the multi-pack and you could get different flavors.
Grape, of course, and cherry were the two standards.
Orange, not as popular, but I was a banana fan.
Do you remember banana?
Popsicles?
I
yeah.
Popsicle flavors.
I'm sure people out there will recall their favorite flavor.
But I think grape was the most generic.
It would be an interesting survey to say it's like ice cream chocolate or vanilla.
blackberry
well ours was and I went with more of and they still have a good humor and it would be chocolate and it had a nutty outside to it
and it was almost like eating a cookie, but it was an ice cream sandwich on a stick.
And no, oh yeah, no, they were good.
It sounds good.
It's very good.
And I didn't, I've never heard of Blackberry.
I've got to tell
remember
had to wait for it to freeze.
Yeah.
It wasn't where you could go to the refrigerator, you know, either freezer, excuse me, and grab it.
Make your own.
Yes, yes, reusable.
So you rinse off the sticks and they come back.
And I remember those sticks had like two or three holes so the stick wouldn't slide out.
If you go flashback right now and think of the retro stuff that's really coming back.
In Las Vegas because you go to Vegas probably to gamble I go there and I will hit the pinball museum They usually have a thousand machines and they go back of course and you've mentioned on your Saturday night show Pong and I think you've even had some Atari questions on there But I would tell you the big three at least when we first got started space invaders was
really the game to go to.
And that was for about a year.
And then after Space Invaders, do you remember Asteroids?
You know, and that was more like you were sitting in a cockpit and you were firing, but it rotated.
It wasn't just running across the screen, but you actually had that.
And then of course, I was a big fan of Donkey Kong.
Donkey Kong was there.
And I think I would tell you, I even prefer Donkey Kong over
Agreed.
Yeah, no, you're absolutely right.
That was, it was that same era.
Prior to that though, and I mentioned Pinball again, in Muscatate it was called the Chieftain's Tipi and I can even tell you, I've got videos that I used in my social studies class, Wisconsin History of Acons downtown, which was renowned as a pool hall.
but you would always hear that pinball machine as they were interviewing someone.
You could hear that dinging and ringing of the pinball machine.
And I remember, I remember three for a quarter and five balls on each play.
And then you could win a free game if the number matched.
That was always, you know, you'd hear a pop.
and you didn't score high but the number match so you had a one in ten chance because it would roll that real and pinball is something that I think is overlooked right now of course we could go to the song pinball wizard too and I'm sure that's where the
Um, iconic version of pinball comes in, but a lot of people still have pinball machines in their, um, family room or a game center or whatever it might be.
June won't let me, but I, well it takes up a lot of
know, I know you want to have room for the records too.
with your record player, I got to ask, did you ever put like a nickel on your?
Yes.
Okay.
Because it didn't set in just right.
Yeah.
Well, a lot of the record players were a little inferior back then, you know,
Oh, sure.
Oh, sure.
And so I would, it was really frustrating to go to Saffol's music store or the dime store.
Yes.
Get home and the record skips, you know, and you take it back there and it would play fine.
So yeah, you put a little washer on there or a little sinker or whatever.
I'm going
to put, well, I'm going to put my mother on the spot too because she loved Loretta Lynn and she had Charlie Pride.
And I just remember because she played them so often.
that she would actually do that.
It was a little small model, but then we also got, and I've got to say it was the Archies.
and it was on the back of a cereal box.
Am I right in saying
you know the history with this one?
I do.
I
Were they vinyl that they were flexible enough?
it was cardboard.
was actually cardboard,
wax.
So,
do.
Well, Captain Crunch and the other one was, it was a chocolate.
Count
Count Chocula,
Those were popular.
Of course, we did the standard Rice Krispies and Cheers, and I just heard, here's your trivia, but did you know there was a fourth character for the Rice Krispies box?
No.
And I said, so I'm gonna leave that out there
Crackle Pop.
Yes, I agree.
know.
Oh, is that when the spoon hits the milk?
It might be.
So I'm throwing it out there that there used to be.
four caricatures on the Rice Krispies box.
And so if anybody wants to check that out, they can.
You know, mentioning the songs though, and the reason the Archies stick out, I'm a Riverdale grad, but in junior high, the Archie comic strips, and of course Riverdale was, so we were hooked on that.
I don't know about you, but that.
comic strip with Reggie and Veronica and others.
Another girl that was in a Betty Betty.
Okay.
Good.
Good.
Jughead was in there.
And the Archie comic strip was popular.
Did you ever get, were you too young to get weekly readers?
Do you
loved about it is they went from a one sheet, basically 11 by 17 fold, and it was stapled.
And so now you could have multiple pages.
It wasn't just a four page doc because you spent time and you were excited to.
get that and it came in a plastic wrapper with a strap over it you know it was mailed to the school and I still remember breaking that open and you know passing them out and everybody would right away get into reading the weekly reader.
That was a memorable moment in my youth of education.
That and help me out.
Fun times have you ever heard of that?
Yes.
And it was a magazine and
a great magazine okay it really was but that was in the magazine sales because they would have those promotions where you could buy
12 issues of fun times for the summer and it would be mailed to your house and it actually had a cardboard or a heavier cover to it, but it would be mailed to you.
I remember that well,
Good stuff from the education of our youth.
I go back to that and I think, well, I'll say it because I used film strips and people gave me a hard time, but film strips are nothing more than a modern day PowerPoint.
That's
you think about it and the information that was in those film strips, or did you do, did you do the 16 millimeter projector?
Oh, sure.
Yeah.
And forget to put this back in and have it run all the way out.
Run on the floor.
It did.
It did.
I've had those moments where you go, oh, I remember that.
Well, and we would use it in the large group room at Richland Center High School.
And for students today, it was called The Ancient Games.
and to sit in the elevated, you know, tiered seating of the LGI, and the students would come in, lights be off, and you'd turn it on, and they'd hear.
And it kind of freaked them out a little bit, because what is that?
It is in a video where you pop in a VHS, and I go back to beta even.
I was the early one in the car.
I had cassette tapes, and everybody gave me a hard time.
I had a Gremlin.
You talk about your Maverick.
I had the Gremlin.
had cassette tapes and everybody says oh that'll never catch on these you know these larger you know eight tracks are so much better well
What happened?
Cassettes lasted a lot longer.
If
them.
Well, it took care.
So I've done that where you stick a pencil up in
internet.
And did you have tape that you'd put over that or not?
Sometimes.
Yeah, exactly.
You know, I had to
few
Do you still have some?
know for your Saturday night show, you bring in a lot of stuff.
I've seen the entourage of cases and cartons that you bring in.
yet.
Digitalized, and, well, as soon as you do that, they're gonna come up with something better and something, you go from the floppy disk to the three inch disk to, I mean, now it's a thumb drive, and I think that's even becoming outdated, I don't know.
I
just as I learned it, they'd switch, you know, we'd have Windows O3, and I,
find out where all the on the computer where all the icons were and where to click.
And as soon as I get it figured out, oh, we're going to Windows 7 because it's so much easier and faster and better.
Well, I just found out Windows 3 and I'm now got to figure out Windows 7.
So they were always the time span and the bell shaped curve that our young people, our kids and our grandkids are looking at
Now is just unbelievable.
Well the those programs too and people that are a lot smarter than me with computers will agree Not always is it better these software upgrades, you know, because it seems like they're leaving out one little thing that
works so well with this other one and it doesn't work with a new program very much I agree there oh it's a money grab I
think so and and it's a marketing ploy too because well now you got to buy this one and this one I think too when you talk about that and it goes back to history moments if you can go back in time each era each segment had something notable our big one when I was in high school was
a Texas instrument calculator.
It really was.
And Robbie Anderson, if you're listening, your father was awesome.
We got to use them, but we could only use them for checking our work.
So in science class, if we were doing our science problems, you could have your Texas instrument there, but you couldn't use it to calculate.
You had to do it in your head, then you did it on paper, then you could check the answer.
And what we've lost, and I'll be very candid here, this is the old guy being the old guy, but we've lost critical thinking skills, we've lost memories.
Tell me that you didn't have to memorize phone numbers if you wanted to have a quicker way of calling rather than looking it up in a phone book.
Oh, sure.
You remembered phone numbers.
Better than writing it on your hand because that would wipe off, you know, girls number, you didn't wash your hand for a week.
Probably it didn't.
Ken Thiet is our guest on our morning show as we reminisce, we'll have more coming up in a moment.
Ken Thiet is our guest on the morning show today from WRC.
O's radios.
We, we get back to talking about the old days.
There was a character on Saturday night live called the grumpy old man.
Yes.
I remember that guy.
Yeah.
Walked uphill both
my.
And I was a big Muppets fan and so the two guys that sat up in the balcony because they were nothing Satisfied them or made them happy, but you know it's funny back in my day and tell me you haven't heard that line On a regular basis, and you know you're getting older when you use it because now I'm using it on a regular day back in the day
We think back in the day and, you know, again, they were good times.
You know, and I think we grew up in a great era because I've said this before, you know, I had parents and grandparents that that went through the Depression and World War Two.
And, you know, you learned a lot of valuable lessons from them about, you know, being frugal and taking care of equipment.
And, you know, I'm still like this.
I don't, I don't replace something unless it's broken and can't be fixed, you know.
And
we've lost that.
We really have.
because we've become a throwaway society.
Let's agree to that.
And it's too easy just to go out and buy a new one.
And we've lost that concept of fixing things.
You know, I think of it with farm machinery.
I think of it just at home, being at home.
I talked about re-soling shoes and you got to remember Butch's shoe repair downtown.
And just having or patching jeans.
Now it's the style to cut holes in jeans.
You know, I'd say to my daughters, what is that?
No, dad, they're more expensive that way.
I thought, no,
Well, you you've mentioned before and again, I always love when you talk about it on your Saturday night show, but the new school clothes.
So, you know, first of all, the jeans were rough.
You know, you couldn't bend them.
Oh, it really was.
And the backpack.
You got to remember the backpack.
And and I the clothes were just new, you know, you had new school clothes.
Right.
And I think that's all the big thing for us.
I'll still go back to it.
and I'm not gonna name names of my classmates because I'm in our 50th now, so we're 50 years.
But it was to have a pack of 64 crayons.
was elite.
I mean, that was the rich kids.
Yes, no, they were.
You know, you got 64.
Oh my God.
Or the better one, and I think 64 bucks might have had this.
The sharpener was in the back
and and good for it but but even the color white because light was there and they'd say what are you going to use the color white for well it does work on a darker sheet of paper you know yes and for us the big thing was the pencil it was unusual because
the erasers would go before the pencil got too short.
So he was always had and they were cool.
You'd get different types of eraser tops that you could slide over the top.
And the diamond one or what was appear I called it a pyramid top.
Those were the popular ones.
But you could get some really neat.
Of course, you had to go to ours was at the dime store.
We'd stop at the dime store.
I think they were they might have been
15 cents because they were just they might have been a face of a person
different logo or something
cartoons, obviously.
Scooby-Doo.
Scooby-Doo eraser.
Okay.
I can remember that.
And forget that.
I always gave a hard time to my friend.
He had the
Oh three inch one and it was slanted on each side so you could reverse it because he as he said to me I have to use an eraser a lot He'd have a mistake and he'd erase and of course then you'd sweep that rubber substance off onto the floor and Everything was gritty after a while.
I I do remember to the why did they make I got it?
This is one of those I don't know I can't answer this
why did they have like eight different holes on the pencil sharpener?
When almost all the pencils were the same size and they were number two lead and some of them were hexagonal and some were round.
But you know, the circles, they had like a three quarter inch diameter.
I'm going, what kind of pencil are you
sharpening?
Do they still have pencil sharpeners in classrooms?
do.
I really
think and I think you're seeing it more.
And this is just me through subbing and hearing what's going on.
And again, that would be an interesting question when you have some teachers in because they're going back to pencil and paper, you know, they're there.
Let's recognize that several districts in our area have said no cell phones, bell to bell.
And I think that's a great thing.
And you don't want to know who's the worst is the parents because they'll say how can we get a hold of our kids call the office and And then you think about it screen time it Technology is great if you use it appropriately, but too much screen time.
They're finding is just so detrimental
And again, I come back to, I mentioned it earlier as we were talking, those critical thinking skills.
And the different ways you do, whether it's hooked on phonics, whether it's remembering things by association, you know, as simple as, you know, Roy G. Bibb would be the one that everybody knows from elementary days, or to remember all the Great Lakes, Homes, H-O-M-E-S, you'd develop different skills.
I remembered Pizza Hut's telephone number because it was Larry Bird and Robert Parrish.
because if you wanted to call for Pizza Hut, and everybody says, want to be easier just to remember the number?
No, I knew if I needed to call Pizza Hut, it was 647-3300.
Larry Bird War 33.
and Robert Parrish wore double zero.
So I knew I would call Larry Bird and Robert Parrish, oh yeah, 647-3300.
That's how I remembered the numbers.
I'm accused of remembering page numbers and birth dates and where people sat in my classroom.
You'd remember it by association.
And we talked a little bit about...
weekly reader earlier, one of the few things I was good at in school is we had, we had the radio on all the time at my house.
So I always heard the news and Mike Stoddard, when we were in middle school, uh, had, he used to subscribe to new scope quiz.
I remember
those.
Yes.
Yeah.
VEC is what we had.
So new scope would be
You know, Dan Carney in seventh and eighth grade had the V and he had it up and he had some elaborate elongated name for it, which made it even more attractive.
And the big thing was, so you got to understand there were four classes.
OK, so with that being said, you know, in seventh and eighth grade, you put it together.
That's eight periods.
You don't want to leave out the answer of what the V is.
see guest figure was because you come up and you had to come up with a name.
And first hour didn't give it up to like the afternoon classes because you didn't have your social studies class till later in the afternoon.
Yeah, and so VEC.
So what was yours called again?
Newscope Quiz.
Newscope, and weekly they would send
right?
No, no, and the great, great promo here for WRCO.
Absolutely.
got to ask a question of you.
I very much enjoyed officiating for many years with Mr. Fred Dylan.
Okay.
Yeah.
And of course he, I think he still bleeds, uh, I think a purple, but you know, he did teach at Richland Center for a time period.
And I had the privilege of officiating many basketball games, but you were often a topic of conversation simply because of your football expertise.
So I've got to ask right now on the.
air is this
or urban legend, or is it a true story that he said, because you played center.
position.
That's right.
And he said, there was a time that Phil Knee came off and looked at me through the ear hole.
Is that a true story or not?
He might be embellishing
Well, I agreed.
And he would often refer to you by your Beatle Bailey look.
You know, if Beatle Bailey ever gotten a fight,
You know, he would always have arms and legs all over the
Well, first of all, you've got to you've got to give me a little credit for not backing down from the fight because I was you got to understand.
I was I was playing center about 130.
I understand.
And I always say that, you know, they cleaned off their cleats on me.
But we were the story is we were we're playing in Seneca and there was a young man that was across me that he had gained all state recognition the year before.
And and he was an animal, you know.
But the thing of it is, it's like, okay, he's over me.
They were running a five-man defensive line.
So why wasn't one of the guards helping me?
They were uncovered, so there's, you know, but anyway, he ran over a few times, you know, and I might have slowed him down, you know, just because he had to get over me or whatever.
But supposedly on the sideline, Fred says to Dan Rice,
We got to get him out of there.
They're going to kill him.
And we remembered the vintage fields for the Ridge and Valley.
They were iconic.
Wherever they were, you know, they were probably part of the baseball diamond and even part, you know, let's look back at the old football games we'd watch on TV.
When we watch sports on TV, I still remember they didn't have the pregame shows for football.
And
if you can go that far back.
I go back to when Brent Musburger.
Exactly.
Yeah.
But we would get home from church and Dairyland Jubilee
Yeah.
And I don't remember watching NBA basketball on TV.
I do remember on Saturday afternoons because college games were Wednesday night and Saturday.
as
I'm not disagreeing with that.
And you can go there for any sport.
Football included.
I'm not a Friday night college.
No.
And I know there's some.
No, or as the schedule for the 2026 season has Green Bay playing on a Wednesday night.
It's like, no, that's just not right.
No.
Before things, it's marketing.
Watching.
basketball, college basketball in the afternoon was very enjoyable.
But see, I remember too now.
So we'll go back.
It was 18 game schedule.
So we might have one game a week and four practices for high school, high school.
Yes.
And then I'll take that a step further.
We had a crow's nest in the gym where they would film the game.
And I still have and I believe Mr. Thompson at Riverdale has dating back to the early seventies, those
16 millimeter in a smaller set, smaller case, different games that are on the 16 millimeter.
So, you know, they'd have actually a film session where you could watch the film and it was remarkable to me the turnaround time because Friday night game and Monday you were watching game tape of what happened.
Of course, you couldn't get out of anything now because it's on film.
And it's there, but that was vintage, vintage high school football in the 1970s.
blurry.
And so you were hoping that it
Well, now for basketball, you always talked about sitting at the end of the bench
Okay.
And so the grounders,
you were really good at that, but you know, really a tough throw is that second base to first base throw because pivot and turn.
Well, if you take a little bit off it.
you know, it may wind up short.
And then if you throw it hard, it could go over the first baseman's head.
So that throw is more difficult than you think.
And again, when you think back to high school fields, and we can talk baseball, for example, I arguably will say that Riverdale has always had in this part of the state.
one of the best baseball fields.
play baseball on.
Jamborees.
remember that with Jim Mason
played.
That was, yeah, that was classic.
And it was a three day event and great baseball.
You know, you, you, you have that and you come to Muscatay and, and you played.
I, I, I still, so I was a first baseman.
and you maintained your area.
You had the rake, you had to take the base, you were in charge of that.
You took pride in that area.
The one I remember most, and we had three of them in SWAL, the old SWAL, we had skinned infields.
You did not like that because unlike Astroturf where you got a true bounce,
Grass maybe would give you a, you know, a cockeyed bounce.
Those skin infields would just skip.
It would just hit and skip.
And you weren't used to basketball was the notorious one closest in our area.
But you'd look at those different fields.
And I do remember this too.
And you can maybe date back to Mr. Pampoo and talk about that.
But there were a number of times that Richland Center couldn't play at Crosscut Park because it was too wet or the field wasn't in condition.
But it was always that we could play at Ithaca.
And I know Mr. Pampoo graciously would arrange for, and Ted Wheelock was the coach at center.
That's going back to the 1970s.
And Richland Center played a number of their games on an Ithaca field.
I can tell you, we played two conference games there, both my sophomore year and my senior year.
I remember playing there.
Of course, location.
Well, and let's recognize really Verne Geyshirt and the role that
played in the history of high school baseball here in our area.
And many will recall Mr. Geyshirt and the job that he did.
But I know at that time when he played, that would be Muscaday C. It wasn't Riverdale yet.
Yep.
And Muscaday like...
Ithaca they battled it out and isn't it interesting spring baseball maybe had six games back then because you played summer ball
And it was summer ball that was part of and we had some great teams in the area with Casanovia and Lone Rock and and Avoka fielded a very good baseball team.
But that was all local boys playing baseball.
enough for.
there's nine people out for baseball.
But, you know, eight man football didn't work.
No, exactly.
I appreciate that anytime.
and it's good history moments that we're talking about here.
I enjoy those history moments very much.
Thank you very kindly.
You bet.
Ken Thied joining us on the morning show for a bit of reminiscing and the Richland County Historical Society.
We'll have him back again to talk a little bit more about some of my deep dark past.
On our morning show today, we bring on Ken Thied, Richland County Historical Society president, and we always like to talk about the past.
You and I live in the past, I think, a little bit.
That's all right.
I think that's
a good time period.
We talk about it all the time, but things were good back then.
You know, we look back now, and we can ask our parents, but then for our children also.
Those were good years, now that we look back on them.
that.
Completely, and people say, oh, that must be tough, because we're now in, we're hitting 250 for the episodes that are being taped.
In fact, I'd ask you this question, here's a simple one, because as we reminisce, if we were saying it in Richland County, would we say
Crick, C-R-I-C-K, or would we say Creek, C-R-E-A-K?
Is it Crick or Creek?
Well, I
Crick.
Well, and I'm there as well.
And we have so many, you know, bodies of water.
That'll be a history moment, by the way, if you want to go and check it out.
But when we talk about that, that's the little things because it's down by the crick.
Yeah, exactly.
Still the same body of water, though.
Lots of things that we've talked about through the years that young people today have no idea because they've got a phone instantly in their hands.
We all do.
We all do.
Not just young people, but back in the day when you had to make an appointment, basically, to make a phone call because there were other people on your line.
Were you on a party line?
Oh, absolutely.
And at one time, I was counting this the other day, there were like six families at one time.
Was
that up the valley then or was there a certain, so for our party line, it was in the neighborhood.
So we had four.
And then there was another party line just down the, and you'd pick it up and somebody'd be on the phone and you
So from our house, and then they went to Aubrey Corners, there was at least one person on there.
It went over to Huffman Lane, 58, and then people up Huffman Lane.
two or three houses up that way, and then there was just across the creek from us, and they were on there as well.
So yeah, if you had to make a call to get a date for a girl or something, other people could be listening.
Well, mine was, and it happened with my daughter, and it was 10 years ago, but went to make a phone call, and we were at a location that had a rotary dial phone.
And my daughter picks up the phone.
She goes, Dad, what is this?
I said, it's a telephone.
You can make a call on it.
What do I do?
I said, put your finger in and just turn it clockwise as far as you can go until it stops and leave it go.
And the first time she did it, she squealed because you know how it gives that little kick back as it comes.
If you haven't used one before, that's really, and then do you remember if it was a rotary dial, there was the phone that sat with a handle, but then they had the one that was kind of a compact model.
It was a little bit more modern that you pick it up and it was right inside between the airpieces.
Sure,
was there.
And for someone that's never used it before and tell me it isn't true and you're dealing it now with your grandchildren.
but telling time digitally?
And what time is it?
And is it a quarter past or 15 minutes to?
Or is it military time?
You know, the clock
Oh, yeah.
Little things like that we lose sight of because analog, everything's there for us.
And I've even said when I'm subbing, I'll say to the kids, it's supposed to download at 1230, but it will probably download at 1233 because you get that little, you know, rodent in the wheel that's turning, turning, turning, turning and it finally kicks in.
Well, and what they don't know here at WRCO, having four lines coming in and it lights up, that's something different.
I mean, you don't have that with a cell phone.
You'll hear a beep and you can take another call.
And that's what amazes me because I'm not that techno savvy that you can check out things in your phone just a second or you can photo.
shoot it and do a message or a picture, that's way beyond me right now.
I had friends say, when I got a cell phone and then I started texting, they were fearing that the world would come to an end because Mr. Thede is actually texting people.
The first texting I had was I had a flip phone, one of the initial ones, and you had to hit the uppercase, and then you had to figure it out.
You hit the numbers.
It was actually hot and packed.
It really was.
It was hard work, that's for sure.
And then going back to television, you and I both grew up with television.
And when I was very young, we had just the VHF antenna.
So we had channel three or channel eight out of the cross.
Out of
the cross came you.
On a good day.
But that was only CBS.
And people would talk about, oh, you know, these other cool shows that we couldn't get.
So finally, finally, dad, we convinced him to get another antenna.
And we were able to get Madison.
But on a good night, you know, he had to go up on the roof and actually turn the antenna sometimes.
Well,
we did that.
And as soon as we left, go over the antenna, we lost the reception because that gave it a little bit extra.
So I actually had a sister that said, would you stand up there and hold it while we watch the show?
But that.
Oh, did you have a rotary box where you could rotate it to get a better reception on the rotary
Because we had, down by the river, live along Highway 60, KBT didn't come in as well because that was north of the hills.
But we could draw in some Iowa stations, depending on the weather and in the cloud cover.
And I know I've even called in to you and I've been nearly to Stephen's point, but because obviously the connections were still there, we had good reception.
to get that rotary box to rotate it just right so we could bring it in.
So you watched primarily Channel 3 and CBS, but did you have those shows that you went to?
They were the go-to shows that you watched.
What was your era of TV?
your favorite shows?
Everybody talks about Gunsmoke, but my favorite show as a young kid for Westerns was a show called Lancer.
Do you remember that?
I don't.
Who was in that one?
The Lancer, you're gonna put me on the spot here a little bit.
It was only on for about two or three seasons.
But it was two brothers.
One brother was a lawyer, I believe, and the other was a cowboy, and they're in the Old West trying to right wrongs.
I really like Chuck Connors and the Rifleman.
I think it was more because he didn't wear a gun, and they showed him using it, and he had his son.
And you pick up on certain, the big valley, I remember that.
Well, and of course, when we watched
TV in our era that was what was predominantly on and Saturday afternoons and except I'm old enough to tell you that there were tooth programs that we regularly watch especially in the wintertime hockey was on and they didn't have that little orange disc that followed the hockey puck around but do you remember roller derby on Saturday afternoons I do Charlie O'Connor in the San Francisco
Bay bombers and Joni Weston, and they were blockers and jammers.
And we really got exposed to a different sport.
That would be your vintage WWF, I think, back in the day.
And it was a, you had to be pretty good.
But that was out of an offshoot because if you think about it in the 1950s, our parents.
would have socialized by going around to different roller rinks.
I can name every community in this area, and I can tell you where the roller rink was.
For example, I'll use muscaday, Riverdale egg, but it was Floyd Fleming had lived across the street, and it's got a little archipelago.
Pelago shed and that was the roller rink in muscaday and you had keys that you would actually key on your shoes People carried like you'd carry a bowling bag with your bowling ball They would carry their roller skates in a little suitcase Then they always wanted to make sure you had extra key in case you lost it or set it down or misplaced it But that was the social time in the 1950s and early 60s.
I kind of faded out.
It was a fad.
It was a phase
well I'll give this river view not far from me it was the river's edge well known because they had a large dance floor and I know you've had on before and a shout out to Galaxy Skate Center that they still maintain that and I do know they even offer it to the youth with some fied programs because it's an excellent sport great exercise but the fact was that roller skating was really popular in that time period.
Yeah it was I believe Virgil Center
three.
Okay.
Yeah.
And you see, I go up and I'll go back to the Clarkson's had the rink there for a while.
And of course, double Cola, you got to remember double Cola soda pop at that time was actually in returnable bottles.
You got to remember the wood cases and especially for double Cola because it was in this area and everybody talks about ski and I know you're a big fan.
I date back to the 10 ounce Hillbilly.
bottles.
Do you remember the green with yellow?
And there was a guy coming out of the woods, you know, he was your hillbilly, and he had a whiskey bottle up over his shoulder and Yahoo Mountain Dew.
And I
like ski, if you actually held it up to the light, I think you could actually see some of the citrus floating around
Well,
I remember well, and of course they all had distinct hires, dads, distinctive flavors and
really marketing right now for an alternative to alcohol.
A lot of companies, I know Nuglaris does it, and I can name several, that they have their root beer, 1919 root beer is the one that's most prevalent to me, non-alcoholic, but of course it's got that sweetener in it, and it's an offshoot of A&W.
We're talking with Kim Thied, Richland County Historical Society, talking about reminiscing about some old times and those pop bottles.
I remember the old pop machines, too.
Oh, did you have to slide it out?
Slide it out.
It's a wonder some of those bottles didn't break.
Was it a quarter
or was it 10
Richland Center High School, when I first started there, realized that was 1983.
and they had the cases there, and it was 10 ounce bottles, and you had the machine, and you would actually slide the bottle into location, and then you put your change in, and you pulled up and it would release the bottle.
a double stick fan for popsicles?
anymore?
I gotta think they do I Honestly haven't went to the store to check.
I know they do have the single stick
Well, that's just it.
And well, and what we did is we would take different flavors because you could get the multi-pack and you could get different flavors.
Grape, of course, and cherry were the two standards.
Orange, not as popular, but I was a banana fan.
Do you remember banana?
Popsicles?
I
yeah.
Popsicle flavors.
I'm sure people out there will recall their favorite flavor.
But I think grape was the most generic.
It would be an interesting survey to say it's like ice cream chocolate or vanilla.
blackberry
well ours was and I went with more of and they still have a good humor and it would be chocolate and it had a nutty outside to it
and it was almost like eating a cookie, but it was an ice cream sandwich on a stick.
And no, oh yeah, no, they were good.
It sounds good.
It's very good.
And I didn't, I've never heard of Blackberry.
I've got to tell
remember
had to wait for it to freeze.
Yeah.
It wasn't where you could go to the refrigerator, you know, either freezer, excuse me, and grab it.
Make your own.
Yes, yes, reusable.
So you rinse off the sticks and they come back.
And I remember those sticks had like two or three holes so the stick wouldn't slide out.
If you go flashback right now and think of the retro stuff that's really coming back.
In Las Vegas because you go to Vegas probably to gamble I go there and I will hit the pinball museum They usually have a thousand machines and they go back of course and you've mentioned on your Saturday night show Pong and I think you've even had some Atari questions on there But I would tell you the big three at least when we first got started space invaders was
really the game to go to.
And that was for about a year.
And then after Space Invaders, do you remember Asteroids?
You know, and that was more like you were sitting in a cockpit and you were firing, but it rotated.
It wasn't just running across the screen, but you actually had that.
And then of course, I was a big fan of Donkey Kong.
Donkey Kong was there.
And I think I would tell you, I even prefer Donkey Kong over
Agreed.
Yeah, no, you're absolutely right.
That was, it was that same era.
Prior to that though, and I mentioned Pinball again, in Muscatate it was called the Chieftain's Tipi and I can even tell you, I've got videos that I used in my social studies class, Wisconsin History of Acons downtown, which was renowned as a pool hall.
but you would always hear that pinball machine as they were interviewing someone.
You could hear that dinging and ringing of the pinball machine.
And I remember, I remember three for a quarter and five balls on each play.
And then you could win a free game if the number matched.
That was always, you know, you'd hear a pop.
and you didn't score high but the number match so you had a one in ten chance because it would roll that real and pinball is something that I think is overlooked right now of course we could go to the song pinball wizard too and I'm sure that's where the
Um, iconic version of pinball comes in, but a lot of people still have pinball machines in their, um, family room or a game center or whatever it might be.
June won't let me, but I, well it takes up a lot of
know, I know you want to have room for the records too.
with your record player, I got to ask, did you ever put like a nickel on your?
Yes.
Okay.
Because it didn't set in just right.
Yeah.
Well, a lot of the record players were a little inferior back then, you know,
Oh, sure.
Oh, sure.
And so I would, it was really frustrating to go to Saffol's music store or the dime store.
Yes.
Get home and the record skips, you know, and you take it back there and it would play fine.
So yeah, you put a little washer on there or a little sinker or whatever.
I'm going
to put, well, I'm going to put my mother on the spot too because she loved Loretta Lynn and she had Charlie Pride.
And I just remember because she played them so often.
that she would actually do that.
It was a little small model, but then we also got, and I've got to say it was the Archies.
and it was on the back of a cereal box.
Am I right in saying
you know the history with this one?
I do.
I
Were they vinyl that they were flexible enough?
it was cardboard.
was actually cardboard,
wax.
So,
do.
Well, Captain Crunch and the other one was, it was a chocolate.
Count
Count Chocula,
Those were popular.
Of course, we did the standard Rice Krispies and Cheers, and I just heard, here's your trivia, but did you know there was a fourth character for the Rice Krispies box?
No.
And I said, so I'm gonna leave that out there
Crackle Pop.
Yes, I agree.
know.
Oh, is that when the spoon hits the milk?
It might be.
So I'm throwing it out there that there used to be.
four caricatures on the Rice Krispies box.
And so if anybody wants to check that out, they can.
You know, mentioning the songs though, and the reason the Archies stick out, I'm a Riverdale grad, but in junior high, the Archie comic strips, and of course Riverdale was, so we were hooked on that.
I don't know about you, but that.
comic strip with Reggie and Veronica and others.
Another girl that was in a Betty Betty.
Okay.
Good.
Good.
Jughead was in there.
And the Archie comic strip was popular.
Did you ever get, were you too young to get weekly readers?
Do you
loved about it is they went from a one sheet, basically 11 by 17 fold, and it was stapled.
And so now you could have multiple pages.
It wasn't just a four page doc because you spent time and you were excited to.
get that and it came in a plastic wrapper with a strap over it you know it was mailed to the school and I still remember breaking that open and you know passing them out and everybody would right away get into reading the weekly reader.
That was a memorable moment in my youth of education.
That and help me out.
Fun times have you ever heard of that?
Yes.
And it was a magazine and
a great magazine okay it really was but that was in the magazine sales because they would have those promotions where you could buy
12 issues of fun times for the summer and it would be mailed to your house and it actually had a cardboard or a heavier cover to it, but it would be mailed to you.
I remember that well,
Good stuff from the education of our youth.
I go back to that and I think, well, I'll say it because I used film strips and people gave me a hard time, but film strips are nothing more than a modern day PowerPoint.
That's
you think about it and the information that was in those film strips, or did you do, did you do the 16 millimeter projector?
Oh, sure.
Yeah.
And forget to put this back in and have it run all the way out.
Run on the floor.
It did.
It did.
I've had those moments where you go, oh, I remember that.
Well, and we would use it in the large group room at Richland Center High School.
And for students today, it was called The Ancient Games.
and to sit in the elevated, you know, tiered seating of the LGI, and the students would come in, lights be off, and you'd turn it on, and they'd hear.
And it kind of freaked them out a little bit, because what is that?
It is in a video where you pop in a VHS, and I go back to beta even.
I was the early one in the car.
I had cassette tapes, and everybody gave me a hard time.
I had a Gremlin.
You talk about your Maverick.
I had the Gremlin.
had cassette tapes and everybody says oh that'll never catch on these you know these larger you know eight tracks are so much better well
What happened?
Cassettes lasted a lot longer.
If
them.
Well, it took care.
So I've done that where you stick a pencil up in
internet.
And did you have tape that you'd put over that or not?
Sometimes.
Yeah, exactly.
You know, I had to
few
Do you still have some?
know for your Saturday night show, you bring in a lot of stuff.
I've seen the entourage of cases and cartons that you bring in.
yet.
Digitalized, and, well, as soon as you do that, they're gonna come up with something better and something, you go from the floppy disk to the three inch disk to, I mean, now it's a thumb drive, and I think that's even becoming outdated, I don't know.
I
just as I learned it, they'd switch, you know, we'd have Windows O3, and I,
find out where all the on the computer where all the icons were and where to click.
And as soon as I get it figured out, oh, we're going to Windows 7 because it's so much easier and faster and better.
Well, I just found out Windows 3 and I'm now got to figure out Windows 7.
So they were always the time span and the bell shaped curve that our young people, our kids and our grandkids are looking at
Now is just unbelievable.
Well the those programs too and people that are a lot smarter than me with computers will agree Not always is it better these software upgrades, you know, because it seems like they're leaving out one little thing that
works so well with this other one and it doesn't work with a new program very much I agree there oh it's a money grab I
think so and and it's a marketing ploy too because well now you got to buy this one and this one I think too when you talk about that and it goes back to history moments if you can go back in time each era each segment had something notable our big one when I was in high school was
a Texas instrument calculator.
It really was.
And Robbie Anderson, if you're listening, your father was awesome.
We got to use them, but we could only use them for checking our work.
So in science class, if we were doing our science problems, you could have your Texas instrument there, but you couldn't use it to calculate.
You had to do it in your head, then you did it on paper, then you could check the answer.
And what we've lost, and I'll be very candid here, this is the old guy being the old guy, but we've lost critical thinking skills, we've lost memories.
Tell me that you didn't have to memorize phone numbers if you wanted to have a quicker way of calling rather than looking it up in a phone book.
Oh, sure.
You remembered phone numbers.
Better than writing it on your hand because that would wipe off, you know, girls number, you didn't wash your hand for a week.
Probably it didn't.
Ken Thiet is our guest on our morning show as we reminisce, we'll have more coming up in a moment.
Ken Thiet is our guest on the morning show today from WRC.
O's radios.
We, we get back to talking about the old days.
There was a character on Saturday night live called the grumpy old man.
Yes.
I remember that guy.
Yeah.
Walked uphill both
my.
And I was a big Muppets fan and so the two guys that sat up in the balcony because they were nothing Satisfied them or made them happy, but you know it's funny back in my day and tell me you haven't heard that line On a regular basis, and you know you're getting older when you use it because now I'm using it on a regular day back in the day
We think back in the day and, you know, again, they were good times.
You know, and I think we grew up in a great era because I've said this before, you know, I had parents and grandparents that that went through the Depression and World War Two.
And, you know, you learned a lot of valuable lessons from them about, you know, being frugal and taking care of equipment.
And, you know, I'm still like this.
I don't, I don't replace something unless it's broken and can't be fixed, you know.
And
we've lost that.
We really have.
because we've become a throwaway society.
Let's agree to that.
And it's too easy just to go out and buy a new one.
And we've lost that concept of fixing things.
You know, I think of it with farm machinery.
I think of it just at home, being at home.
I talked about re-soling shoes and you got to remember Butch's shoe repair downtown.
And just having or patching jeans.
Now it's the style to cut holes in jeans.
You know, I'd say to my daughters, what is that?
No, dad, they're more expensive that way.
I thought, no,
Well, you you've mentioned before and again, I always love when you talk about it on your Saturday night show, but the new school clothes.
So, you know, first of all, the jeans were rough.
You know, you couldn't bend them.
Oh, it really was.
And the backpack.
You got to remember the backpack.
And and I the clothes were just new, you know, you had new school clothes.
Right.
And I think that's all the big thing for us.
I'll still go back to it.
and I'm not gonna name names of my classmates because I'm in our 50th now, so we're 50 years.
But it was to have a pack of 64 crayons.
was elite.
I mean, that was the rich kids.
Yes, no, they were.
You know, you got 64.
Oh my God.
Or the better one, and I think 64 bucks might have had this.
The sharpener was in the back
and and good for it but but even the color white because light was there and they'd say what are you going to use the color white for well it does work on a darker sheet of paper you know yes and for us the big thing was the pencil it was unusual because
the erasers would go before the pencil got too short.
So he was always had and they were cool.
You'd get different types of eraser tops that you could slide over the top.
And the diamond one or what was appear I called it a pyramid top.
Those were the popular ones.
But you could get some really neat.
Of course, you had to go to ours was at the dime store.
We'd stop at the dime store.
I think they were they might have been
15 cents because they were just they might have been a face of a person
different logo or something
cartoons, obviously.
Scooby-Doo.
Scooby-Doo eraser.
Okay.
I can remember that.
And forget that.
I always gave a hard time to my friend.
He had the
Oh three inch one and it was slanted on each side so you could reverse it because he as he said to me I have to use an eraser a lot He'd have a mistake and he'd erase and of course then you'd sweep that rubber substance off onto the floor and Everything was gritty after a while.
I I do remember to the why did they make I got it?
This is one of those I don't know I can't answer this
why did they have like eight different holes on the pencil sharpener?
When almost all the pencils were the same size and they were number two lead and some of them were hexagonal and some were round.
But you know, the circles, they had like a three quarter inch diameter.
I'm going, what kind of pencil are you
sharpening?
Do they still have pencil sharpeners in classrooms?
do.
I really
think and I think you're seeing it more.
And this is just me through subbing and hearing what's going on.
And again, that would be an interesting question when you have some teachers in because they're going back to pencil and paper, you know, they're there.
Let's recognize that several districts in our area have said no cell phones, bell to bell.
And I think that's a great thing.
And you don't want to know who's the worst is the parents because they'll say how can we get a hold of our kids call the office and And then you think about it screen time it Technology is great if you use it appropriately, but too much screen time.
They're finding is just so detrimental
And again, I come back to, I mentioned it earlier as we were talking, those critical thinking skills.
And the different ways you do, whether it's hooked on phonics, whether it's remembering things by association, you know, as simple as, you know, Roy G. Bibb would be the one that everybody knows from elementary days, or to remember all the Great Lakes, Homes, H-O-M-E-S, you'd develop different skills.
I remembered Pizza Hut's telephone number because it was Larry Bird and Robert Parrish.
because if you wanted to call for Pizza Hut, and everybody says, want to be easier just to remember the number?
No, I knew if I needed to call Pizza Hut, it was 647-3300.
Larry Bird War 33.
and Robert Parrish wore double zero.
So I knew I would call Larry Bird and Robert Parrish, oh yeah, 647-3300.
That's how I remembered the numbers.
I'm accused of remembering page numbers and birth dates and where people sat in my classroom.
You'd remember it by association.
And we talked a little bit about...
weekly reader earlier, one of the few things I was good at in school is we had, we had the radio on all the time at my house.
So I always heard the news and Mike Stoddard, when we were in middle school, uh, had, he used to subscribe to new scope quiz.
I remember
those.
Yes.
Yeah.
VEC is what we had.
So new scope would be
You know, Dan Carney in seventh and eighth grade had the V and he had it up and he had some elaborate elongated name for it, which made it even more attractive.
And the big thing was, so you got to understand there were four classes.
OK, so with that being said, you know, in seventh and eighth grade, you put it together.
That's eight periods.
You don't want to leave out the answer of what the V is.
see guest figure was because you come up and you had to come up with a name.
And first hour didn't give it up to like the afternoon classes because you didn't have your social studies class till later in the afternoon.
Yeah, and so VEC.
So what was yours called again?
Newscope Quiz.
Newscope, and weekly they would send
right?
No, no, and the great, great promo here for WRCO.
Absolutely.
got to ask a question of you.
I very much enjoyed officiating for many years with Mr. Fred Dylan.
Okay.
Yeah.
And of course he, I think he still bleeds, uh, I think a purple, but you know, he did teach at Richland Center for a time period.
And I had the privilege of officiating many basketball games, but you were often a topic of conversation simply because of your football expertise.
So I've got to ask right now on the.
air is this
or urban legend, or is it a true story that he said, because you played center.
position.
That's right.
And he said, there was a time that Phil Knee came off and looked at me through the ear hole.
Is that a true story or not?
He might be embellishing
Well, I agreed.
And he would often refer to you by your Beatle Bailey look.
You know, if Beatle Bailey ever gotten a fight,
You know, he would always have arms and legs all over the
Well, first of all, you've got to you've got to give me a little credit for not backing down from the fight because I was you got to understand.
I was I was playing center about 130.
I understand.
And I always say that, you know, they cleaned off their cleats on me.
But we were the story is we were we're playing in Seneca and there was a young man that was across me that he had gained all state recognition the year before.
And and he was an animal, you know.
But the thing of it is, it's like, okay, he's over me.
They were running a five-man defensive line.
So why wasn't one of the guards helping me?
They were uncovered, so there's, you know, but anyway, he ran over a few times, you know, and I might have slowed him down, you know, just because he had to get over me or whatever.
But supposedly on the sideline, Fred says to Dan Rice,
We got to get him out of there.
They're going to kill him.
And we remembered the vintage fields for the Ridge and Valley.
They were iconic.
Wherever they were, you know, they were probably part of the baseball diamond and even part, you know, let's look back at the old football games we'd watch on TV.
When we watch sports on TV, I still remember they didn't have the pregame shows for football.
And
if you can go that far back.
I go back to when Brent Musburger.
Exactly.
Yeah.
But we would get home from church and Dairyland Jubilee
Yeah.
And I don't remember watching NBA basketball on TV.
I do remember on Saturday afternoons because college games were Wednesday night and Saturday.
as
I'm not disagreeing with that.
And you can go there for any sport.
Football included.
I'm not a Friday night college.
No.
And I know there's some.
No, or as the schedule for the 2026 season has Green Bay playing on a Wednesday night.
It's like, no, that's just not right.
No.
Before things, it's marketing.
Watching.
basketball, college basketball in the afternoon was very enjoyable.
But see, I remember too now.
So we'll go back.
It was 18 game schedule.
So we might have one game a week and four practices for high school, high school.
Yes.
And then I'll take that a step further.
We had a crow's nest in the gym where they would film the game.
And I still have and I believe Mr. Thompson at Riverdale has dating back to the early seventies, those
16 millimeter in a smaller set, smaller case, different games that are on the 16 millimeter.
So, you know, they'd have actually a film session where you could watch the film and it was remarkable to me the turnaround time because Friday night game and Monday you were watching game tape of what happened.
Of course, you couldn't get out of anything now because it's on film.
And it's there, but that was vintage, vintage high school football in the 1970s.
blurry.
And so you were hoping that it
Well, now for basketball, you always talked about sitting at the end of the bench
Okay.
And so the grounders,
you were really good at that, but you know, really a tough throw is that second base to first base throw because pivot and turn.
Well, if you take a little bit off it.
you know, it may wind up short.
And then if you throw it hard, it could go over the first baseman's head.
So that throw is more difficult than you think.
And again, when you think back to high school fields, and we can talk baseball, for example, I arguably will say that Riverdale has always had in this part of the state.
one of the best baseball fields.
play baseball on.
Jamborees.
remember that with Jim Mason
played.
That was, yeah, that was classic.
And it was a three day event and great baseball.
You know, you, you, you have that and you come to Muscatay and, and you played.
I, I, I still, so I was a first baseman.
and you maintained your area.
You had the rake, you had to take the base, you were in charge of that.
You took pride in that area.
The one I remember most, and we had three of them in SWAL, the old SWAL, we had skinned infields.
You did not like that because unlike Astroturf where you got a true bounce,
Grass maybe would give you a, you know, a cockeyed bounce.
Those skin infields would just skip.
It would just hit and skip.
And you weren't used to basketball was the notorious one closest in our area.
But you'd look at those different fields.
And I do remember this too.
And you can maybe date back to Mr. Pampoo and talk about that.
But there were a number of times that Richland Center couldn't play at Crosscut Park because it was too wet or the field wasn't in condition.
But it was always that we could play at Ithaca.
And I know Mr. Pampoo graciously would arrange for, and Ted Wheelock was the coach at center.
That's going back to the 1970s.
And Richland Center played a number of their games on an Ithaca field.
I can tell you, we played two conference games there, both my sophomore year and my senior year.
I remember playing there.
Of course, location.
Well, and let's recognize really Verne Geyshirt and the role that
played in the history of high school baseball here in our area.
And many will recall Mr. Geyshirt and the job that he did.
But I know at that time when he played, that would be Muscaday C. It wasn't Riverdale yet.
Yep.
And Muscaday like...
Ithaca they battled it out and isn't it interesting spring baseball maybe had six games back then because you played summer ball
And it was summer ball that was part of and we had some great teams in the area with Casanovia and Lone Rock and and Avoka fielded a very good baseball team.
But that was all local boys playing baseball.
enough for.
there's nine people out for baseball.
But, you know, eight man football didn't work.
No, exactly.
I appreciate that anytime.
and it's good history moments that we're talking about here.