This book is the story of a large group of football-playing teammates at their alma mater, Randolph-Macon College, in Ashland Virginia, during the period 1965-1970—the winningest six-year run in program history there. It has been written to rekindle recall of the halcyon days of their youth, before all their collective memories fade to black. They were bulletproof back then, but now have grown all too familiar with their manifold limitations.
It is said that one dies twice. The first time is when your heart stops beating, and the second is when the last person utters your name. This book enables these teammates to equip all their grandchildren and great-grandchildren with the story of a shared past, so as to push the inevitable a little further into the future.
The newspaper accounts included here are faithfully re-created, in hopes that those who didn’t keep scrapbooks will, long after the fact, be able to have their own. Piecing together events now fifty years old has been at once frustrating and stimulating, and at last very satisfying. In every case where the author may have unintentionally slighted someone, sincere and humble apology is offered. The three-year Conversation that took place among old friends—mostly by email—sparked their mutual memories, and was a thoroughly joyous experience for all who took part.
Although this exercise has produced an item that may capture the imagination of friends and teammates, it perhaps will have limited appeal to a broader audience. Student-athletes who attended one of the many colleges Randolph-Macon opposed on the gridiron during 1965-1970 may find it to be of peripheral interest, at least. Many of those men will find their names and athletic exploits recounted in the six-year saga.
If you attended Randolph-Macon’s arch rival Hampden-Sydney College, you may find the editorial rants of the author a little abrasive at first, but in the final analysis his underlying respect for your fine school must certainly shine through. The author intends to undertake another book that has long needed writing, THE GAME Itself—Ludus ipse, so if you’re an alum of the garnet and gray extraction who might like to conspire in that effort with an old Yellow Jacket, please contact Tom Harleman!
Written in six parts, one for each year of the run—the tale recounts the experiences of the very flower of American youth … men long since advanced into their golden years. The unofficial soundtrack for this work is Bruce Springsteen’s Glory Days—a song that inspired its title, in fact. The Big Man is gone but not forgotten, Bruce. He was a football player, too, and from the author’s neck of the woods, Tidewater, Virginia.
Lastly, the author holds that playing football in their college days was certainly not the only thing, and probably not the greatest thing most of these men ever accomplished. Small-college football is just a part of life … not a way of life! It was, nonetheless, a wonderful adventure, and for Tom Harleman quite a magical experience, as it transpired at the very most exciting time of his life. He thinks—in fact he’s sure—he didn’t realize that at the time. His worldview was admittedly myopic, and his situational awareness somewhat less than perfect.
Thanks, teammates, for the memories of a lifetime.
