Don Engler, Michigan — I retired December 31, 2003. Now we can go visit our kids & grandkids and not have to worry about burning up vacation days. Our oldest daughter lives in Baltimore, with husband Rick and her kids, Bryanna (12) & Amanda (8).

Cheryl is Global Accounts Manager for T. Rowe Price and Rick works for a courier service. Bryanna is big into AAU basketball and her team (Dad is the Coach) has gone to the Nationals the last two years as 10-year-olds and this year as 11-year-olds. She might have a future in basketball if she keeps growing, 5'4" in 7th grade.

Middle daughter Lori lives outside of The Woodlands, north-west of Bush International-Houston. She is the registered nurse for an elementary school with about 600 kids. Kevin works for EDS and has about 70 employees working for him around the country. Both are doing very well. Ashley is 14 and in 9th grade, on the Varsity Cross Country team, and has been on the basketball teams the past two years. Kelsey is 13, 8th grade, currently playing volleyball & will be playing basketball soon. Zachary, 12 in 7th grade, is†running cross country now and will be playing basketball soon. They have two horses the girls spend lots of time with, including Lori, and they have two Rhodesian Ridgebacks in the family.

Son Brad is with a small company in Indianapolis which contracts with Indiana counties bringing properties up to speed on the tax rules, then buys and sells property, doing very well at this point. His wife, Andrea, is coordinator of student orientation at IUPUI. Alex, 8 now in 3rd grade, has been in figure skating and now swimming. Scott, in kindergarten, also has been figure skating and now swimming. So there you have it, a quick synopsis of our kids and grandkids.

Jan and I stay very busy these days. She's into her exercise routine daily and going to Curves. She has been doing some special sewing for some friends making draperies for their houses. She still has that special sewing talent. When polyester fabrics were popular, she made all my clothes for me, but that's quite a few semesters ago. We are both very active in our church and getting ready for a huge building program moving the church and our Day School about 7-8 miles from where we have been since 1956. In the summer my golf partner and I keep very busy going to various venues in the state, probably 3-4 days per week.

I'm getting ready to start my 31st season coaching our school's 7th-8th grade boys basketball team. It still is fun working with this age group and I'll continue as long as it is fun and I can relate to the kids. Being 67 now, some day they might want a younger man to coach them. When our season ends on 2/24/07, Jan and I will go the MSU-IU game here that night and then take off for Texas on Sunday after church. We've been spending the better part of March at Lori and Kevin's the past three years since I retired.

Well, there is a quick snapshot of The Engler family. How about the Boone family? So you get back to campus to see many football games or basketball games? I haven't gotten back to anything since the 20-year reunion they had for the 1961 team. Just seems like something always has been in the way.

Oh, last September, Charlie and Corky were here and we had them over to catch up on them and their kids. Fun talking about all the times we had, especially the basketball team. Well, so much for now. I'll get to the blog and see what's on there. Nice to hear from you and hope to see you in the near future. Where do you live now? Still in the Central Indiana area? How about your family? Fill us in please. Take care, Don.

Posted by Jim Amidon at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Posted by Bill Boone '60 at 08:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tom Bennett soars for two

Charlie lays one in

Posted by Bill Boone '60 at 08:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Other names come to mind when I remember the Bowerman era of Wabash basketball, and each deserves a paragraph. It is my hope that some will read this record and add their remembrances to this short trip down memory lane about Wabash basketball in the 50's. Jim Cumming was a classmate, teammate, and Phi Delt brother who played three years on the varsity with Charlie. Jim or "Wilt" as Charlie nicknamed him was the big man of the team-all 6'4 of him. Wilt was solid player, a good rebounder who ranks in the top ten in rebounding in several categories. He averaged 11.7 rebounds in his senior year and had 538 for his career. He had single game highs of 23 against Illinois Tech his junior year and 22 against McMurray that same year. He was a ferocious rebounder and never backed off from bigger, stronger players. Jim was the only player during my years at Wabash who could dunk the ball and when he got free, he really threw it down. Jim was able to balance the demands of a grueling basketball practice with the long hours of a pre-Med program.

Several players stand out in my mind for one reason or another and I will just note an item or two that stick in my mind. Tom Bennett was a member of the class of 1960 and played four years on the varsity. If I recall correctly, he started every game he played at Wabash, some 82 in all. Tom was a wonderful athlete and could have played any sport. He ran track a couple of years and also played golf. He ended his 4-year career just ahead of Charlie with 1,439 points. Duane Axel was one of the members of the "Wonder Five" who has already been mentioned along the way. He was a good shooter and a very intelligent basketball player. He was unselfish and thought about the team first. Mike Costello was one of the Lafayette Jeff players who came to Wabash when I was there. I don't think Mike ever played up to his potential. One day he missed practice because he fell off the front porch of the Delt house and suffered severe lacerations of the butt when he broke a bottle he had in his back pocket. I never did know what was in the bottle. Yeah, right. Jim Price made occasional trips to the end of the bench with the "Wonder Five," but he never got a permanent place because Coach Brock kept starting him occasionally. Once that happened, it took some time for a player to reclaim his place with the irregulars. Jim was from Logansport and had a great high school career. He played in spurts at Wabash. Some times he shot well and played and other times, he watched. Don "Honk" Engler from Benton Harbor was a pure shooter. When he was on, he could fill it up. He was a lot of fun to play with and always kept things loose in practice. I think he transferred in for his last two years. Charlie will have to help me on him. He and Jim Price were Sigma Chis and always came to practice telling us what went on during the latest Huckleberry Hound cartoon. He would imitate Huckleberry Hound and Jim would imitate Boo-Boo. It was a real hoot.

            Sherm Franz 1959                                        John Hollett 1959

Some of the older guys on the team were Bob "Wedgie" Wedgeworth, John Hollett, and Sherm Franz. I will never forget the day that Wedgie went to Indianapolis for his Selective Service physical. He was the only black basketball player in my four years at Wabash and was a great guy. He came back from his physical before practice was over and completely broke up the team and coaches. When someone asked him how the physical went, he broke into the biggest smile I ever saw, held up his right hand and proudly proclaimed, "I flunked-no trigger finger." Wedgie had put his index finger in the spokes of a moving bicycle wheel when he was little and had lost the finger. It didn't interfere with his shot in basketball, but I guess the doctor figured it would be a hindrance on the rifle range. When we played DePauw, Wedgie always wanted to guard "Bing" Davis, the only black that DePauw ever had while I was playing. They had some tremendous battles and although Bing was several inches taller than Wedgie, the advantage usually went to our guy. Sherm Franz was a big (6"5) lefthander from Scottsburg who had some outstanding games for us. I remember one night against St. Joe at Wabash that Sherm really took control and scored over 20 points and was a demon on the boards. John Hollett was a great streak shooter from someplace in Indy, Shortridge I think, who had the smallest hands of any 6"3 player I ever saw. He couldn't even palm the ball and therefore couldn't dunk it. John was also an outstanding tennis player, but was pretty casual about basketball. He seemed to play at the same level all the time. He never really pushed himself, not even in Phys-Chem or comps.

These are some of my memories of my basketball career at Wabash in the late 50’s, beginning in 1956 and ending in 1960. As you read my reminiscences, I hope you come up with some of your own. It seems to me that as I have met with old friends over the years and we have talked about the old times, we all seem to remember different things and need each other to get the whole picture. When you come up with new memories, send them to me and I’ll add them to the narrative. If you know where the Brockmen of the 50’s are now and what they are doing, send me a note and I’ll try to get this literary gem to them.

Here are the ones I remember. Add to the list if I have missed any. If you know anything about their careers, add it to the list.

Ben Fellerhoff—

Hal Traviola—

Jack Kudlaty—Deceased

Sherm Franz—

Bucky Dennis—

Mike Costello—

Bob Wedgeworth—

John Hollett--

Jack Yerkes--

Duane Axel—May be retired from Insurance Sales, but still lives in Kendallville, IN

Dave Kohn—

Tom Bennett—Lives in Arizona. Coached at Mesa Verde Junior College and won National Championship. Has been inducted into the Wabash College Hall of Fame and the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame

Charlie West—

Whitey Wilcox—Deceased

Don Engler—

Gary Jouris—

Rusty Nichols—Recently retired as President of Hanover College

Jim Wood—Lives in Florida

Jim Price--

Jim Cumming—Doctor in Indy

Charlie Bowerman—Recently retired from Phillips 66, living in Bartellsville, OK. Member of the Wabash College Hall of Fame and the Indiana High Basketball Hall of Fame.

Rusty Cleland—

Jim Wells--

Frank Cassell—

Bill Dickerson—

Bob Templin—

Joe Beal—

Bob Hainje—

Jim Johnson—

Bill Wilson--

Posted by Howard Hewitt at 09:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My other contribution to Wabash was my presence on the Wonder Five. Wabash has had five great teams that won championships and were referred to as the Wabash Wonder Five, but only Dave "Whitey" Wilcox, Duane Axel, Jim Price, Charlie West, and Bill Boone remember the Wonder Five of the 50's. We were the five that sat on the end of the bench and

                                             Charlie West--1961

  "Wondered" if we would get into the game that night. Most of the time we got in when the game was either lost or won. We got to go in and mop up. Duane Axel played a lot his junior year and looked forward to starting his senior year until the Wizard of Alamo showed up. It didn't take Ax too long to see that his days on the floor were numbered, but he cheerfully became a member of the Wonder Five. One of the contributions of the Wonder Five was to play the opponent's defense in preparation for the game. We decided that if we weren't going to play in the game, we would make the starters work as hard as we could to get ready for the actual game. The practice time was our chance to make a contribution and we did our best to help the team. Duane Axel provided my most embarrassing moment in my athletic career, topping even striking out in the bottom of the seventh with the bases loaded one day. As I have reported, we always sat together on the end of the bench and tried to stay in the game as much as possible. One night in a close game, Axel turned to me and said, "Boone, the coach wants you." I took off my warm ups, left my seat on the bench and went to Coach Brock for my instructions that would undoubtedly preserve the game for Dear Old Wabash. When I got there, Coach Brock looked surprised and said, "Boone, what in the H_ _ _ are you doing here." I wanted to dig a hole and pull it in after me. I had been had-big time. Axel and I have laughed about that one many times

Several incidents stick out in my mind about different ball games that Charlie Bowerman played in. I don't remember most of the opponents or where the incidents took place, but the incidents are vividly etched in my mind and now they are on paper so others can laugh about them too. Charlie had very little tolerance for bad referees or inferior opponents. He had a real killer instinct and strove for perfection in every facet of the game. If others didn't, they were in trouble. I can remember several times when referees would make bad calls on Charlie or one of his teammates. Charlie would always end up with the ball and when the referee would turn around to inform the bench, he would get hit in the head with a long pass from Johnny Unitas, who then put on the most innocent look as if it were impossible for such a nice guy to do something like that. He never got caught.

At other times a defensive player would try to guard Charlie too close and Charlie would protect the ball by putting it back over his head and to one side. As soon as the defender got his nose too close to the elbow of the "Assassin of Alamo"-you guessed it. He got hit in the nose and usually ended up getting called for the foul in addition to the shot in the nose. CB was a fierce competitor and protected the ball at all times using any method. He was difficult to tie up even when surrounded by defenders because he always kept the ball moving until one of the defenders slapped him on the arm trying to get the ball.

I can still see the incident in my mind's eye from my seat on the end of the bench the night when Dwight "Ike" Tallman, a football tackle was playing high post for the hated DePauw Dannies basketball team. Tallman, who was about 6'5 and 260 pounds, had set a pick at the top of the key for Charlie's man. As Charlie slid over the pick, he reached back and casually, but with some enthusiasm struck the cup-less Tallman in the portion of his anatomy where he should have been wearing a cup, at least that night. The infuriated Tallman chased the "Wizard of Alamo" the rest of the game trying to get close enough to even the score, which was obviously 2-0, without attracting the attention of one of the referees. It completely destroyed his game, his poise, and his ego, but Charlie just kept playing as if nothing had happened. We had some real battles with the Dannies my junior and senior years. Sometimes I got to watch. Sometimes I got to play. One of my proudest moments was at a game down at DePauw, when there were three County boys on the floor at the same time. There was Charlie, either Rusty Nichols or Gary Jouris and me. It was a great moment. It was at the end of the game (That's why I was in there) and we won.

Charlie was at his best in big games and against traditional rivals. In those days, that was Butler and DePauw because we played them home and home each year. It really rankled Charlie that Butler's legendary coach Tony Hinkle didn't recruit him because he thought he was too small and too slow. The ledger versus the Bulldogs read Wabash 4 Butler 2 in three years of competition, including the 5 overtime win in 1959-60 when three players played the whole game. Two were County boys Charlie and Richard Haffner from New Ross who along with teammate Bernie Burk had gone to Butler to play basketball and study to become coaches under Tony Hinkle. The other player to play the whole game was Orville Bose of Butler.

What do I remember about the 5 overtime game? I wish I could verify this by some kind of record like the film of the game, but unfortunately the cameraman ran out of film before the 5th overtime when I finally got into the game because somebody fouled out. I'm sure nobody remembers but me that I stole a pass to help set up the winning basket. Can't prove it, but it happened. Oh well, this isn't about me. Charlie was even more amazing that night than usual. He scored 53 points and played the whole game. He was playing just as hard at the end of the game as he was at the beginning. He wasn't fast, but he sure was quick and understood the game as well as anyone I ever played with or against. At one time, we attributed his endurance to a resting heart rate of 62. I think it was because he chewed on a piece of gauze instead of gum. J. Owen Huntsman said he would have made a great distance runner with that low heart rate. The picture of Charlie running a Marathon seems a little out of focus to me.

Ah, J. Owen Huntsman. That name takes me back to some more stories about Charlie: now Tom Bennett from Southport, a protégé of Blackey Braden enters the narrative. Charlie, Tom, and I were all planning to coach. Tom and I did, but Charlie went on to his career with Phillips 66. We must have taken 3 or 4 courses with J. Owen, all in his office, which as I recall was right next to George Mahorney's equipment room. George was a marvel. He worked at Wabash for 15-20 years and knew everybody's name.  To George, everybody's name coaches and athletes alike, was "Brother"  and that's what he called us. 

George Mahorney is honored at his retirement.

When we went to J. Owen's office to learn about the theory of basketball, baseball and football, the discussion always got around to the same topic--his sons. Stan and Jerry Huntsman were two outstanding athletes for Wabash in the early 50's. Stan was the youngest and was a powerful running back and trackman, even competing in the Decathlon trials at Wabash in 1956. He went on to coach track at several colleges and recently ended his illustrious career at Austin, Texas coaching track at the University of Texas. Jerry quarterbacked the undefeated Little Giant football team of 1951 or 1952 and went on to coach at Covington High School, Crawfordsville High School and Indiana State Teacher's College, now Indiana State University. J. Owen was justifiably proud of his two sons and could launch into stories about them at anytime. When the three of us met to go to his office for class, we kidded each other by saying, "Here we go, it's time for our class-Stan and Jerry I and II." We learned a lot about the offense of the New York Celtics which J. Owen either played on or coached and guaranteed us that their offense could get a lay-up every time against any zone defense in the land. He even diagrammed the offense on the board while we dutifully took notes about everything he said. You know what coaches say? "The last guy with the chalk wins." Tom Bennett must have taken better notes than I did. He ended up coaching at a Jr. College in Arizona-Mesa Grande or something like that and won the National Juco Championship, I think. Anyway he had a great coaching career. He is going into the Wabash College Athletic Hall of Fame this year so it will be good to see him again and relive some great days and listen to some old Wabash stories.

Well, back to the 5 overtime game. It was the most exciting game I ever watched or played in. I'll have to check, but I think Charlie broke all the Wabash scoring records that night as he scored 53 points. I also recall seeing one of the most amazing rescues I ever saw in any athletic contest. I think some alert photographer got a picture of it and put it in the paper. Ken Pennington was a big, strong post man for Butler and very agile for a big man. I think he was from Rochester, Indiana. As I recall, Orville Bose got faked off his feet and jumped up and came down on the back of the shooter. He got turned around upside down and was heading for a nasty fall, in which he would have certainly hit his head on the floor. Pennington had the strength and the presence of mind to grab him by the shirt and hold him like a person would hold a suitcase until he could let him down easy. He really saved his teammate from a serious injury.

What else do I remember about Charlie? He had a little routine that he went through before every game he would sit down and read a passage from his Bible in his motel room before every game. He said that his Dad gave him some passages to read and think about. I also remember the time that we were getting ready to go on a basketball trip when John Currier walked up to the bus. I can't remember whether John was a manager or a sportswriter for The Bachelor. Charlie lured him over to the bus and I cut off his tie with a knife or pair of scissors. He looked pretty funny with only three inches of tie left below the knot. As I look back at it now, it was a pretty stupid trick. We used to go the game room where the Wabash bookstore is now and play Ping-Pong in the afternoons. I could win some of those games because I had played a lot of ping pong while I was growing up. We had a ping pong table at the IOOF lodge hall, one at my house, and several at the high school, so I had played a lot of ping pong. I was not exactly the Forest Gump of the 50's, but I played a lot. We also played baseball together at Wabash for three years. Charlie always said that baseball was his fun season. He enjoyed baseball, but loved basketball. He worked a lot harder at basketball than he did at baseball and Ping-Pong.

Charlie talked a lot about his Dad and always called him "Picks." I guess that's what everybody at Alamo called Tom Bowerman, who coached at Alamo for over 30 years. I think that name referred to the fact that Tom was as skinny as a toothpick. I remember Charlie telling me once that he was shooting baskets late one night. Charlie's Dad had evidently put up a lighted goal at their house. (Probably the only electric light in Alamo at that time) Anyway, Charlie had come home from a date with his beloved "Corky" (The only girl he ever dated). He decided to shoot some hoops before going to bed. He had been shooting for a while when, as he related it to me, "Picks jumped out from behind a bush and screamed like an Indian; he almost scared me to death." Charlie really loved and respected his Dad and talked about his coaching philosophy a great deal. Charlie would have made a great coach. He would have been just like his Dad. He even shot his free throws underhanded, just because his Dad had a rule that everybody had to shoot a certain percentage on free throws or shoot them his way-underhanded. Charlie became an excellent free throw shooter shooting that way and just never changed.

Charlie still holds several Wabash records. The two top single game scoring marks are his. He scored 63 points his senior year against Illinois-Chicago and 53 in the 5 overtime game against Butler his junior year. He scored 1,408 points in his career, which spanned only three years and would have scored a lot more if the three-point arc had been in existence. He scored many of his points on high-arching two hand set shots from well beyond what is now the three-point line. He loved to shoot from "downtown." His 22.0 scoring average is still tops on the list. I'm sure that the records he cherishes most are the team records of 42-22 for his three years on the varsity and three appearances in the NCAA small-college tournament.

Posted by Howard Hewitt at 09:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Bill Boone '60 - Charlie Bowerman, the Wizard of Alamo, the sportswriters called him. He was the original proof of the statement that "White men can't jump," or run or play defense. However, that "White Man" could shoot and pass and dribble the ball like nobody else I ever played with or against. He was so intense, so relentless, and so determined that he should have been called "The Assassin of Alamo." If he had been 6'9, he would have been the Larry Bird of his day. He was a truly gifted basketball player and made everybody on the floor a better player. Anyone who didn't watch him when he had the ball ran the risk of getting hit in the head with the ball or in the case of Rusty Cleland, in the chest. How many times in practice did Charlie whip a pass into the post and drill Rusty right in the chest?

Charlie and I went to different schools together. He was an Alamo Warrior and I was a Ladoga Canner in the late 50's when there were still ten small schools in Montgomery County. To be quite honest, I don't remember much about playing against Charlie in high school. I think that Alamo always played Ladoga at Ladoga because we had pretty good fan support and Alamo's gym was quite small. Charlie was a junior and I was a senior when we played the last time at Ladoga. I seem to remember that the game was close for three quarters with Alamo holding a lead going into the last quarter (I'll have to check my scrapbook) and then we put on a furious rally to win going away.

I remember getting several easy baskets that night off missed free throws. In those days, the free throw lane only six feet wide. It really did look like a keyhole. The old-time radio announcers referred to it as the key and some announcers today refer to a player shooting from the "top of the key" even though the free throw circle and the lane doesn't look anything like a keyhole anymore. The rules makers ruined my game when they widened the lane to twelve feet. It really looked weird to see the lines extend straight down from the free throw circle to the respective end line. The international lines look even stranger as they go at an angle to end line to widen out the post area even more. The other rule change that killed me was when they gave both inside positions to the defense on all free throws. The rules used to give one inside space to each team. That was a great advantage to the shooting team. One player was only three feet away from a score on every free throw. When there was a foul on the other end of the floor, I would sprint to our end to get one of those inside positions. We had some really bad foul shooters my senior year (I include myself in that category) and a lot of free throws just rolled off to one side or the other--easy pickings for the player with the inside position. I remember getting several easy put backs that night as we rallied to beat the Warriors.

After I graduated in 1956, I went off to Wabash to study and become a coach and Charlie finished his senior year at Alamo.  I played basketball my freshman year at Wabash and made the traveling team, but didn't play enough to letter. We had several juniors that year including Benny Fellerhoff from Muncie Central and Hal Traviola, a football player who played basketball like he played football. The returning sophomore lettermen were Sherm Franz, Mike Costello, John Hollett, Bucky Dennis, and Bob Wedgeworth. We also had a freshman sensation from Southport named Tom Bennett who came in and made an immediate impact on Little Giant basketball. I'll say more about these Little Giants later on.

When I remember Charlie Bowerman, I think immediately of all the hours we spent before practice playing HORSE, going one on one, and playing keep-a-way. When we played HORSE, the wager was always the same--loser buys the winner a coke at the Scarlet Inn. Did I ever win, you ask? All I can say is that Charlie never spent a nickel in the Scarlet Inn his junior year. I have no doubt that after I graduated in 1960, he probably found another FISH (That's slang meaning someone you can always beat) to play HORSE with. My guess is that it was Rusty Nichols, during Charlie's senior year. When we played one-on-one, the result was the same; he always won. If I played him tight he drove on me, if I backed off, he shot the deadly two-hand set shot over me. He always won. After we tired of playing those two games, he wanted to play keep-away. He would dribble the ball like Marcus Haynes and I would be like Red Plotz and try to take it away from him. It never happened. The Harlem Globetrotters always beat the Washington Generals and Alamo always beat Ladoga when we were at Wabash. Do you remember seeing the movie about the Harlem Globetrotters? I'm sure Charlie must have watched it a dozen times. At one point on a long bus trip in bad weather, the bus got stuck and after spinning its wheels for a long time, Goose Tatum, a favorite of Abe Saperstein walked up to where the coach was sitting and asked in a slow Southern drawl, "How many more miles now, Abe?" Charlie played the Goose on one of our long bus trips and asked Coach Brock, "How many more miles now, Abe?" Coach Brock cracked up. Only Charlie could have gotten away with that with the curmudgeonly coach of the Little Giants.

During practice, we ran a lot of three line drills for conditioning and ball handling (Do basketball coaches still use the same drills?). After one group went it jogged back on the outside of the regular floor waiting for the other groups to finish. It seemed like we ran for hours. To break the monotony, Charlie and I played Johnny Unitas and Raymond Berry. Whoever ended up with the ball was Johnny U. and the other one was Raymond Berry. We worked on our long, full-court passes on the way back. It may have seemed like horseplay to some, but Coach Brock never yelled at us, but then he never yelled at Charlie. He sure yelled at me a lot. Coaches seem to know who they can get on to make everybody work. That was probably a part of my contribution to Wabash College basketball.

Posted by Howard Hewitt at 09:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)