Florida Spring Training, 1976 and 1977

BY CHUCK JOHANNINGSMEIER ’77

ALL I HAD IN MY MIND was the prospect of leaving the cold and snow of Ashburnham behind, spending two weeks with my teammates having fun, seeing parts of the country I’d never seen before—and, oh, also playing baseball. Fortunately for me, I got to do all of these things not once but twice, in both 1976 and 1977.

What I have only recently learned, as a result of two long phone calls with McGowan and Sanborn (both now semi-retired) is that these trips were the result of their shared desire to improve Cushing’s baseball program. One major obstacle to attaining this goal, they believed, was the long New England winter, which usually prevented the team from getting much practice time until shortly before the season’s first game. To help remedy this situation, they dreamed of getting an indoor pitching mound, a batting machine, and a net to protect the interior of the Heslin Gymnasium from batted balls so that we could practice during the winter. At a time when funds were very scarce at Cushing, though, the high price tags for these items seemed to put them very much out of reach. It was then that McGowan hit on the idea of raising money by grilling hamburgers, cheeseburgers, and hot dogs on the porch of Lowe Hall every Friday and Saturday night, weather permitting, and selling them to hungry stu- dents. Purchasing the supplies wholesale from the Cushing food service, McGowan sold the hamburgers and hot dogs for 50¢ each; cheeseburgers could be had for 65¢. For a great many students who attended Cushing during those years, the memory of biting into a hot, delicious late-evening snack while hanging out with friends on that porch remains quite vivid.

But for players on the baseball team, the funds raised from these grilling sessions—as well as from the raffle tickets they sold—would lead to even greater memories. Enough money was taken in not only to purchase the pitching machine and net (the Cushing maintenance crew was able to build a makeshift mound out of lumber scraps) but also to subsidize something McGowan and Sanborn had only imagined in their wildest dreams: a trip to Florida for spring training, just like the pros did each year.

The Cushing trips, of course, resembled the pros’ warmweather experiences only in broad outline. For one thing, we rode not in airplanes but in the two Econoline vans the school owned. We also did not stay in high-end hotels; our lodgings were typically much more humble. Our meals were purchased cheap and in bulk. The only truly professional-looking part of our team’s experience was getting to wear snazzy new polyester uniforms, which thanks to the generosity of alum John Biggs ’33 had replaced the wool uniforms I wore during my sophomore year.

But no one on the team would have thought of complaining about anything. After all, because of the success of the coaches’ and players’ fundraising efforts, each player received round-trip transportation to Florida during spring break, lodging for about 12 nights, meals, and a variety of fun excursions—all for the very low price of approximately $110. A real bargain, even then!

What really made the coaches’ and players’ dreams come true was the invaluable assistance of Mr. William D. Barry, father of Bill Barry, one of the players on the 1976 team. In a letter to McGowan during the winter before the first trip, Barry offered to help make the arrangements for a team trip to Florida, which he had heard from his son was something the coaches were considering. The coaches, of course, wrote back to say they would welcome his aid. Amazingly, McGowan still has the letter Barry sent a month or so later; in it he provided addresses and phone numbers of his contacts all up and down the East Coast who would be willing to provide lodging, baseball fields, teams to play against, and so forth. (This letter, I might mention, was a powerful reminder to me of how things got arranged in the pre-Internet age!)

So finally, in the early morning hours of Saturday, Mar. 13, 1976, the team assembled at the vans parked next to Lowe Hall, put our gear inside, and took to the road. Our first stops each year were in Hadley, Mass.; in 1976 we picked up player Jeff Mish ’76 at his home, and in 1977 we picked up David Farnham ’77, who lived in the same neighborhood. At both houses, the parents welcomed us and generously fed huge amounts of delicious breakfast food to our hungry pack of teenage boys to keep us satisfied for the long drive ahead. Dinner that first night was at the home of Dan McGowan’s parents near Bridgeton, N.J. And then came a long stretch of driving that brought us to our first night’s stop: Burlington, N.C. Here, a business associate of Mr. Barry’s paid for us to stay two nights at the local Hilton Inn and also arranged for us to play baseball at the Elon College facilities. I will never forget waking up on my first morning in North Carolina, walking outside with my teammate Steve Jordan without any jacket on, and smelling spring in the air—a good month before either thing would be possible in Ashburnham.

During our day or two in North Carolina we not only got to practice outdoors, but we also drove around the Duke University campus, had dinner at the home of Betsy

Farnham ’76, and even took a tour of a cigarette factory (which Mr. Barry had described in his letter as “an educational experience for the team”). From there we headed to Charleston, S.C., where we put our sleeping bags on mattresses at the Charleston Army Depot. At Jacksonville Beach, Fla., we stayed four to a room in a hotel within walking distance of the beach; each room cost a whopping $14 a night! In that area, too, we played an actual game against a team from Episcopal High School. Although we held our own, it was clear to all of us that this team was really good (as were all the teams we played in Florida); being semi-intelligent teenagers, we figured out that this must have been due to the fact that they got to play outdoors all year round.

The long van trip south didn’t vary a great deal from 1976 to 1977. But what was quite different was our ultimate destination or home base (so to speak!) in Florida, where our days were chiefly focused on playing baseball. In 1976, we stayed in the National Guard Armory in Lakeland, Fla., and scrimmaged against a number of local teams. The next year, we got to stay at and attend the Fort Lauderdale began. And we certainly did play a good bit of baseball. But recent conversations with my former teammates Lew Goldstein and David Farnham have confirmed for me that what the majority of the players likely remember best are the great times we had off the field. Going to Disney World. Visiting a Gulf Coast beach near Tampa. Seeing the Detroit Tigers (in Lakeland) and New York Yankees (in Fort Lauderdale) at their training camps. Eating at a string of all-you-could-eat restaurants (a wise choice, this, given the caloric intake necessary to keep teenage boys full!). Hanging out at Daytona Beach along with thousands

Baseball School and Camp, based at Boca Raton Community College, for an entire week. Clearly, the fundraising efforts had gone very well that year, because despite this camp costing $130 per person, the amount each player on the team had to pay was the same as the year before.

My teammate Lew Goldstein ’77 recalled recently that what he remembers most about this baseball school/camp was “how incredibly well done the sessions were.” I would second that, and add that those were the best baseball fields I have ever played on in my life, with no depressions in the infield grass or pebbles in the stone dust, as we had back home in Ashburnham. The stiff competition we faced from other teams was also an excellent incentive for improving our skills. What I remember best, though, is watching Lew stump one of the instructors, former New York Yankee Steve Whitaker, with numerous questions about his teammates’ batting, pitching, and running statistics back in the 1960s; it was abundantly clear to all of us watching this conversation that Lew clearly knew more about Whitaker’s team than he did!

The ostensible purpose of these trips, of course, was to give us an edge on all our New England opponents who couldn’t get much outdoor practice time before the season of college students. Almost four decades after his trip, David recalled to me with a laugh how much fun he and some other players had at Daytona with teammate Glen Kimball ’77, who had brought a scary Halloween mask with him and put it on to walk down the beach, much to the surprise of passers-by. Lew distinctly remembers how at Disney World, because everyone knew he didn’t want to go on a roller-coaster, they got him to wait in line with them by convincing him that the Matterhorn ride was just a moving walkway/3D experience (he did go on it, but he closed his eyes the entire ride).

And who could forget the long van rides themselves? In the days before iPods, cell phones, or even Walkmans, what we had to keep us entertained was AM radio, blasting at high volume to reach the back seats. I still think of those trips, in fact, whenever I hear the song “Oh What a Night…” by Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, a new release that got a lot of airtime on various radio stations during one trip. Open windows were our only air conditioning. Sleeping was especially difficult: at a time when seat belts were not mandatory, we either stretched out on the bench seats or lay on the floor, parallel to the seats. The most coveted position, actually, was the one where

Coach Dan McGowan in 1976

BOTTOM you could lay your head against the warm engine cowling up front and put your legs under the first one or two bench seats. Lew, David, and I also distinctly remember how fun the trip home was in 1977 when, shortly after the accompanying picture was taken, we all piled into the vans and drove almost non-stop back to Ashburnham. How coaches McGowan and Sanborn did this with only about a twohour nap at a rest area in Virginia still boggles my mind.

I’m unsure whether or not getting to play baseball for a few weeks in a warmer climate these two years translated into more baseball victories for my two teams during the season back up north. Eventually, the dream of creating, in Sanborn’s words, “a premier baseball program that would make Cushing stand out to prospective student players” was definitely realized, and maybe this was due in part to our having established a tradition of taking the team south over spring break: in the years since that time, under the able coaching of Wayne Hancock, the baseball squad has perennially been one of the top-ranked prep teams in New England. The two teams I played on, alas, could not exactly have been described in such terms!

To me, though, and I think the rest of the players would agree, the real “payoff” from these trips can’t really be measured in games won or improved batting and pitching stats. Looking back, Sanborn says, “The really fun part was taking kids on a whole different experience, especially the ones who had never traveled much before.” McGowan similarly recalls that the best part for him was

“seeing the number of players who enjoyed the trips, and building the relationships with the kids.” Sanborn notes, too, that at many alumni events over the years, former players have come up to him and reminisced about these and other spring training trips.

Looking at my senior Penguin yearbook the other day, I saw that one teammate, Scott Berube ’77, had written, “Never forget Florida,” and Lew Goldstein wrote, in part, “Thank you for your singing performance in Florida.” While I’m hoping my singing exploits are now long forgotten, I’m glad that I still have so many vivid memories from those weeks. As one of the “kids” McGowan and Sanborn talk about, I can say that truly, those trips are an indelible part of my “dear old Cushing days.”

And since in my self-centered teenage years I didn’t have a clue what it took to make those trips and memories happen, I’d like to take the opportunity now to say a huge thank you to coaches McGowan and Sanborn, who gave up so much of their time during the school year, as well as their spring breaks (a big thanks, too, to their wives, Ruth and Jeannie, who sacrificed precious time with their husbands!). I’m sure that I, and most of my teammates, while we might wince at the prospect of sleeping on thin mattresses at National Guard armories, prefer to fly instead of ride in cramped vans for hours on end, and be extremely sore from playing baseball for more than twenty minutes in a day, would jump at the chance to take that trip again if we could.