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After a long summer, fall can mean a nice, if brief, reprieve from the heat. It can also mean a chance to pull jackets and sweaters out of the closet or to enjoy a hot beverage.
Probably more than anything, in the Southeast fall means college football season. Fans across the Suwannee Valley will sport their school colors on Saturdays, ready to give or receive some friendly ribbing on Sunday mornings.
But even when they put us on opposing sides, sports have a way of reminding people we’re all part of the same community. Rivalries and good old-fashioned grudge matches are always fun. But once the game is over, we’re reminded of the passions we share for the sport and good competition.
A great example of that can be found right here at SVEC. Our employees can be as rabid for their teams as anyone. Just ask Lineman Russell Summers and Technician Bill Roberts, whose fandom is featured in this month’s newsletter. But when the final whistle blows, both of them are dedicated to the same thing: doing their best to serve our members and our community.
That’s a goal we all share, and one each of our employees truly takes to heart. You don’t have to look further than SVEC’s recent donation of more than $11,000 to the United Way of Suwannee Valley to see it in action.
Cooperative employees raised more than $6,000 for the United Way, allowing SVEC to secure a $5,000 matching grant from CoBank. Those contributions will help pay for health care, education and financial programs that benefit those most in need in our community.
It’s just one of the ways cooperative employees are doing what they can to improve their community — and one of the many reasons it’s great to be a member of the SVEC team.
Suwannee Valley Electric Cooperative employees once again showed their commitment to the community by raising $11,027 for the United Way of Suwannee Valley.
Employees raised $6,027 through the cooperative’s annual employee giving campaign. The fundraising effort qualified SVEC to offer the United Way an additional $5,000 from a CoBank matching grant. It was the second year in a row that SVEC qualified for the grant.
CoBank, which is part of the Farm Credit System, provides loans, leases and financing for agriculture-related businesses and rural utility providers. The bank donates $3 million annually to match charitable contributions made by cooperatives and other customers.
“We appreciate the relationship we have with SVEC,” says Chris Dampier, president of the United Way board of directors. “SVEC employees conduct a tremendous United Way campaign. To be able to secure matching funds from CoBank is just another bonus for the
benefit of our community residents in need of services.”
The contribution is part of SVEC’s ongoing efforts to make the community a great place to live.
“SVEC has a deep concern for the well-being of others in our community,” says SVEC Chief Executive Officer Mike McWaters. “Every year, our employees make generous contributions to the United Way through a variety of fundraising activities.”
The money will help fund local United Way-affiliated agencies that provide the community with assistance through health care, education and financial programs.
Rita Dopp, executive director of United Way of Suwannee Valley, says the organization works with 23 health and human service agencies in the region. Agencies
There is no trophy like an Old Oaken Bucket or Paul Bunyan’s Axe for the winner; it doesn’t have a catchy nickname like “The Backyard Brawl” or “The Civil War.” But the annual feud between Florida and Florida State has all the passion found in other rivalries across the college football landscape, and the city of Live Oak finds itself right in the middle.
Live Oak is about 60 miles from Gainesville and some 80 miles in the opposite direction from Tallahassee. The community has players and fans of both universities who take their sides with tomahawk chops and Gator chomps. The annual meeting
between the Gators and Seminoles on the gridiron has divided families, friends, co-workers and neighbors.
“Late in the year when the game is coming up, the air seems a little clearer,” Live Oak businessman and former Florida State receiver Todd Frier says. “It just feels like a special time of year … Being from Live Oak, where a bunch of people who have played at UF and Florida State and have roots here and where a lot of people have gone to school there, it’s really neat.”
The Gators had been playing football for nearly 50 years when Florida State, previously a women’s university, admitted men after World War II and played its first varsity intercollegiate football season in 1955. The two teams met for the first time in 1958, which was the beginning of an annual series that has had local fans choosing sides ever since.
“I went to a Punt, Pass and Kick contest at Florida Field, and that was all it took,” says Russell Summers, a journeyman lineman and one of a cadre of football fans employed by SVEC. “I fell in love with it … I’ve had season tickets and have been going down there for about 30 years. I’ve seen Florida win a bunch of games in a row against FSU and seen Florida go on a streak. It’s like that, it comes and goes.”
The Gators lead the series 34-25-2, but the Seminoles have won six of the last seven meetings. Before that, Florida won six in a row, starting in 2004.
The series was dominated by Florida in the
early going as the Gators won 16 of the first 19 games in the series. When the two teams fought to a 3-3 tie in 1961, then Florida head coach Ray Graves compared it to “a death in the family.”
Florida State got its first victory three years later in 1964 but continued to struggle against the Gators until the mid 1970s and the arrival in Tallahassee of Robert Cleckler Bowden, a drawling Alabaman by way of West Virginia who went by Bobby.
Bobby Bowden delivered new life to the Seminoles football program, which was 4-29 in the three previous seasons. Starting in 1977, Florida State won four straight games, and the series was almost at an even split — seven wins for the Seminoles and six for the Gators — over the next 13 years.
SVEC Advanced Metering Infrastructure Technician Bill Roberts came to Live Oak from Alabama in the 1980s. As the rivalry grew in stature, it also grew on him. “I had friends who went to FSU games, and I went up there with them and fell in love with it,” says Roberts, who grew up an Auburn fan.
But the Florida-Florida State rivalry is not without stories of its own.
In 1966, the Seminoles appeared to score a lastminute touchdown when quarterback Gary Pajcic hit receiver Lane Fenner with a 45-yard touchdown pass to put FSU ahead. Referees ruled the pass an incompletion. Photographs later showed Fenner caught the ball, but Florida went on to a 22-19 win. FSU fans still consider it a victory.
Future NFL Hall of Famer Jack Youngblood led
a Florida defense in 1969 that sacked FSU quarterback Bill Cappleman 11 times for minus-91 yards. The Gators defense held FSU to minus-18 yards of total offense in a 21-6 victory.
Steve Spurrier returned to his alma mater in 1990, bringing with him the “Fun-n-Gun” offense and eyes on national prominence, but the Gators would have to go through Florida State to get there for the next decade. The two teams also played some of the most memorable games in the series during the 1990s.
In 1993, the Seminoles clinched a 33-21 win over Florida with a 79-yard touchdown pass from Charlie Ward to Warrick Dunn at The Swamp. Ward went on to win the Heisman Trophy, and FSU won a national title. The 10-2 Gators won the SEC Championship the next week.
The following season, the rivalry shifted back to Doak Walker Stadium where a 31-31 tie became known as “The Choke at the Doak.” Florida led 31-3 in the fourth quarter before a four-touchdown rally by the Seminoles. Bowden decided to kick the extra point and settle for a potential tie. A rematch in the Sugar Bowl — won by the Seminoles, 23-17 — was dubbed “The Fifth Quarter in the French Quarter.”
A 24-21 upset win over the No. 1 Gators in 1996 drew the ire of Spurrier. The FSU defense battered Florida quarterback Danny Wuerrfel, sacking him six times. The Gators and Seminoles returned to the Sugar Bowl with a national title on the line, and Florida won in a 52-20 rout.
In 1997, the series returned to The Swamp for what some consider the greatest game in the series, a 32-29 Gators victory over top-ranked Florida State that denied the Seminoles a shot at a national title.
Live Oak’s Todd Frier and his brother, Matt, were both highly regarded receivers at Florida State. Their careers spanned the decade of the 1990s, and both won national titles with the Seminoles.
“In The Swamp my senior year, I felt like my eardrums were about to explode it was so loud,” Todd Frier recalls. “It was awesome to be in that kind of atmosphere. You get that kind of ‘us-against-theworld’ mentality in enemy territory.”
Jimmy McCullers, a former coach at Suwannee Intermediate School, says he was a Florida fan and local high school standout in the 1980s. He was recruited by Clemson as a fullback and had a tryout at Florida State with an invitation to
walk on, but he couldn’t bring himself to suit up for the Seminoles. Two years later he walked on at Florida and played for then head coach Galen Hall as a nose tackle.
“So many guys at Florida and Florida State played together and against each other in high school — they all knew each other,” McCullers says. “The players seemed to get along OK, but the fans hated each other.”
In addition to FSU and Miami, Florida also has a Southeastern Conference rival in Georgia. The two teams annually meet in Jacksonville in the game dubbed “The World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party.”
But for McCullers and Summers, the “party” takes a backseat to the annual meeting with the Seminoles. “Oh, it’s Florida State — it’s hands down,” Summers says. “I pull for Florida and whoever is playing FSU.”
McCullers says the intra-state rivalry is much more intense that the Florida-Georgia border battle. “I understand that you want to beat Georgia and win the SEC East, but I just think Florida State is a much bigger rivalry.”
Summers’ 26-year-old daughter, Kristin, attends football games and other sporting events at Florida with her father. “It’s something we do together,” she says. “We’ve started going to base-
ball and softball games, so it’s not just football. We support the Gators.”
Like her father, Summers says she sees Florida State as the Gators’ top football rival and cheers accordingly.
So does Roberts, while keeping perspective with his friends and co-workers who are on the other side of the rivalry that will soon be entering its sixth decade.
“The thing it boils down to here is that we like to poke at each other — Gator fans and FSU fans back and forth,” Roberts says. “But at the end of the day, the brotherhood and camaraderie we have here at the co-op means way more than the rivalry.”
UNITED WAY, continued from page 1
include various Head Start programs, Voices for Children/Guardian ad Litem, the Children’s Home Society of Florida, Love Inc. of Suwannee County, the American Red Cross of Northeast Florida, organizations for residents with disabilities and behavioral health problems, and many more. The funds received will be allocated to agencies
based on financial need and how much they can help the community.
“It’s the role of the allocations committee to ensure every dollar is invested for the best possible community outcomes,” Dopp says.
SVEC Member Services Manager Brenda Pryce says United Way is an organization the community can trust.
All SVEC members in Suwannee County are encouraged to sign up for Alert Suwannee, an emergency alert program operated by the Suwannee County Sheriff's Office — Division of Emergency Management. Sign up for Alert Suwannee online at http://bit.ly/2x0RUQK.
“I’ve witnessed the results of the work they’ve done in the community, not just on a collective basis but also in the lives of individuals,” Pryce says. “We need agencies such as the United Way for community support and for those who need assistance and have nowhere to go.”
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Learn more and sign up for MyChoice today at svecmychoice.com or call 800-447-4509 or 386-362-2226.
SVEC member John Miller won a Kindle Fire in last month’s drawing.
SVEC’s SmartHub app gives you a convenient way to pay your bill, monitor your electricity use and report an outage from your smartphone or other mobile device. Sign up for SmartHub at svecsmarthub.com from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15 and automatically be entered in a drawing for an Amazon Kindle Fire.
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Vampire loads describe devices that use electricity even when they appear to be off. The primary culprits are chargers, cable and satellite TV boxes, gaming systems and instant-on TVs. Standby modes on these devices make them convenient, but they continuously suck power. Here are a few suggestions for handling these power vampires:
Unplug chargers when not in use.
Invest in smart power strips. One outlet on a strip is the “master,” which always receives power. When the device connected to the master outlet turns off, everything connected to the strip turns off, too. For example, if you turn off the television connected to the master outlet, the DVD player, speakers, streaming devices, etc., will also turn off. Smart power strips are ideal for PCs and their peripherals, too.
Turn off cable and satellite boxes that do not contain the DVR functionality or use a smart power strip.
Disable automatic updates in gaming consoles and turn the console off when you finish using it.
Turn off the instant-on function of your TV.
ca. 1966.
Do you have an interesting photo taken in the Suwannee Valley in the 1940s, ’50s or ’60s? If you do, please email an electronic file and caption to communications@svec-coop.com or send a printed copy to SVEC Communications, 11340 100th St., Live Oak, FL 32060. If you email a file, please make it the highest quality possible.
Selected photos will be included in an upcoming newsletter and Facebook post, and submitters will receive an 80th anniversary travel drinking tumbler.