Interviews and E-mails
Jack Plymale
And
Stephen “DOC” Yeagle
Jack Plymale:
Jack was an only child of Forest and Myrtle Plymale.
Jack went into the Navy in May of 1945, after graduating from Portsmouth High School. “I was in the Navy until October, 1946 and enrolled in Ohio State University in January, 1947. Through the Navy V-5 program, I transferred two quarters from Denison University and Union College in Schenectady, N.Y.. I graduated from OSU in June 1949.” Jack married in Richmond, IN in 1952 after discharge from being drafted during the Korean War.. Jack and his wife have been separated for over thirty years.
“I have two sons, who will be 55 and 52 years old this year. Both are in the citrus industry and live in Arcadia, FL. Jack and his wife have been separated for over thirty years.
I moved to Florida in 1951 and spent most of my productive years there. I was a processor in the citrus business and a real estate broker of properties pertinent to that business. I retired to spend the life of a hermit in a mountainside in Costa Rica in the 1990’s. One of my favorite quotations is that of a fraternity brother at OSU: ‘The last remaining vestige of homozygous Americanas is residual to the hills of southern Ohio.” Jack baffles meturns me over with his quotations and vocabulary at times. It must be the “Uncle Bert leach” influence on the then younger PHS student. Homozygous has something to do with deletion of genes, but I take it that the frat brother was indicating that Jack was of a disappearing breed. I hope that is close.
Jack also says: “The proudest thing I have done in my life is to keep two people like Jim Fout and Doc Yeagle as my closest friends.”
Stephen “Doc” Yeagle:
Doc’s parents were Jessie and StellaStella (McGraw) Yeagle and he had brothers Paul, Jack and Raymond, and a sister, Barbara.
Doc graduated from PHS in June of 1945, had entered the Air Force in March, 1945, and was discharged in December 1946. He was in the service for both his high school and his college graduation classes. His mother received the diplomas by mail.
He entered the University of Cincinnati in 1947 on a football scholarship at 170 pounds. He was saving his GI Bill for expected law school use. He was a starting guard from his freshman year and made Honorable Mention All American in 1948. That same year, Bob Gains was first team tackle AA and Wah Wah Jones was second string end AA, each out of the University of Kentucky for coach Bear Bryant. Doc finished his undergraduate work at UC in 1951. He was in the Air Force Reserve from the time of his first service and was recalled to active duty for the Korean War. He was admitted to flight training in 1951 and was an air Force pilot until December, 1954. Doc rose to the rank of First Lieutenant. He went to work for Eastern Airlines and was with them until their demise in 1984. Doc told Jack that he tripped over a cat, fell down a flight of stairs, broke an elbow, and was forced to retire.
Now three ex-Trojan footballers of the 1943-1945 era form the troika of Jim Fout, Jack Plymale and Stephen “Doc” Yeagle. I interviewed Jim for his story in my Excellence in Athletics in the Portsmouth Area book in 2004. As an ex- Ohio State quarterback, Jim Fout has four excellent season seats in the Horseshoe for OSU games. He invited me to join him for the Cincinnati home opener in 2004. Jack Plymale and Doc Yeagle were also Jim’s guest for the game, as they have been for many games. These P’Town football greats, which I am not one of, graciously made me feel right at home.
Jack Plymale entertained me with old Trojan stories during that game and he has continued to do so in e-mails, most of which I have forwarded to my Portsmouth address list and excerpts of which I will include herein later. Jack is a story-teller much in the vein of my good departed friend and another former Trojan great of that era, Gib Lakeman. I interviewed Jack and Doc together in Portsmouth the day after Memorial Day. Jack told the brunt of the stories and Doc corroborated.
The great Paul Walker had often joined these three in Jim’s seats. Paul had coached these Trojans in an undefeated football season in 1944 before he obtained the Middletown Ohio High School basketball coaching job. The players of the 1944 team met often with PW on nearly annual reunions and he credited that team with winning him the best high school coaching job in America. The interviewers of him for the job in Middletown first asked if he smoked and he replied that he did. From that point in the interview, all they wanted to talk with him about was the 1944 football zero to zero tie between Portsmouth and Middletown. In fact, three highly rated football teams- Middletown, Springfield and Huntington East (WV) failed to cross the Trojan goal line that season.
Paul Walker had a seventy-six game winning streak in basketball at Middletown and was named Ohio’s High School Coach of the Twentieth Century. Paul Walker had been a three sport star at Western Kentucky University. He loved basketball best, but he was obviously an exceptional coach and teacher of young men, to say the very least about the man.
Paul was tough but he came to love the Portsmouth footballers who gave their best for him. The bond was only strengthened throughout the ensuing years. Jack told me that Ray Pelfrey, Dave Spriggs, Dave Thomas, Red Griffin, Jim Fout, and Doc Yeagle were among Paul’s favorites. In fact, Jack also told me that he could tell the time much later, when PW appeared to be losing it, when “he nudged me at an OSU game and asked who the fellow sitting next to him was- actually it was his beloved hardest hitter, Doc Yeagle.” That was just a few years before Paul died after finally succumbing to Alzheimer’s.
Doc told me that Paul’s son was born in Portsmouth and is now a lawyer in Texas. The son had been a good quarterback at Middletown, but had a falling out with Woody at OSU and transferred out.
Jim Fout became a Senior Vice-President for Ashland Oil in charge of Refinery Sales for Ashland Chemical in Ashland Kentucky. Ashland Chemical was one of several subsidiaries of Ashjland Oil. Not many years ago, a fellow asked Jim about the Ashland Trojan game they played in 1944 after they had beaten highly ranked Louisville Male. The fellow told Jim he could still see a black back running for a long touchdown in the game and waving back at the Ashland players. Jim, corroborated this time by Jack and Doc, said that it was not within the character of Bobby Parks to do that.
So many outstanding Trojan stories were told by Jack and Doc that I have decided to just put the names down alphabetically and bring up their stories in that way. Let us see how that works:
Ashland-
The Tomcats were a consistent power in Kentucky sports. Jim Fout has lived there for his career with at Ashland Oil for most of his life. Ashland is only thirty miles east from Portsmouth and just across the river from another Ohio high school football power, Ironton.
A former Tomcat recently asked Jim Fout about the 1944 Ashland-Portsmouth game. He remembered a black back running away from his team and waving back. Jim told the fellow that it would never have happened that way, because Bobby Parks, the runner, was just too nice a person to act in that manner. Jim’s story was corroborated by Jack and Doc.
Jack said that the Ashland team had beaten a strong Louisville Male or Manual team by twenty-one points in their previous game. “Paul Walker always had us charging across the line of scrimmage. They picked that up in scouting Portsmouth and were trapping our lineman as they came into their backfield. They marched right down the field and scored on us the first time they had the ball. Paul told us to hold back, not charge through, but catch the runner. We stopped them with no further scores while our guys scored thirty-two.
Bobby Parks was a black athlete, about one hundred seventy-five pounds and six foot tall. He was one of the nicest people in the world. Sadly, he died while very young. Some said he had cancer, but I suspect the cause was sickle cell anemia. He was such a well-liked young black man. He had married and had gone into the service. His young wife was pregnant. Sadly, he died while still very young. Some said he had cancer, but I suspect the cause was sickle cell anemia. His funeral was held at Portsmouth High School.
Barker, Jim “Lovey”-
"Lovey" Barker was a big and strong athlete whom I, Sam, remember as a softball player in the late forty District Softball Tournaments in Mound Park. Besides Doc and Jack, Rocky Nelson also mentioned Lovey as an outstanding Trojan football player. He had shoulders which turned in towards his chest, which may have been a physical deformity due to being muscle-bound.
Jack remembered “Lovey” as an old Mabert Roader as he and Ray Pelfrey also were. Jack said Jim was an outstanding running back for the 1939 Trojans.
Boykin, Dick- Ironton-
Probably no Ironton player rivaled the exploits of Dick Boykins, a big black back with the Tigers. Jack said; “He must have been six foot and over two hundred pounds. His Ironton teammates called him “Meat” I caught him head on once and was nearly killed. Ironton also had an excellent player named Daniels.”
Butt, Friend, “Nick”-
Nick Butt, Lamoin Elliott and Dave Spriggs were tri- co-captains of the 1945 team. Nick later lost an eye in blocking a punt in a semi-pro game in Portsmouth. There were no face masks then. He lived most of his life in Chillicothe, OH.
Elliott, Lamoin “Lemon” or “Bugs”-
Lamoin cussed like a mule-skinner before he met Juanita, according to Jack. I dated Juanita prior to their getting together. She and Lemon used to stop and visit with me in Florida throughout the years.
Gib Lakeman had the best punting form and “Bugs” was a little unorthodox; however, he could really kick a football. He made a really big difference in the 1944 season. Against Middletown, Lemon’s punting performance was the most daunting I have ever seen at any level.
Flamer, Calvin and Lloyd-
“Sam, Calvin was a black boy who played the last two-thirds of the 1943 season. He was the fastest guy I ever saw in Portsmouth. He was always a step or two faster than Dave Thomas over fifty yards, and that was blazing fast.” Coach “Houndog” Elder used to tell the linemen: “Boys, you break either one of them through the line and they will have to shoot them down with a rifle.” Calvin, whose older brother, Lloyd had starred for earlier Trojan teams, had another black fellow who came out for the team the same time he did. Matthew Johnson was a good runner, not as fast as the other two Houndog mentioned, but he had his jaw broken, a lot of teeth knocked out, and his face messed up badly when we beat Mansfield up there.
Fout, Jim-
Dave Thomas had a nervous stomach and was throwing up. He was unable to start the Middletown game and Red Griffin was called on by Coach Walker to start in Dave’s place. Griffin was one hundred twenty-eight pounds and never acted afraid of anything. He was doubled up on a hit and came back to the huddle and told Jim Fout: “They have broken my neckhead, Jimmy!” Jim noticed that his head was back into his shoulder pads, so he smacked him on both sides of the helmet and
Red was ready to play.
Jim Fout’s further story is in my first Excellence in Athletics in the Portsmouth Area book (2004).
Green, Walt-
“Walt was an outstanding Trojan lineman. He played at Eastern Kentucky and later coached Corbin, Kentucky’s high school teams. His players, Calvin and Larry Byrd, went on to the University of Kentucky for sports.”
Griffin, Red-
See Jim Fout above. “In our 1944 Springfield game, Red ran off tackle for a sixty-eight yard touchdown, but I swear he had to run at least eighty yards.” Jack said: “I blocked the same guy three times on that play.” Doc spoke up: “Walker loved Red. He ran low and would get up and continue if not completely down. “
Johnson, Matthew-
See Flamer story above for Matthew.
Lakeman, Gib-
Jack said: “Gib’s last year on the Trojans was my first. Before Trojan practices, Gib was at his comic best. You could always count on ten to fifteen minutes of Gib before the coaches showed up. We would play games of touch football and Gib would get up under center with his helmet on sideways and count out- ‘Pig poop and apple-sauce’ as his play cadence. You immediately recognized his ability to switch from being a clown to being an all out performer on the football field.
Leach, Bert-
Jack and Jim Fout thought the world of Bert Leach, who was often referred to by many locals as the “smartest man in Portsmouth.” The two football students also performed in plays for ‘Uncle Bert.” Mr. Leach may have been a little eccentric, but he taught at Portsmouth and produced plays at the high school. Jack regularly comes up with quotes of Uncle Bert’s, such as this:
Wars are planned by old men, in council rooms apart.
They plan for greater armament and map the battle chart
But where the sightless eyes stare out, beyond life’s vbanished joys,
I’ve noticed somehow, all the dead are hardly more than boys.
Lorentz, Chuck-
Jack reported: “A couple of buddies told me they saw our line coach, Chuck Lorentz, Jump up under a crossbar and grab it with one hand and chin himself. I wasn’t sure I should believe that, but the man was in excellent physical condition. He and Coach Pat Mitchell worked at the great Terrace Club, or Dreamland Pool in the summertime. I had some difficulty with a bigger fellow and we were mixing it up pretty good. Coach Lorentz saw it and came running. As he got closer and saw that I was giving it to the big fellow pretty well. He slowed down. He got there rather slowly and said: ‘Here! We’ll have none of that!’” Mr. Lorerntz was so low key that you could never benefit from his instruction until you realized how little you knew and how much he knew. I heard that he was killed when he fell off of his roof in Florida at 93.
I never had Mr.Lorentz as a class room teacher, and I always regretted that. He was such an outstanding human.
Luchi, Joe-
Jack again: “Joe was an outstanding athlete for Portsmouth Central Catholic (later to be re-named Portsmouth Notre Dame). He played for the University of Cincinnati along with Don Monk. and Elbie Nichols.
Joe was naturally powerfully built. Joe married a Pridemore girl from Portsmouth. Portsmouth guys reported that Woody Hayes, an ex- Golden Gloves Champion from Newcomerstown, OH, yelled something objectionable during a Cincinnati/ Miami of Ohio basketball game in a very small gym and Joe went into the stands and decked Woody came on the court to protest. Joe, the Cincy player decked Woody. Joe’s coach held back from kicking him off the team, because he didn’t want to lose Joe and his Portsmouth buddy, Don Monk, at the same time.” Doc was a witness to this altercation and Jack’s telling of it.
Middleton, B.I.-
B. I. died this year. He was our football; captain in 1943. Bert Leach probably threw the quote of Mark Twain at us in which Mr. Twain proclaimed that he never let the truth stand in the way of a good story. B.I. liked to tell the story of trying to swim the Ohio River and giving up about three-fourths of the way across and turning around and swimming back.
B.I. did his undergraduate work on a full football scholarship at Murray State in western Kentucky and, many years later, retired from a full professorship at Ball State, where he taught paleontology or archeology. B.I. was all but blind and Houston Elder bought him a pair of rubber goggles with his prescription in them. Those goggles were passed down to several guys through the years with their own prescription lenses in them.
Another B.I. story was told by Jack Horton who believed he had run into B.I. in Paris after WW II. Jack Horton wasn’t sure, but he yelled out through the crowd, “Hey, B.I.!” B.I. looked all around and yelled back: “I don’t know who you are, you SOB, but stay where you are and I’ll find you.” B.I. didn’t have his glasses on. He said: “I know you are from Portsmouth, Ohio by calling me B.I., and I will find you!” The two had a great reunion together in Paris.
Monk, Don-
Clay Vice, the great basketball player at Clay High School, assistant coach (to his wife, Carol) of extraordinary Clay girls’ softball, and a regular e-mail correspondent of mine, sent this in response to one of Jack Plymale’s e-mails which mentioned Don Monk. I normally forwarded on to my Portsmouth address list those that Jack didn’t admonish me not to.
“Hey Sam. I appreciate reading these e-mails. They are great in my way of thinking. Don Monk will always be in my heart. He was a man among men. There was no man better than Don.”
Jack responded to Clay’s message: “I never knew Don coached. I would love to have seen that. His normal approach was to say only what he had to about anything. He was an attractive guy that the girls found irresistible, but he was just too shy to press his advantage.
Don pitched softball straight underhand and could throw harder than most side-winders. I batted against him once and a foul tip caught me in the mouthforehead-, no helmets then- and immediately decked me.
Neikirk, Charlie and Joe-
Both were former Trojan footballers. Joe played football at North Carolina with Choo-Choo Justice. . Joe retired from Norfolk & Southern Railroad from a very high position in their management.
Nichols, Elbie-
Elbie Nichols played only football Elbieand became a god to the University of Cincinnati football fans. He preceded Don Monk and Joe Luchi at UC.
Parks, Bobby-
Please see stories on Bobby in Paul Walker and Ashland stories above.
Pelfrey, Ray-
Jack and Doc put Ray Pelfrey as probably the most unforgettable character they have ever met. Ray had many outstanding exploits as a Trojan athlete in football and basketball, but beyond those exceptional athletic skills, Ray had a very unique personality.
“Houston Elder inherited the Clay Township move-in who had never played football. Ray did not have the benefit of playing in the Portsmouth grade school feeder leagues for the Trojans. I met him when he moved to Mabert Road when he was twelve or thirteen. Some things may be off-color and not worth repeating, but Ray has never been a malicious person, an unkind person, or a person you would not want to have for a friend.
“Houston Elder All of us guys who were his best buddies from Mabert Road, called Ray “Dribblin Dip from Clay Township” and often told him to “Put your brain in a Jay Bird and fly backward!” This was because Ray was absolutely new to the game of football and had a few things to learn. A coach concentrates on certain raw players to bring out their best playing talents and Coach Elder was certainly probably doing that with Ray.
“Ray Pelfrey was one of the two best football players I ever saw. The other was Vic Janowicz of Ohio State.
Jack had a friend in Ft. Pierce, Dr. Maxwell King, who had been President of Indian Run Community College and Brevard College in Florida. Dr. King was an Auburn graduate. When Jack asked Dr. King if he knew of Ray Pelfrey, he brightened up right away. “Anyone who was at
Auburn during Ray Pelfrey’s time there had to remember him. We had the first panty raid at Auburn and Ray was the organizer and leader of it. Ray’s response to Jack about the incident was: “Yeah and I’m the guy who got it stopped too. They were going to kick me out of school.”
“Ray was the most free spirited and the second finest all around athlete I have ever known. You couldn’t ask for a better or more talented teammate than Ray Pelfrey. All of this weird stuff he did was usually an afterthought. We won a rainy Mother’s night game against Huntington East twenty to nothing. There was huge amounts of water and the mothers sat in cars around the track surrounding the field. Coach Walker brought two cases of one pound jars of vasoline for us to put on our cleats. Ray also put two jars all over him and became a ‘greased pig’. I think the game was two plays old when an official noticed all of this lubrication, stopped the game, and used three towels and five minutes wiping the vasoline off of him.”
Ray started a successful kicking business, www.professionalkickingservices.com which has trained many top notch kickers in America. His son, Rob now runs the business out of Sparks, Nevada. In January of this year, Ray e-mailed Jack “in which he proudly announced that the punter for LSU in their victory over Ohio State is one of his students. His name is Pat Fisher, and he is six foot, six inches and two hundred thirty-five pounds. Ray thinks Pat has a good chance to make it in the pros.”
I, Sam, interviewed Ray for his story which I included in the Excellence in Athletics in the Portsmouth Area book (2004).
Rapalee, Clark-
Clark was a good friend of mine, Sam, after my high school. He came back from Korea with some horrid war stories. Clark had gone to Otterbein College in Westerville, OH at the same time Gib Lakeman was a student football player there, and was immediately drafted into the Army upon his graduation. He was with the Second Army as they went into Korea. He lived many days on the front lines and, although they wanted him to take a battlefield commission, he refused. I mentioned Clark in an e-mail to Jack and he responded thusly:
“Sam, I don’t know how long it has been since I thought of Clark Rapalee. He was on the 1943 Trojan football team with me- third string quarterback. Real bright guy. Looked like he was running in mud all the time. Beyond bright, he was artistically talented and totally likeable with an incredible sense of humor.” Jack continued that neither played much that year but they made the traveling team and the trip to Charlestown, WV. Houston Elder insisted that the players stay in bed until time to eat in the evening. “Clark and I were in bed in our shorts when a fight broke out in the hall. There obviously were some women involved. We, naturally went out to see what was going on. Some lady had come to the Holly Motel (now demolished) to find her husband who had another lady in a compromising position. One man and one lady were nude and the fight was in progress. Gus Thompson was on our floor and he was yelling instructions to the offended lady about where to hit who with her purse. A good time was had by all until Elder arrived and started to kick butt. Thanks for reminding me of Clark. He was a real good friend.”
Spriggs, Dave-
Doc and Jack had a lot of respect for Dave Spriggs and his dad and family. The two old Trojan war horses believed in the toughness and strength of character of the Spriggs clan. Huntington East got the ball to the Trojan eight yard line and were whooping it up. “Dave yelled across the line as they broke huddle for the next play. “I’ll bet any one of you SOB’s fifty cents each that you don’t score. They didn’t score and Dave went into their locker room after the game and collected his bet winnings.
Dave played football at North Carolina for Coach Bobby Dodds. Bobby played his tackle size guys at guard. They had to be fast enough to play guard and dave was at guard. They had to be fast enough to move in order to play for him and Dave was quick.
“Unbeknownst to Dave, his kids entered him into the Senior Olympics in Columbus, OH a few years ago, and, by ruse, got him there. He won four or five medals and regained some senior confidence.
Interjection by Sam:
Dave Spriggs played his college football at North Carolina. He became an engineer. Before he moved his family to Columbus, OH, Jeanie and I bought his house on Clover St. in Eden Park in Clay Township. We saw him a couple of times after we moved to Westerville a few years later. He took another job in Springfield, OH and we lost track of him except through Jim Spriggs, his younger brother. Dave died as a result of an automobile accident a few years ago.
Doc and Jack remember Dave Spriggs as one of God’s nicest human beings.
Thomas,, Dave-
Dave Thomas had big thighs and was tremendously fast. Dave’s dad and the Spriggs family dad were always at Trojan games together and often seen together around town. They also must have been old Portsmouth Spartan fans. They were Portsmouth icons for sports.
Dave Thomas was a Trojan star and very unaffected by his popularity in P’Town. He graduated in 1945 and Houston Elder recruited him to Maryland where he had taken a coaching job. WWII ended in 1945, and the veterans were returning home. Many of them accepted college scholarships in sports. In an early practice at Maryland, Dave Thomas’ football career was ended and he was in a coma for a couple of weeks, induced by football injury to the high school boy-star by the bigger and stronger veteran men-stars. Dave also has passed on and must be with other football Trojans somewhere in God’s universe.
Thompson, Floyd “Gus”-
Gus was a fairly fast end on Trojan teams of the Plymale/Yeagle era. I, Sam, knew him during his 52-20 days in Mound Park with us “urchins”. Gus and Gib Lakeman regularly entertained us with old Trojan stories giving our brains knowledge of the Pelfreys, Plymales, Fouts, Thomas’, etc. etc. that is, most of the names Doc and jack cover in their stories here. Gus has been mentioned repeatedly in the stories above. He became starting end when Don Monk switched to fullback.
He refereed the Middletown motel hall fight between the lady and her opponents- Gus was always ready and he later became a serious elder in Central Church of Christ and husband of Oleta Lewis of the class of 1950. Gus was funny and clever and he and Gib were the best to learn from while stil in your formative years, as I was. Gib always chided Gus at the way he could go across the street to the Sugar Bowl and return with a fudge sickle and make it last all day.
Conclusions:
At 75, I, Sam, am slowing down, even in my writing. I don’t intend to play softball this year even though my subdural brain hematoma has, apparently, dissolved. We did win the Championship of the Columbus Over-Seventy League that day. Being on Coumadin makes a risk of similar injury too great for me. I would rather continue with my interview stories and my great enjoyment of Jeanie and my family and friends.
What a pleasure it has been for me to listen to or read these stories, which were mainly told by Jack. I am sure the stoic Doc Yeagle would admit to that. The two shared the times together especially with Jim Fout, and nobody stands above Doc as the hardest hitting football player Jack has ever seen. Mr. Plymale regaled the Tim Horton air that post Memorial Day, 2008 with stories very much like Gib Lakeman and Gus Thompson used to share with us when I and my fellow Mound Park Urchins were young teenagers there.
I cherish that!
Ahhh- Portsmouth, Ohio! The Cultural Center of Our Universe, although none of us urchins knew what the word culture meant at the time.
Jack added this conclusion in his correcting of my rough draft: “Sam, in all honesty, if all of the players on the 1944 team had my talent, we would have gone 0-10, rather than go undefeated. I filled in between the talented ones. This is not false modesty. I loved the game and the playing of it. I loved the camaraderie and friendships and will be forever grateful for the opportunity to play for PHS during that time. Please don’t give me credit for being more than average.
“I hate to disagree, Jack, but you do display false modesty here. You had to be an outstanding athlete to get on the field in the Trojan uniform and play with the guys you and Doc have reported on herein.
Thanks to Jack and Doc for some excellent remembrances!
