Sunday, May 5, 2024
Hood County News
LOOKING BACK IN SPORTS
Looking Back is a column that highlights articles retrieved from local newspaper archives that were published in years past.
An article published 46 years ago, in the Oct. 21, 1976 edition of the Hood County News, reported that Tolar High School’s football team posted a 7-6 homecoming triumph over the Godley Wildcats. The game was scoreless until the third quarter, when Tolar’s Kevin Fry ran for a “short” touchdown run, after the Rattlers’ Scott Ives had blocked a Godley punt. The extra-point kick by Fry proved to be the winning margin, despite Godley’s fourth-quarter TD, because Ives got through to block his second kick of the game, on Godley’s point-after kick attempt.
90 YEARS AGO
October 1932
This item is from a time when high school football season began a little later than in the modern era. A front-page article in the Oct. 7, 1932 edition of the Granbury News reported that Granbury’s team opened its season versus Dublin High the previous Friday with what some at the time said was an upset victory, 25-0. The game story stated, “the Dublin team made the only completed forward pass in the game,” — and the player who caught that pass was “downed almost in the player’s tracks.”
83 YEARS AGO
October 1939
An article on Page 1 of the Oct. 26 edition of the Hood County Tablet gave an account of Granbury High School’s football team playing the Gustine Tigers to a 6-6 tie the previous Friday afternoon. The article states, “Both the offensive and defensive play of the Pirates was loose, but the stiff workouts being given by the boys this week is expected to remedy that. When the team meets Desdemona here this Friday, October 27, Coach Godwin plans to have the team up to full strength, unhandicapped by injuries as it was last week.” The article does not mention how either team scored.
83 YEARS AGO
October 1939
If squirrel hunting fits in the category of sports, here’s another story of interest from the Hood County Tablet’s Oct. 26, 1939 edition. It states: “W.R. Mitchell, of the Neri community, killed an 80-pound bobcat Friday while hunting squirrels. Mr. Mitchell brought the evidence to the County Judge who paid him $250 bounty. The dogs treed the cat in a tree, and Mr. Mitchell brought him down with a .22 target. The cat was killed on the old Fred Sue place.”
75 YEARS AGO
October 1947
The Oct. 9, 1947 edition of the Hood County News-Tablet reported a 12-6 football victory for the Granbury Pirates, over Walnut Springs. The article states that it was the first game that season, and that running back Minor Johnson scored both of the touchdowns for the Pirates. Among the players cited for outstanding play were linemen Thomas Allen, Charles Tidwell, Howard Gibson and Bob Purselley, along with backfield players Harold Dean Porter, Johnson and Edwin Dabney.
67 YEARS AGO
October 1955
The Hood County News-Tablet reported in its Oct. 27 edition that the Granbury Pirates opened district football play with a 46-13 victory over Mansfield. The Pirates recorded an 80-yard touchdown run by Jackie Davis, plus TD runs of 66 and 60 yards by Tom Davis. Also for Granbury, Walt Rains threw three TD passes although he threw only four passes in the game.
64 YEARS AGO
OCTOBER 1958
In a 39-13 football victory for the Granbury Pirates over Jacksboro High School the previous Friday, halfback Jerry Carswell accounted for four of the Pirates’ six touchdowns, according to an Oct. 2, 1958 edition of the Hood County News-Tablet.
