route8rivalry.com
Covering high school football in Venango County, Pa.
Tales of Two Cities
Oil City
Franklin
Route 8 Rivalry I: Franklin's hired guns: 1903
Har-rumpf: We'll show Oil City...
Front row from left:
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B.D. Sutter (5-4,150) right end;
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Paul Steinberg (5-10,175) left half
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Lynn D. Sweet ( 5-7, 152) center
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Jack Hayden (5-8, 170) quarterback;
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H. A. "Bull" Davidson (5-10, 220, fullback
Second row:
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W. J. McConnell left guard
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Dave Printz manager
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John Lang (5-10, 208) left tackle
Back row:
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Clark A. Schrontz (6-0, 186) left end
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W.P. McNulty (5-11, 203), left tackle
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Arthur L. "Tige" Mc Farland right guard
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Herman Kirkoff (6-4, 242) left guard
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John A. "Teck" Matthews (5-11, 197), right half
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Charles Edgar "Blondy" Wallace (6-0, 240), right tackle
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Chal Brennan left half.
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Bill McConnell later became a mayor of Franklin and Brennan became a street commissioner.
They made it to the NFL
College stars
Oil City's Adam Lehnortt and Ben Lynch starred for West Virginia in the mid-oughts.
Franklin's Lou Fogle was a standout tight end for Clemson in the 1960s before becoming an outstanding high school coach in the Carolinas.
Jack Cleaves starred for Oil City during World War I and then played for Princeton's famed Team of Destiny in 1922. That squad played the University of Chicago in the first college game broadcast coast-to-coast on radio.
Oil City Olympian and definition of all-around athlete
When Melinda Hale graduated from Oil City High School in 1973, she was just your common, everyday "all-around athlete."
But by the time she graduated from Slippery Rock, she expanded on that tag -- adding team handball to her extensive repertoire -- to the point where she made the United States Olympic team.
A lot has been written about Melinda -- some of it by me -- but I'm going to use a 1996 story by Kay Dannels of the Allied News out of Grove City after she was invited by the Olympic Committee to apply to carry the Olympic torch a portion of its 15,000-mile voyage throughout the United States on its way to Atlanta.
Melinda competed in all varsity sports at OCHS, and she was primarily a basketball player at the Rock, captaining the team her junior and senior years.
She took up team handball in 1974 and that allowed her to tour the world. She made the Olympic team in 1980 and competed in 1984.
She was so versatile in sports that she was head coach of the Kansas State volleyball and lacrosse teams during her very athletic life.
Screen shot, The Derrick
Surprise, surprise, surprise
It was 1976 -- an Olympics year -- so all the "big names" skipped the Boston Marathon to prepare for them.
That left the field open for such unheard runners as Franklin's Jack Fultz (who sat in front of me in math class.)
Fultz took advantage and won the thing.
He did try out for the Olympics in May, but came in "20-something" in a race in which "big names" Frank Shorter and Bill Rodgers were 1-2.
Fultz was in the top 10 after the 21st mile, but hit the wall and that was that.
The linked story -- written by your's truly -- appeared on Page 1 of the April 20, 1976, edition of The Derrick.
Mat magicians
Josh Moore (left) and his brother Scott wrestled for Franklin in the late 1990s. Together they racked up 222 wins (Scott missed a season). But they didn't stop there, starring in college at Penn State mostly and Virginia (Scott). And they're still active as coaches -- Josh at Cleveland State and Scott at Lock Haven, bringing their programs into prominence.
You can read more about Scott here, too.
How Scott Moore uses his Penn State wrestling experience in building a program at Lock Haven
First team all-state
He was a legend in Oil City in 1964 with his football (and wrestling and track), and later contributed to Arizona State's success on the gridiron. He's still the talk around town among baby boomers.
Fred Blackhurst and Paul Beals, both played guard for two of Franklin's juggernauts, Blackhurst in the late 1960s and Beals during the early part of that decade. Garrett Brewster was left tackle on the Knights' 2003 playoff team.
Decorated high school coaches
The OCHS graduate, a former Franklin coach, has guided Kirtland, Ohio, to numerous state championships in the last 15-20 years. He notched his 200th coaching victory at Kirtland on Aug. 19 in the Hornets' 2022 season opener.
He's picked up numerous coach of the year awards, including on the state level, for his work at Redbank Valley in Clarion County. The Franklin grad, a former OCHS assistant, guided the Bulldogs to the 1A state championship game in 2021.
Track was their game
Pictured here with coach John Kaufman at Mitchell Avenue Field, Charlie Winger was a three-tine state champion.
Put her anywhere in the lineup...she was primarily a middle distance runner for Oil City and earned four state medals.
Rocky Grove boasted two state champions in 1959 -- Bob Flickner in the 100 and DeWitt Green in the pole vault.
Bet you'd never guess this and other oddities
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Everything Went Swimmingly for Them
The most successful coach in Franklin history is not Joe Stewart or Bill Hager. It is none other than Eric Smith, the coach of the swimming team, mostly in the 1990s.
Smith compiled an astounding 574 victories in 25 years at Franklin and produced star swimmers galore.
Two of them were Phil Emerson (right), who won five state championships, three in the 100 free and two in the 50 from 2012-14. He also teamed with Andy Frederick, Quinn Heffernan and Isaac Cooke to win the 200 free relay in 2013 when the Knights were runners-up in the team standings at states despite only having six swimmers.
Jill Wilkinson was a two-time state champion in the breaststroke in 1995-96. She was on the Lady Knights' state championship 200 medley relay in 1997 with Amanda Armburger, Gwynne Junkin and Katie Findlan.
Franklin also boasted a boys state champion medley relay in 1996 with Darren Livezy, Mike Frederick, Ryan Fennick and Nate Edmundson.
Smith produced eight undefeated seasons, 19 conference titles and 16 district crowns. He coached 46 All-Americans and 263 D-10 champs in 128 events.
Both Emerson and Wilkinson would go on to swim for Division I programs in college, Emerson at Tennessee and Wilkinson at Penn State where her career was cut short by injury.
Smith, meanwhile, has returned to Oil City, his alma mater, to coach.
