One more time for the Purple and Gold

A  week from Saturday night, Aug. 22, they’ll play the 79th rendition of the Recreation Bowl.

The game will be a Mt. Sterling High School Trojan Purple and Gold Retro Night.

What’s that mean?

Well, there are a few of you who were there, and you understand.

For most of you, if you’ll take the time and bear with me, I’ll try and give you an explanation as best I can.

Beginning back in the early 1900’s, they started playing high school athletics at Mt. Sterling High School.

Then, in 1921, led by a couple of guys named Smiley Davis (who connects to the Ishmael family) and Tom Coons (a legendary athlete in Mt. Sterling) the Trojans won what was a “mythical” state baseball championship.

There was no Kentucky High School Athletic Association at the time, no official state playoffs.

The Trojans had beaten the best team out of Louisville that year and was considered among the best and they played another team with that reputation, Cynthiana, at the old county Fairgrounds just off the end of East High Street. 

Mt. Sterling won, the team was presented with a silver cup from the Chamber of Commerce and declared state champs.

A decade later, the Trojans were in the state basketball tournament and had an unbeaten football team that allowed only six points in a season.

Bain “Tiny” Jones had begun a legendary, Hall of Fame coaching career and the tradition of Mt. Sterling High School athletics was under way. 

There were two more state basketball teams in the 1940’s and many outstanding teams.

And many outstanding players over the years. 

Naming them would only leave many, many of the best out, so we’ll just say there were many. 

In the late 1950’s and early 1960’s, under Phil “Duke” Owen, Pat Dale and Chili Ishmael, football was the shining light. 

District titles, regional titles and then in 1969 a state Class A football title. 

Additionally, there were many teams that were closer than close. 

A loss to Lynch in 1959,  a team that beat the state champ but didn’t get into the then limited playoffs, in 1962.

The 1965 team tied Erlanger Lloyd in the playoffs and lost on a statistical tie-breaker and the Juggernauts went on to win the title.

The 1967 team lost in the state final and the ’68 team was easily the best in Class A but lost in the mud at Dayton. It hadn’t rained much, hint, hint.

The 1970 team lost to Paris, 7-0 and the Greyhounds were the state’s best team.

In 1974, another great Trojan team failed to make the playoffs on a technicality.

There were some very good basketball teams, as well, and in track and field there were many of the state’s best.

They wore purple and gold.

The colors, the nickname Trojans, the aura of Mt. Sterling High School meant more than you can imagine. 

Game nights on Friday night at Jones Field off of East High Street, were magical times, win or lose.

It was a happening. You truly had to be there to appreciate the moment. 

Certainly, it was understandable when Mt. Sterling merged with Montgomery County in 1976, that the Trojans would, in essence, be left behind. 

Unfortunately, most of the tradition was left behind, as well.

As loyal a Trojan as I was, it was no problem for me, in the position of covering sports here, to adjust to the Montgomery County Indians, the Red, White and Blue.

However, I never could quite understand the fact that the tradition from Mt. Sterling High School wasn’t, in some  way coveted, and brought along with the merger. 

Tradition, like it or not, is truly worth quite a lot and leaving it behind accomplishes, well, not much. 

Back in 2007, Montgomery County played Paris and defeated the Greyhounds at Cunningham Field on a Trojan-retro night when they rolled out the purple and gold.

Now they’ll do it again next Saturday.

The Hazard fans will understand the retro-night because they don’t need one, the old school has been preserved over the years. 

The Bulldogs played in the Recreation Bowl back in 1965, losing to Hopkinsville,  in my opinion one of the top teams to play in the Rec’ Bowl over the last seven decades. 

Thanks to Coach Chirico for taking advantage of the idea. With ties going back to Marshall University and Paintsville, the coach knows the value of tradition. 

The Montgomery County High School Band has even been asked to play the MSHS song/fight song.

So join in with the tradition at the Rec’ Bowl. Sing along with:

Hooray for the Purple and Gold, may they wave as our colors forever, their glory shall always be told, they are colors that stand for right- fight, fight, fight. We’ll fight for our colors so dear, and we’ll win by our mighty endeavor, we’ll proclaim so almighty and, by our right and by our might we’ll win forever!