RHS Athletic Hall of Fame: Paul Ferraro

Mission:
To honor the athletic achievements of RHS student athletes, coaches, teams, and individuals who are deemed to have had a major and lasting impact on the athletic program at RHS. The Hall of Fame recognizes these individuals’ accomplishments as beacons to others, that they may clearly see and be inspired by the outcomes of lives lived in love of sport and competition.

Here is the link to the RHS web site for Paul Ferraro, son of another Hall of Famer Mario Ferraro:
http://www.ridgewood.k12.nj.us/index.cfm?sid=6&nav_id=10478&sub_nav_id=10602&ArticleID=29106

"Acknowledged as one of the greatest two-way football players in the school’s history, he was acknowledged as a first-team All-Decade linebacker for the1970s by The Record and was a two-time first-team linebacker on the All-County, All-Suburban and All-NNJIL all-star teams. He was the first single-season 1,000-yard rusher in school history and held the single- season rushing record of 1,079 yards (accomplished in nine games) for 28 years."

RHS Athletic Hall of Fame: Becky Deetz

Sports were always a big part of my life and certainly deserve a number of entries to this blog. To keep things rolling here is an article about Becky Deetz being inducted into the RHS Athletic Hall of Fame. This is the link to the Ridgewood Public Schools web site:

http://www.ridgewood.k12.nj.us/index.cfm?sid=6&nav_id=10478&sub_nav_id=10665&ArticleID=29655

"She held the Bergen County indoor and outdoor high jump records for 23 years, the state outdoor standard for 8 and the indoor for 10, with leaps of 5-feet 8 inches outdoors and 5 feet 8 ¼ inches indoors. She won the 1975 Bergen long jump and high jump titles and the 1976 long, triple, and high jump titles in the group meet. "

More Graydon Pool

As Paul noted, my Dad ran Graydon for all of my childhood. It's interesting to read Paul's perspective on Dad's management style and remember Dad's thought processes during those years. First, some thoughts about Graydon. As Paul observed, during the time Dad was in charge, there were no fences at all. There it sat, acres of natural swimming pool, in the middle of a town of 25,000, in the middle of a county of several hundred thousand. Now think about that: you can't put a 15'x25' pool in your yard without a fence, but Graydon was surrounded by nothing but sandy beaches and grassy banks, in the midst of as dense a population as one might find west of the Bronx. Well, Dad took his responsibility for the safety of Graydon swimmers very seriously. He was responsible for everybody on that piece of property, and he had very little control over who wandered onto the grounds. I remember one day a small child fell off the wall and under the water, while his mother chatted on the beach. Dad scooped him up, but came home haunted by the fact that he had seen it happen before the child's mother. That was the nature of the time, and Dad accepted the responsibility. But it also forged his adherence to rules and regulations. Ironclad rules were his mechanisms for accepting responsibility for a big swimming pool in the middle of town. Later on, when I became a lifeguard, I learned to appreciate Dad's approach to rules. It removed the arbritary nature from the job. Rules are rules, and nobody can throw sand, not even your buddy from school. I learned a lot about leadership, responsibility and consistency from Dad. I learned many years later from other former guards that he taught the same lessons to just about all that passed under his leadership at Graydon. (As an aside, one summer I also learned to decline the advances of an "older," probably mid-20s, married woman - wheee!!) At RHS, Dad merely demonstrated and administered his authority. At Graydon, he took the opportunity to teach it. I wish more people could have known the teaching side of Dad. All that said, I do have other Ridgewood stories, so I promise my contribution to this blog will not become a tribute to Dick Flechtner!

Graydon Pool

We used to go to Graydon Pool quite a lot up until the time I was in the 6th grade. It was an all day affair with various set routines. We arrived in the morning and always sat on the "shaded side" with the big trees and where my Mom would meet up with her friends for an all day chat. Us kids would then swim until lunchtime and after a sandwich the Moms would have us religiously wait one half hour before we went in the water again. Nobody wanted us to cramp up and drown was their stated reason. In the afternoon there was always a visit to the ice cream truck and the gum ball machines and then we went home. Going to Graydon was an activity which used up all our daily allotment of youthful energy. I'm sure the Moms appreciated it because there would then be less trouble getting us to go to bed. It's funny reflecting back on all of this and thinking how different things are today. Women then didn't have to explain to anyone why they were housewives. Today they would have to explain why they aren't working at some career. Times certainly have changed. One other memory of Graydon: the Head Lifeguard, Richard Flechtner. His word was law and there were few who would dispute it. If they did they were usually given a stern lecture and might even be escorted off the premises. This was in Graydon Pool's heyday. Before the cheesy looking fence was put up, before everyone had a pool of their own, and when Graydon was a place to meet one's friends. It was a considerably more difficult place to manage than it is today. For one thing you can tell by looking that fewer people use the pool and there are more people on hand to maintain order. Though when I used to go there was always one man who maintained order among the pool goers and the lifeguards and that was Mr. Flechtner, Kurt's Dad. I never crossed him then and I kept this up when I met him once again at Ridgewood High School where he was the Athletic Director. He was the sort of person I didn't want to argue with because I knew he was going to be right and I had seen so many try and fail in this fruitless endeavor. It was always better in my mind to cut him a wide track and marvel at the efficiency with which he managed the pool.

Acid Trips

     I have two vivid memories from the late 60s: Walking across the bridge over the Ho Ho Kus Brook from the Graydon parking lot, there were several naked stoned-out teenagers lying in repose in the brook. Dad told me they were "very tired." I learned later that they had been to Woodstock. My dad came home from RHS, disgusted that he had to spend his lunch hour "guarding" the faculty coffeepot. It seems the RHS Principal was afraid the students might "spike it" with LSD. I am glad I missed out on THAT nonsense!

Hi Folks

Tis I, co-blogger Kurt Flechtner. I know many RHS grads from the 70s probably remember my dad, Richard Flechtner (AKA "Dick").

Ridgewood was, and still is, an amazing place. I hope I can bring a new perspective for you all as I drag out my father's memories and augment them with my own.

Thanks to Paul for starting this blog, and I hope I can help him draw more RHS grads in to remember our special time there.

Two New Links!

I've added a co-blogger, Kurt Flechtner, a link to his blog, and a link to the Molly Ahearn blog. Both of these fine folks are members of the class of 1978 and have excellent blogs of their own.

I hope you check them out and enjoy their contributions to the Blogosphere.