Mel Bashore

Mel:  Tell me about your basketball . . . to start with.

 

Pete:  Yes.    Then  I went to the All State with Murray.  The day after the  last  tournament  game,  Vadal  Peterson coached Utah, and I bumped  into  him  talking with Murray about going to school.  Of course,  those  were Depression days and I said, "Hell, I haven't got  any  money  to  go  to  school."  Come from a big family and Depression days.  1936.  I said, "I don't have any money to go to school."  He  said, "If you want to go to school, you've got to snow  'em.  We'll  take care of the rest of it."  So that's how come  they  let  me  go  to the University of Utah.  So I went up there  in September and I bumped into Ike Armstrong, the football coach.

 

Mel:  What year was this?

 

Pete:  1936.  He  says,  "Aren't  you coming out for the football?"  I said, "No.  I came up on a basketball scholarship."  And he said,     "Well,  I  think  I can make an end out of you and besides, we're going  to  Hawaii in 1938 and to guarantee you the trip, I've got to  know."  And so that kind of sparked me also.  I went out that afternoon and checked out a football suit and that was it because I  wanted  to  go to Hawaii . . . would have gotten down there.  So I ended  up being a better football player than a basketball player     there.  I  made  all  conference end in my senior year which in those days was the old Rocky Mountain Conference.

 

Mel:  What year was your senior year?

 

Pete:  That would have been in 1940.  So that was the extent of that end of  it.  I enjoyed football.  Of course, I also played basketball and  also  lettered  in track.  I held the hammer throw record up there  for  years. Plus I lettered in basketball and never did play  regular, but I lettered in basketball.  I'm one of the last guys  that  lettered  four  years  in three sports in those days.   Kind of fun.  So the season ended and I talked to Ike Armstrong about  playing  pro  football.  He said, "Oh, we can take care of that."  So he contacted  his  old friend Dutch Clark, who was playing  for  Colorado  College.  So I got a letter from the   Cleveland  Rams  and  went  back there.  Of course in those days, football  was  so much different from the way you play it today.   Of course, I'm about a hundred years too late.  I only got $115 a game  though.  We had to pay all of our own expenses and that.  I never  did  play  regular for Cleveland or anything like that.  I played  quite a bit as a substitute.  I was only 195 pounds and six feet tall.  We had some guys there that were around 6'5" that played end like Paul McDonough from Utah and some of those guys could move pretty good.  So they generally were the ones that got the  starting  roles. So  I lasted there and that was quite an  experience playing pro football in those days with Cleveland.

 

Mel:  How did Dutch Clark get you into this?

 

Pete:  Dutch  Clark played with the Detroit Lions.  Then he became coach of the Cleveland Rams.  He was coaching the Cleveland Rams.

 

Mel:  So  you  went  back  there to the training camp in kind of a make good situation?  Or was it guaranteed?

 

Pete:  No.  We didn't have to make good.  It was just all cut and dried. You  signed  a  contract  and  there  you  went.  We trained at Baldwin-Wallace  College  in  Berea,  Ohio which is just a little ways  out of town from Cleveland.  That's where we stayed when we trained . . . but  we  didn't  have  a training camp or anything like that like they do nowadays.  To the best of my knowledge.

 

Mel:  How  about  rookies?    Didn't  they have to try out?  Talking to Elmer Ward.  He said he had to, with the '35 Lions, he had to try out.  That  there  was a big camp.  Lots of guys.  Lots of guys didn't make it.  It was a competitive situation.

 

Pete:  I  don't  recall that ever happened to us.  I just don't remember that  ever  happened  to  us. I  went  back  there  and  I was     automatically on the squad.

 

Mel:  Now this was what year?

 

Pete:  1940.

 

Mel:  So your last year playing for the U was '39?

 

Pete:  Well,  I  actually  graduated,  '39  was my last football season. Then  I  graduated  in 1940 and went back in the fall of '40 back there.  We  left  here  in  July.  In fact at that time, Paul McDonough  from  Utah and Clarence Gehrke, we all drove back in a car  to  Cleveland.  It was kind of fun. You know, we traveled around.  I can't remember exact dates that I was there.  Later on in  the  season  sometime and I don't remember just exactly when, probably it might have been even in late October or November when     I  was cut off the Cleveland Rams team and then they pushed their best  squad.  They said why don't you go down and play with the Columbus  Bulls. And so I went down with the old Columbus Bulls for the rest of the season.  I was there about, I don't remember exactly, now it's been so long, I haven't looked at the records on it. The Columbus Bulls were the old American League at that time.  They  had  teams  like,  they  had  Columbus and there's Milwaukee, Boston, New York and I think St. Louis. They had four or  five  teams  in that league at that time.  It was kind of fun playing in Columbus, you know.  That big old university stadium.

 

Mel:  Is that where you played?

 

Pete:  Yes.

 

Mel:  Where Ohio State plays?

 

Pete:  Yes.

 

Mel:  That is a big stadium.

 

Pete:  A  hundred  thousand  people.  When we went back to Cleveland, we played  in  the old Cleveland ball park.  I still see it on TV in baseball  season.  When the Cleveland team today plays, they've got  the huge stadium there.  We'd go back there and have fifteen thousand  people and you could barely spot them in the stands, it was such a big stadium.  Fifteen thousand people.  Of course, up here  at  the  University of Utah, fifteen thousand people filled the  damn  stadium  practically.  It was a little different for a little old farm boy that went back there.  It was kind of fun.  I played  in  the  old  Yankee  Stadium.   We went up to Boston and played  when  the  Rams went up there.  We went and played, Green Bay  came  down and they played in Cleveland with us.  I met that great  end from Green Bay, Don Hutson, the old great end of those days  who  set records for ever and a day.  You know, he's just a little  teeny  guy.  He  could  really  run and move.  It was a different  type  of ball game than I was used to at Utah.  It was about the extent of it.  A good experience.

 

Mel:  Do  you  remember  any details about Berea College?  The training camp.  How long did it last?

 

Pete:  Well,  we  stayed  there  and trained at the high school football field. We all stayed at the Baldwin-Wallace College. Out of

Cleveland.  It's located in Berea, Ohio.  We all stayed there in dormitories at the Baldwin-Wallace College and trained there.  I

think  we went back, as I recall, we must have gone back sometime in the middle of July.

 

Mel:  It's pretty hot in Ohio in July.

 

Pete:  Oh, God, I'll say it was.  [---] back there.

 

Mel:  Humid, too.

 

Pete:  Oh, sure.  Warmer than a son of a gun.

 

Mel:  What was training like in those conditions?

 

Pete:  Well,  just about like here, you know.  We start training here in the  end  of  August  and  September.  It gets pretty hot.  After you'd worked out  for  a couple of hours, then we'd have to run around the track for a couple or three times.  Then we'd work out twice a day like in the morning and the afternoon.  I'll tell you,  you didn't  have to worry about going to sleep because you fell asleep pretty good after a two-a-day workout.

 

Mel:  Dutch Clark.  What are your memories of him?

 

Pete:  He  was a wonderful guy.  Just a real nice, friendly guy.  Just a wonderful  guy.  He passed away about two, three, or four years ago.  Something like that.  [---]

 

Mel:  As a coach, was he a taskmaster kind of person?

 

Pete:  No.   He wasn't the tough taskmaster that you have in some of the pro  game  today.  Like old Ditka with the Chicago Bears.  He's meaner 'n hell with his kids.  That wasn't the way it was in those  days.  Of course, like I say, football today and then what     we  played  was  two different things.  Jiminy crickets.  Now you got,  what  have you got?  Ten coaches on a professional football squad  and at that time, I think we had two or three.  Everything is  specialized  today.  Got to have a field goal kicking coach today,  a  [-] coach, and a tackle coach, and this coach and that coach and  a quarterback  coach.  That wasn't the case in those days.  Field goal kicking was very rare in those days in both the college  and  the pro game at that time.  Just the way they do it today  and the way did it then, you don't even recognize the game from the way we played it.  The way it is today.

 

Mel:  [Mentions names of players on the Cleveland Rams and asks for him to recall personal details about them.]

 

Pete:  . . . . I  can't remember all the details about those guys.  This has been  fifty  some  odd  years ago.  [laugh]  . . . . Who was it?  I'm trying  to  think  of our quarterback in those days.  He was from Mississippi  State,  but I  can't  think of his name.  He got up     there.  He was All-American from Mississippi.

 

Mel:  Parker Hall?

 

Pete:  Yes.  Parker Hall.  That's the guy.  Yes.  We were all jealous of Parker Hall because he signed up for $5,000 a year and the rest of us were only making $115 a game.  That was big money then.

 

Mel:  Did he come in as a rookie that year?

 

Pete:  Yes. He  was  All-American  that  year. I think he came from Mississippi or Mississippi State . . . . Vic Spadaccini [he pronounced it  Spa-da-ceenie]  was  on  that [-] team . . . He was quite a guy.  Boy,  he  was  a  football  player.  He came from Minnesota, or someplace.  He was quite a football player.  I don't know whether he made All Pro or not in those days, but he was quite a football player.

 

Mel:  He  ended  up  coming  here  to Salt Lake to play with one of the service teams here.

 

Pete:  Oh,  did he?  I remember Vic Spadaccini.  He was just a real good Italian,  I  think he was Italian.  He had a lot of laughs and he was fun to be with.

 

Mel:  Fred Gehrke?

 

Pete:  Of  course,  Freddy  was a good friend of mine because we went to school together up here at Utah.  Then I got drafted in the army, as  I  told  you,  when  I got back from Cleveland. Actually, at Columbus,  Ohio,  I  got  drafted. I  came  back home in early December  and  I  went up to the Ogden high school coach, I can't remember  his  name,  now. Football coach up there.  And my old high  school  basketball coach was basketball coach at Ogden High School.  But the National Guard was called out and the football coach, I think he was a major in National Guard or something like that,  and they pulled them out so they could start training.  So I went up and applied for the football coaching job at Ogden High School.  That's what I really wanted to do.  That was my major. In  education. Also  had a minor in physiology and anatomy and stuff  like  this.  So anyway, I went up there and talked to Gib Mosinger,  my  high  school  basketball  coach. He  was a fine individual. Just a great guy. So he said, "I'll help you all I can  to  help  you get  the  job.  You and I could work together pretty  good." I  said, "Yes.  I'll help you with football and you'll  help me with basketball and we'll make a go of it."  So I met with the board of education and they said, "What's your draft number?" I  said,  "I  haven't  the  slightest  idea because I registered  in  Cleveland."  To change the subject, that one year training  deal  because  that was before we moved into Poland and all  that  stuff.  They  said,  "Gee. Have you got your draft number?"  I  didn't have the slightest idea.  "Well, you better check that out before we can make any decisions."  So I drove all the way back to  Murray.  Went down to the draft board.  Leif Erickson's wife was head of the draft board in Murray and he was quite a baseball player in the old Magna team.  She said, "Gee, it's good to see you Pete.  I was just getting ready to mail this to  you."  It  was  a  draft  notice. So I left.  That was in December. I left about the middle of February, one of the first ones that go. So that took care of my high school coaching deal at Ogden High. Then I went to Maryland.  I applied for the officer training school. Then Pearl Harbor came around December 7th.  I  was  in,  what,  almost ten months. I applied for the infantry  training school to become an officer.  War happened and in a half hour, we took off for Aberdeen, Washington.  Out on the coast, the Japs were coming.  We had no guns.  No nothing at all.  Here we are at Aberdeen waiting for the Japs to land and they never  did.  So part of our division was pulled out and was sent to  New  York  by  way  of  New  York  and went down to the South Pacific.  The 41st Infantry Division.  So anyway, we sat back and we were going our second half of the division and I was loading a boxcar. I  was  staff sergeant at that time and a little bucko came  over  and  said,  "Sergeant.  You're wanted at regimental headquarters immediately."  I said, "What the hell did I do wrong now?"  So  I got over to regimental headquarters and they said, "Sergeant,  get  your stuff and get the hell out of here. You're going  to  officers  training  school."  So I danced over to Fort Lewis to  the  [-]  across the street from Fort  Lewis where     headquarters  were.  Next morning I went back to see my friends and  they were all gone.  That's how close I came to going to the South  Pacific.  And  the 41st Division had more injuries, more casualties, and more decorations than any division in the South Pacific.  And I missed all that, which saved my life.  So to make an interesting story,  I  went to Fort Benning and studied down there. After graduation there, I stayed as an instructor. They put  me over into the area teaching light machine gun work.  Then they organized a physical training committee.  Somebody says, "There's  Lt.  Bogden there. He's a football player and all that stuff.  We'll put him over in the physical training section."  So I  went  over there.  I taught hand-to-hand fighting and physical training.  I was there for two years. I went from 2nd Lt. to Captain in two years which is normal.  We were only supposed to stay  there  about 2 1/2 years and then get transferred out.  So one day we were having a class. I was teaching a class. I saw a strange colonel come over and talk to our colonel.  And this strange  colonel,  talking to our person, "Got anybody here about ready  to be transferred?"  "Yes," he said, "Captain Bogden there is  ready to go."  And he said, "Bogden?  Is that the Bogden from Salt  Lake  City?"   He said, "Yes."  He said, "I want to talk to him."  And guess who it was.  It was Ted Banks who played at the University  of  Idaho  when  I  played  for  Utah.  He was in the Special  Services Division. He'd never forgotten me. One of the best football games I ever played, I could show you an article on it,  we  played  Idaho  at  Boise. He said if I'd played at any school  but  Utah  I  would have been mentioned for All American.  Gee,  I'd  had one of my best games.  Ted never'd forgotten that. Ted  Banks.  So  anyway,  he said, "You want to go into Special Service work?"  I said, "Hell yes, I want to. I don't want to go train  again in the infantry.  Stuck in someplace to fight in the infantry.  So I ended up in Special Services work.  So because of that, the 42nd Infantry Division I think it was at that time.  We did  quite  a  bit  of training.  I spent most of my time, and we actually went overseas and I was in charge of having USO films go through our corps headquarters and was ending their deal and handling equipment with the physical fitness facilities--baseball bats and gloves, footballs, things like that.  Then I opened up a rest  center  for the soldiers in Luxembourg, Germany. My whole life  has been athletics. My whole life.  Ever since I graduated from  college,  my whole life has been in athletics.  As the war ended,  I came on home and I thought I'd get a quickie job someplace. Of course, I came home as a major and all these high school jobs down here was paying about eight or nine hundred dollars a year. And  so, Rawlings Sporting Goods Company was looking around for a rep.  And I contacted them and they hired me as  a  rep. I  did a lot of promotional work for them.  I knew every college coach in the Rocky Mountain football conference.  All  friends  of mine.  Bob Neward [?] was a great guy.  I forget some  of  those  guys over in Colorado and Denver.  Knew 'em all.  Played golf with them and everything.  Then when I left Rawlings.  I finished, changed with them.  They sold out.  So I became one of the manufacturers reps so I hooked up with Louisville on their baseball  bat  line and golf line.  I had my own lines.  My whole lifetime  was  just  nothing  but sporting goods.  Anytime I went anyplace it was all involved with me because of my football deal.  So  I  ended  up  with  them  and  I had several other lines as a manufacturers  rep.   It's been many years, a good friend of mine took  on the Adidas line of shoes in Germany.  So he wanted me to write  a  letter that I was working for him so he could get the line and that guy repped the Rocky Mountain Conference still.  He got  the  Adidas line and that's how come I got with Adidas shoes and stuff.  So anyway, that was basically it, you know.  They can say what they want about athletics, but it sure made a difference in my life. Coming up in Murray, from a big family.  [--] and Ike Armstrong asked me what I was going to do and I said probably go work for Utah Copper Company, at that time.  So it made my whole  life  change being in athletics.  Beautiful for me.  Never did  become rich or anything like that, but traveled a lot.  Went to  Europe  quite a few times for Adidas shoes.  Went to a lot of sporting  goods  shows  around the country and all that stuff you know.   Went  to  a  lot of football coach's clinics and all the National  Football  meetings  that they had and things like that.   Quite  an  experience.  They're all dead now.  Guys that coached when  I  was  calling  on  them . . . . You know Gehrke.  I don't know whether  a  lot  of  people  don't  know  this, but Gehrke wasn't drafted  like  I  was.  He  was  married.   Then they moved the Cleveland Rams to Los Angeles.  Became the L.A. Rams because they weren't  making any money in Cleveland in those days.  Of course, Gehrke  never  was  drafted  so  he  stayed there and then played football  for  the L.A. Rams.  He was a great football player for them.  Of course, I don't remember all the details because I was in  the  Army  then. Gehrke stayed there for a long, long time.  Made  good  money. I mean he was making good money, that was in those  days.  Gehrke  was quite an athlete and quite an artist.  He's the one that painted the Rams' helmets by hand.  He put that big  ram on the helmets.  That's how come all these teams started having  helmets  painted  with  their  emblem  on it.  And Gehrke painted  the  first  helmets  that ever came out.  He painted the Rams'  helmets  with a big horn on it.  It was when they moved to  L.A.  The L.A. Rams.

 

Mel:  In Cleveland it was just a plain helmet?

 

Pete:  Plain  helmet.   Yes....He also helped design the rings that they get  from  playing  in  the Super Bowls.  I saw a Super Bowl ring that  Fred  had  when  the  University  of  Utah honored our team because  we  were  the  first team to ever go to a bowl game.  We played in the Sun Bowl game in 1938.  We went down and played New Mexico in the Sun Bowl game.  We were the first team that went to a  bowl  game  out  of  Utah. Fifteen  of  us showed up at the University  of  Utah  two  years ago last fall.  Gehrke came over from  Denver  and  he  was  wearing a Super Bowl ring.  Gee, talk about  a  beautiful  ring.  He helped design it.  He was quite an artist and all that stuff.

 

Mel:  Was he a coach too?

 

Pete:  He  became  involved  with  Denver  Broncos. He was a personnel manager  over  there. I used to see him once in a while when I traveled  over  there.  I'd  call him on the phone.  Of course, Denver  at  that  time was in the old American League before they merged.   When they merged, Gehrke stayed with them.  He'd always say,  come  on  over  and I'll get you some tickets.  To get in a Denver   game   in  the  last  fifteen-twenty  years  was  almost impossible  unless  somebody left you one.  People don't remember Gehrke of having painted the first helmet . . . . [recalls remembering some  of the Cleveland players] . . . Ted [Livingston].  Oh, yes.  He was  quite  a  guy . . . . after  the  war, I lost track of everybody. Same  way  with the university guys . . . . Paul [McDonough] of course played for Utah.  When he got back from the war, Paul injured his back  playing  up  to the university.  They have a cement railing around  the track.  Paul fell on that cement railing and hurt his back  so  he  came  back after playing pro sometime, it must have been in the early 1950s I think and Paul came back to have a back operation.  He went into the hospital to have a back operation on his  back  and  he was all packed up and ready to go home and his wife  came  down  to pick him up and Paul just keeled over in the hospital  bed  and  died.  He was still a young man.  The thing I remember  about  Paul  quite  a  bit, he was about 6'5", 6'6" and could  run  pretty good, but he couldn't see too well.  He had to wear  glasses, but he could sure catch that ball when he took off down  the  field.  So you get a guy like me who was only 6 foot competing against Paul and it made a lot of difference.

 

Mel:  Did he wear glasses while he was playing?

 

Pete:  Sure.  He had to.  He couldn't see anything without his glasses.

 

Mel:  Was he playing up at the U when you were there?

 

Pete:  I  think he was one year ahead of me, I think . . . . Barney [McGarry] went  back,  too.  He was a guard here at Utah.  He played quite a bit.  Barney was a pretty good athlete.

 

Mel:  Was he in the car when you guys went back there?

 

Pete:  No.  He went back on his own as I recall for some reason. Barney came back and ended up in Provo.  He got in the tile business, floors and that.  I haven't seen Barney for years and years and years.  I've  heard about him.  Asked about him once in a while from  people  who might know him and nobody seems to know whether he's still alive or not.  So I haven't the slightest idea . . . .

 

Mel:  . . . . This  is the lineup of the Columbus Bullies.  You called them the Bulls, but in here they call them the Bullies.

 

Pete:    Julie  Alfonse.  I  remember him....[names those he remembered]  Tom Cory. That's right.  He did go back there with us . . . .  Tom played at Utah.  An end.  He was about two years ahead of me.  He was always in fights up there.  Tom came from Castle Dale.  Down around Price some place.  When war broke out, he went into the air force and he got killed over in Italy flying a plane.  He was a good football player....When I went back there, I really wanted to  play with the Detroit Lions.  So I thought about getting with them because of [Frank] Christensen and Jack Johnson had been there. They  would have been more familiar with me than the rest of them so  [--] with the old Cleveland Rams.  Here's a letter from Dutch Clark.  Here's  my  football contract.  One hundred and fifteen dollars a game.

 

Mel:  And Barney McGarry was one of the witnesses of this?

 

Pete:  Yes.    I  had Barney sign it. . . . Here's some letters from the old Detroit  Lions. . . . I  contacted  them  because,  I  don't remember exactly  now  whether Dutch Clark was still there at that time or whether  he just came to Cleveland that year or whether he'd been at  Cleveland  before . . . . Gus Henderson was the head coach at that time.  Hunk  Anderson.  Do you remember him at all?  Wasn't he from Iowa or some damn place?