Remembering Blue Moore
What a surprise when I turned the last page of the January Union College and saw the story about Harold Moore, the Garnet footballer killed while playing college football in the early 1900s. It brought back memories.
I arrived on the Union campus in 1946 after three year in the United States Navy. I had hoped to try out for the football team under coach Mel Hein, the former great of the pro New York Giants. He was a center and so was I. It never happened. I was required to attend Freshmen Camp. While there I broke my leg playing “touch” football.
Back on campus navigating on crutches and the football season approaching, I was getting edgy.
About then the campus radio station posted a notice that they would hold auditions for play-by-play announcers. With my association with the game through junior and senior high schools and the Navy, I decided to give it a try. I was picked to be the play-by-play announcer. It was an experience. With color man Bill Porter we traveled to many sites off campus to broadcast the action. This then extended to basketball, and I was also asked to do a sports show every Friday.
I wanted to add something extra to the show rather than constantly reviewing college football games at all levels being played the following Saturday. I decided on a history of the sport at Union. I spent a lot of time in Nott Memorial reading yearbooks, college publications, and old local papers. It was then I came across Harold “Blue” Moore. After I wrote my script and aired it, reaction was interesting. There were many on campus not aware of this facet of the game and its effect on football overall. Even some off-campus homes picking up our signal commented. As for play-by-play and the Harold Moore story, I was hooked.
It was the beginning of more than forty-one years in radio sports and broadcasting from minor league for the St. Louis Cardinals to the Miss America
Pageant in Atlantic City.
I didn't become wealthy, but I did meet and rub elbows with the power makers in this country. I retired in 1990 to spend more time with my patient and enduring wife. I never forgot how and why it began-campus station WRUC and the Harold Moore story.
Alan Raber '50 Bethlehem, Pa.
Remembering the alcove
The most recent issue of your fine magazine held great interest for me regarding the Nott Memorial Building. I have “libraried” there, acted there, generally “goofed off' there, and, all in all, loved the ambience of the old place.
In the interest of accuracy, however, I must call to your attention the caption under the picture on page 14, “The reading room in 1936….” The Chi Psi alcove was not installed until the fraternity's 100th birthday, which was 1941. Therefore, the reading room picture has to be at least five years older than acknowledged.
It's a small point, but I thought you might like to know the whole truth.
John C. Alberts '44 Barrington, Ill.