This is a long post, and I've condensed my remarks as much as I could.
The year was 1971, and I was a junior at Walla Walla High School. I was very proud of the fact that I had made the varsity football team as we had a very large high school of 1650 students in 3 grades. I was a backup offensive guard, not near good enough to start as the young man in front of me, Chuck Anderson, was a very good athlete, having set a school record in the shot put a year earlier as a junior. Chuck and I were casual friends as we were teammates on a Pony League baseball team one summer along with our playing the same position on the HS football team, but we were not close. There was a pecking order dictating that seniors not associate with underclassmen.
We were playing our 2nd game of the season, a non-conference game at home vs. Pendleton, OR. We were on offense and Chuck was in his 3-point stance and moved ever so slightly. The opposing linebacker saw this movement and came across the LOS to make contact as at the time, a movement by the offense had to pull the opposing team offside in order for it to be a penalty. The LB really clobbered Chuck, sending him backwards and landing on his hip pockets.
Chuck didn't seem phased and played the next play as if nothing had happened. On the 2nd play, he was obviously in a cloud, wandering aimlessly downfield on a passing play. On the 3rd play after the hit, he collapsed in his 3-point stance and lay motionless on the field.
I was standing on the sidelines when the coach grabbed me by the shoulder pad and told me to go in. I stood there on the field a few feet away from Chuck and watched them load his limp body onto a stretcher and into the ambulance. Everyone knew it was a very serious injury.
The hospital in Walla Walla quickly realized that the case was way above their capabilities and transferred Chuck to Kadlec in Richland where he underwent surgery to repair a broken blood vessel in his brain, but there really wasn't much they could do for him. Chuck died on the following Monday morning with an announcement being made over the intercom while we were in class.
The root cause of his injury was not football, or at least not in that game. There were two possible causes: Chuck broke his jaw playing football 2-3 years earlier, the other that he had fallen off a horse and sustained a head injury. Whatever the cause, the result was that it weakened a blood vessel in his brain and under a perfect storm condition of blood pressure, heart rate, and trauma, the blood vessel ruptured.
President Nixon visited Walla Walla a week later to dedicate a reactor out at the Hanford area (the Pasco airport, a former Navy airfield, did not have a runway capable of handling large jets). After hearing the story, Nixon called Chuck's mom from AF1 to offer his condolences then said this in a short speech of which I attended:
I know, too, that a tragedy occurred in this city, and that all of us, all of you, share the sympathy for the fine young boy who, in an accident, lost his life.2
2 The President was referring to Chuck Anderson, a senior at Walla Walla High School, who died on Wednesday, September 22, 1971, of head injuries sustained in a high school football game the preceding weekend.
www.presidency.ucsb.edu
There was a rumor going around that the Richland brain surgeon who tried to save Chuck's life was flown down to LA in the back seat of a jet fighter the night Bobby Kennedy was shot. I could never confirm or refute that rumor, but it makes sense that they'd be flying in specialists from around the country to save a possible future POTUS's life.
A couple years ago when Damar Hamlin went down during a game and when ultimately successful efforts to revive him began on the field and seeing how traumatized his teammates were, I immediately had a flash back to my own experience some 50 years earlier. It was my first experience with death. Up until then, only old people died, or so I thought.
There's a lot more to the story, but it has to be told over a beer.
The year was 1971, and I was a junior at Walla Walla High School. I was very proud of the fact that I had made the varsity football team as we had a very large high school of 1650 students in 3 grades. I was a backup offensive guard, not near good enough to start as the young man in front of me, Chuck Anderson, was a very good athlete, having set a school record in the shot put a year earlier as a junior. Chuck and I were casual friends as we were teammates on a Pony League baseball team one summer along with our playing the same position on the HS football team, but we were not close. There was a pecking order dictating that seniors not associate with underclassmen.
We were playing our 2nd game of the season, a non-conference game at home vs. Pendleton, OR. We were on offense and Chuck was in his 3-point stance and moved ever so slightly. The opposing linebacker saw this movement and came across the LOS to make contact as at the time, a movement by the offense had to pull the opposing team offside in order for it to be a penalty. The LB really clobbered Chuck, sending him backwards and landing on his hip pockets.
Chuck didn't seem phased and played the next play as if nothing had happened. On the 2nd play, he was obviously in a cloud, wandering aimlessly downfield on a passing play. On the 3rd play after the hit, he collapsed in his 3-point stance and lay motionless on the field.
I was standing on the sidelines when the coach grabbed me by the shoulder pad and told me to go in. I stood there on the field a few feet away from Chuck and watched them load his limp body onto a stretcher and into the ambulance. Everyone knew it was a very serious injury.
The hospital in Walla Walla quickly realized that the case was way above their capabilities and transferred Chuck to Kadlec in Richland where he underwent surgery to repair a broken blood vessel in his brain, but there really wasn't much they could do for him. Chuck died on the following Monday morning with an announcement being made over the intercom while we were in class.
The root cause of his injury was not football, or at least not in that game. There were two possible causes: Chuck broke his jaw playing football 2-3 years earlier, the other that he had fallen off a horse and sustained a head injury. Whatever the cause, the result was that it weakened a blood vessel in his brain and under a perfect storm condition of blood pressure, heart rate, and trauma, the blood vessel ruptured.
President Nixon visited Walla Walla a week later to dedicate a reactor out at the Hanford area (the Pasco airport, a former Navy airfield, did not have a runway capable of handling large jets). After hearing the story, Nixon called Chuck's mom from AF1 to offer his condolences then said this in a short speech of which I attended:
I know, too, that a tragedy occurred in this city, and that all of us, all of you, share the sympathy for the fine young boy who, in an accident, lost his life.2
2 The President was referring to Chuck Anderson, a senior at Walla Walla High School, who died on Wednesday, September 22, 1971, of head injuries sustained in a high school football game the preceding weekend.
Remarks on Arrival at Walla Walla, Washington. | The American Presidency Project
www.presidency.ucsb.edu
A couple years ago when Damar Hamlin went down during a game and when ultimately successful efforts to revive him began on the field and seeing how traumatized his teammates were, I immediately had a flash back to my own experience some 50 years earlier. It was my first experience with death. Up until then, only old people died, or so I thought.
There's a lot more to the story, but it has to be told over a beer.
