Edmonton Journal from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada • 34

C6 F.DMONXOS JOURNAL; Jim Coleman team. The football slaves of the West finally had been freed! Winnipeg's 1935 Grey Cup team included eight Americans. Cronin had left to coach Calgary that season but Rebholz and Kabat still were playing for the Blue Bombers. The Winnipegs' new imports were playing-coach Bob Fritz, Bert Oja, Fritz Hanson, Bud Marquardt, Herb Peschel and Joe Perpich. Three of those original Winnipeg imports remained in Canada after they retired from football.

Hanson still is a successful insurance executive in Calgary. Marquardt retired a few years ago after spending his entire business career with the Hudson's Bay Company. Dr. Oja completed his courses in dentistry while playing for the Blue Bombers. He went overseas with the Canadian Army Dental Corps and, after the war, he returned to practice in Winnipeg until his untimely death.

The Winnipeg Blue Bombers have a proud football tradition. Thus, on the occasion of their 50th anniversary, young readers should forgive these reminiscences. If I got around to writing the gaudy truth about some of those oldtime footballers and their Saturday night replays in Child's Restaurant, no one except Uncle Vince Leah would believe me. (I wonder what became of Nick," the night manager at Child's.) Max Baer. The Winnipeg Football Club was a child of The Great Depression, bom without even enough diapers to protect it from the early winter on the cropless prairies.

I sh that Uncle Vince was sitting beside me to help me with this piece, but, my recollection is that the club was formed by a football nut named Tote Mitchell. In 1930, the team was known simply as the Winnipegs. They wore green jerseys and they were coached initially by Jack Little, a McGill grad whose family was involved in the Robinson-Little departmental stores. The Winnipegs were pretty terrible, losing every game to their cross-town rivals who were known as St John's. The Winnipegs had three of the tiniest halfbacks I ever saw playing senior football in Canada.

Those little guys were Ron Gay, Stan Pepler and Lew Elkin. They played their football games in Wesley Park, a little mud-bowl in the heart of the city. There was a pleasant bootlegging establishment just across the street and on some wet, cold November afternoons, the football fans in the unlicensed bistro outnumbered those in the open stands of Wesley Park. The football games were played on Saturday afternoon and, usually, there was a replay Saturday night in Child's Restaurant at the corner of Portage and Main. Nick, the night manager at Child's, would make a telephone call for police reinforcements when he saw the battered football players lumbering into the restaurant.

Things picked up in 1931 when the Winnipegs brought in Carl Cronin from Notre Dame as playing coach. About the same time, St. John's brought in Russ Rebholz and Greg Kabat from Wisconsin. A third team, Garrison; assembled from armed forces units at Fort Osborne Barracks, was added to the local league for one season. The profitless internecine warfare ended in 1933 when Winnipegs and St.

John's amalgamated under the name Winnipeg Rugby Football Club. In November, with Cronin, Rebholz and Kabat as playing coaches, the Winnipeg combines went East for the first time and they lost the Grey Cup semi-final 13-0 to the Toronto Argonauts. Nevertheless, Winnipeg's good performance against Argos in 1933 was the beginning of a football uprising in the West. In 1934, Regina Roughriders went to the Grey Cup final and the Sarnia Imperials beat them 20-12. As far as Western Canadians are concerned, Dec.

7, 1935 always will be remembered as Emancipation Day. The Winnipeg Blue Bombers defeated Hamilton Tigers, 18-12 for the first-ever Grey Cup victory by a Western June will be Sports Nostalgia Month in Winnipeg. On Tuesday, June 3, Vince Leah will be honored at a civic banquet on the occasion of his retirement after 50 years on the staff of the Winnipeg Tribune. And, on Tuesday, June 10, the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, who have won the Grey Cup more times than any other Western Canada football team, officially will observe the 50th anniversary of the formation of the club. Uncle Vince was the sports writer who supplied the nickname Blue Bombers for the Winnipeg football team.

If memory serves correctly, Uncle Vince didn't hang his nickname on the football team until late in 1935 when heavyweight boxer Joe Louis was heralded internationally as the Brown Bomber after running up a string of sensational knockout victories in which his victims included Primo Camera, Kingfish Levinsky and Winner ofl973 Indy hits wall, breaks ankle INDIANAPOLIS (AP)-Gordoii ohncock, the 1973 Indianapolis 500 winner, was injured Thursday when his race car struck the wall, went airborne and slid more than 121 metres along the first turn at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. He suffered a broken left ankle and was taken from the Speedway to Methodist Hospital here. Johncock, who had just turned a lap at 300.74 kilometres an hour, did a half-spin coming out of the first turn, then hit the wall with his Wildcat-Cosworth. Johncock had practised earlier at more than 300.94 km.h. The top speed during Thursday's practice was turned in by two-time Indy 500 winner Johnny Rutherford, who piloted his Chaparral to a lap of 308.82.

The only other driver over 305 km.h. was former Indy champ Mario Andretti at 307.18. AH of the top drivers are using the so-called ground effects cars, but what makes them faster is still somewhat of a mystery, even to the drivers themselves. "Sure, we love it," two-time Indianapolis 500 champion Bobby Unser said Thursday after turning a practice lap at more than 304.16 km.h. in his new Pe-nske-Cosworth racer.

"It's a new thing to the world." The ground effects tag refers to an aerodynamic innovation which channels air under the car with the aid of skirt-like strips that hang to or near the ground. The ef- feet is to create a low pres-; sure area beneath the thereby creating a downforce that virtually glues the car to the track. That gives it a few extra kilometres an especially going through the turns. It's full potential, and the reasons it works the -way it does, haven't been explained. "Ii's kind of a magic thing." said who logged one of the fastest practice speeds on just two days before pole-; position qualifying for the Indy 500 on May 25.

"It's air. "It's going to innovate- a lot of new things. A lot of people don't understand it, and sometimes I wonder if we do ourselves." The ground effects princi- pie, introduced a decade ago-by Texas car builder Jim" Hall, came into respectability in 1979 when Unser's younger brother, AL drove a Hall-built Chaparral to victory in a late-season race in Phoenix. A.J. Foyt, the only four-time Indy winner, had trouble getting up speed using his own Foyt engine, but he went out in bis back-up Cos-worth-powered racer and turned a lap at more than 300.94 TEEQLLEOBSE Saddlery Western Wear 1st ANNIVERSARY May 9 10th 15 OFF STORE WIDE Remember PANCAKE BREAKFAST Sat May 10th 9a.m.11 a.m.

641 1-118 Ave. 471-1468 ARCHERS SAVE "CEDAR ARROWS" Over 40-50 Target Arrows SI 6.95 doz. Compound Target Arrows 80-85 Spline Full Length $19.95 doz. "GAME GETTERS" 2117-2219 32" winserts $52.95 doz. "SPECIAL ON JENNINGS COMPOUND BOWS" Sidekick III $139.95 SuoerT $199.95 It TV Split $239.95 Arrow Star Hunter $429.95 HUNTERS BE READY! D0NT GET CAUGHT SHORT! ORDER Up to date sports results on Journal SportsLine 423-0598 NOW! Ed's Sports World Ltd.

Phone 987-4949 Box 1404, Devon, Alberta SATURDAY, MAY Plus many more feT nndiiLM MOTOR )AIRSH0CKS( unaoveniseo specials 10 7 save now i hf Re9-119-30 1 ''whfii lVSs SPECIAL I A95 F. GOODRICH Xy-jC PROTECTANT TA TIRES New beauty and long OHO ETG life for rubber, vinyl, lT I leather and plastics. SUPER SPECIAL 4 oz. size 1 SCirn as tmZZTK Jgim VAN LOAD SPARK La QUARTZ HALOGEN I LIGHT SETS V. I SBQ5 and SBQ7 v.

Reg. $90.60 7 ---y ALL OTHER LIGHTS 25 OFF OIL FILTERS With Any reg. price I I purchase yyix FOR Gl3 one complete set SPECIAL S-M BOSCH I "I) jj WUC.jlH B.B-ftiii- I I VERRMANCE dAKDCCUC CARBURETORS charcoal 195 30 OFF SUPER 9 j75 Reg. Price SPECIAL 20 'fr-lK REMEMBER TOMORROW ONLY! t- 'r 8 A.M. r5P.Wl.

aiPF 51 Avenue Phone 437-2840 tlyjS" (Prices in effect Saturday only) While stocks last. Cash Carry nfiyn nvft 3S jswr Kama tr. r- ii'i's 1 May 10, 1980 11 a.m. 3 p.m. West, Millwoods North Stores ONLY How to Apply I KO Asphalt Shingles Let the experts show you how! IKO Armourseal 210 asphalt shingles are self-sealing; the sun seals them against wind and weather.

Learn how to apply them, and save time and money by doing it yourself. Available in white, dual brown, dual grey, cedartone black. Bundle covers 32.3 sq. ft. (3 m) mET- 0 I7L West 16810 104A Ave.

Ph. 484-7711 North 127 Ave. 50 St. Ph. 478-9211 Millwoods 9651 -51st Ave.

Ph. 437-7910 to Fri. i ate fmmmmtm ShoD Mon Saturday Wfe'll Help You Build It Better i.