Rory Craft:  

Hello to all my classmates and other John Adams and OSU Buckeye alumni. I hope that all of you are in the best of health, in good spirits and that your children are not driving you crazy. Eighteen years in a federal law enforcement capacity along the U.S.A./Mexico border (Brownsville,Texas), last nine years behind a desk. My incentive to take a job so far away was part financial and part adventure seeking. Demographics in this area is about 95 percent Hispanic of mostly Mexican descent. Very patriotic area. There has to be more ex-Marines per square foot down here than anyplace else in the U.S. I guess I am best known as the brother of Carol, Jeffery and Bettye Craft. Having good looking siblings helped my lowly social status. Having Carol around at Corlett School was helpful, especially after she punched out a guy who beat me up while I was in the fifth grade. Ah, growing up in Cleveland, let's see, Captain Penny, Ghoulardi, Barnaby (I want you to know that you are the nicest person in the whole wide world.), Hoolihan and Big Chuck, The Ghoul (Turn Blue!) and Polka Varieties. There is also the fond memory of the fragrant aroma emanating from the steel mills in the flats and the pristine water of the Cuyahoga River flowing into Lake Erie. Then there was trying to negotiate lunch time and rec period at Jamison and hoping you would not get shook down for your lunch money. Remember: "Let me hold a quarter man." I remember negotiating the gauntlet through the school yard after school, especially on Fridays. It was like wildebeest in Africa attempting to cross a crocodile infested river. I figured once I made it to E.136 St. and Crennell Avenue I was safe. My time as Rebel began while I was trying out for the junior varsity football team in August 1972. One lesson I learned was not to stand too close to the door of the J.V. locker room. Why? Because a certain junior star running back by the name of Cleo Sapp would make an entrance, turn off the lights and punch out the nearest person to the door. I happened to find this out the hard way. To add insult to injury, one of my sadistic team mates switched off the lights again as I was still recovering from the first series of blows. Sapp was eager to oblige me with an encore. (Carol, where were you?) Needless to say I stayed as far away from that door as possible for the rest of the season. (Incidentally, in 1984 I ran into Sapp and his topic of conversation was about working and taking care of his family. He did mention football but it was in the context of the pounding his body took during his football days.) Another incident I remember from that August of 1972 was when a certain Donny Grissett who in his infinite wisdom decided to sport a JFK T-shirt under his practice jersey. After practice Mr. Young saw the shirt and ordered that it be ripped off of him. A volunteer assistant coach named Mike quickly obliged Mr. Young. This incident left Donny, shirtless, somewhat perturbed but wiser. My junior varsity days were spent getting flattened by Virgil Boysaw and always falling for that same cross body block by Alex Dawkins in practice. Being too slow, too uncoordinated and too timid got me a lot of bench time. Mr. Adams thought so much of my ability that he had me hold the chains during the second half of a game against Glenville, in game uniform no less! Ken Curry never let me forget that. I never made it to the varsity football team. Mr. Young had a keen eye for talent and his eye told him I had no talent. One of my biggest thrills was sitting next to Glenda Beard in biology as a sophomo...Expand for more