V 9 N. 28 Conversations with a Longhorn, Walter Belt

Been chatting a bit with Walter Belt, a thrower of consequence at the U. of Texas in the mid 1960's.   He enlightened me on the weight training program at that institution back in those days when benefits from weight lifting were only beginning to be understood and applied to sports other than kicking sand in the faces of runts on the beach.    He informed me of the Stark Center at U of T that is dedicated to two thousand years of weight training with its magnificent collection and archives.
Here is some of our conversation:


August 26, 2019

Please add me to your distribution.     Thanks

Walter Belt        UT Letterman, 65-66-67

Walter,

Will do, Walter.  How did you find us, through a teammate?   .................................................

 If you wish to make comments, you are more than welcome.  There is a place at the end of each posting which I then screen before putting up. I 've never refused anything unless it sounds like

spam.   ............................  Glad you can join us.  What were your events?

George Brose


George

Ricardo Romo has been forwarding to me.  He and I were on Texas team in 65 and 66. He graduated and I had one more year. I was a thrower - lucky enough to be in lock step with Randy Matson in high school and college. In high school I was 3rd nationally behind Randy and Bruce Wilhelm. 2nd to Wilhelm at Golden West - Matson went to the AAU nationals. Being a mere mortal I did not keep up with either through college and  afterwards. 2nd at Kansas Relays and 3rd at Texas Relays were my best showings. When I was a senior and they were freshmen I did beat Al Fuerbach at Kansas and Oldfield in Austin. While watching Oldfield with Matson, Matson commented, "If that guy ever learns to dance, he will beat my records". Oldfield was stumbling around the ring and almost falling over but still throwing 65. Same story with Fuerbach and Oldfield, 

Thank you for doing all this. Not much on track and field these days.  With reference to the over 9000 at the dual meet -- I bet there were not many more than 9000 at the natl champs in Des Moines.

Walter

Walter,

Yes, track is in a sad state of affairs.  It is where TV and professional sports and Dancing With the Stars have taken us.    I cannot say I get very excited watching track on TV these days  (even though some of the performances are incredible).

Thanks for writing and telling about yourself.  You were at a great school and in a great program.  Did you do much weight training in your day?  We had a modest weight room with a bench

and a couple of dumbells (not the athletes) at OU. It had a dirt floor under the stands.   It was more than the football team had then.  Oh yes, we also had a spittoon next to the bench.  Mike Lindsay, from Scotland, had insisted on getting some weights.  Lindsay (4th at Rome Olympics in 1960) Dan Irwin, Richard Inman, and Sheppard Miers were our main throwers.  We also had Preston Smith from Grapevine TX and Carl Pelligrini from Dallas.  Carl was a very good discus thrower.  Carl had transferred from a school in Boston.  Once told me about a naked couple jumping off a building on St. Patrick's day in Boston and it only made the fourth page of the papers.  

George

George – for the day, we had a great weight training facility at UT. It was used by all sports. The room now is the football cheerleaders practice and locker room.

No spittoons!

Our training coach was a phys ed professor. Fyi, UT and the general Austin area has a long history of weight training – or “physical culture” – outside of the team sports. See below link

https://www.starkcenter.org/     Readers, clik on this site, it is an incredible source of all kinds of info including audio interviews with many members of the 1968 US Olympic Team.   The Stark Center is a must visit if you are in the Austin area. ed.  

Terry Todd lettered in tennis before the iron bug got a hold of him.

https://davedraper.com/blog/2007/05/04/irononline-bash-2007/    Again Dear Readers if you are into weights, history, or Texas barbeque, you must check this out. ed.

The whole article is something else, but do scroll down to the bit about Mike Graham’s Old Texas Barbell Company.

Graham’s partner, Carol Finsrud, was one of the first female throwers at UT.

And you thought track and field was a cult.

Walter

Walter,

I wonder if that physical culture industry came from the Germans who immigrated into the area around New Braunfels and the like.  They had the 'turnvereins' with a lot of exercise with

Indian Clubs as they were called in English.   Dayton where I grew up and Cincinnati had a number of those gyms in the 1880s.    Pierre de Coubertin the father of the modern Olympics

was impressed by the Germans and the English sport mentality although it was quite different in the two countries.  The French had nothing of the sort except smoking, drinking wine and doing

impressionist painting,  and he didn't think they would fare too well in future wars because of this.  At that time the French could have fought the English as easily as the Germans.  He came to  America too and saw sport in schools and brought the idea back to France.

Walter, I love this kind of story. It's going on the blog.  It's what makes us unique.  All these  guys have stuff in their heads that we've got to

collect before it's forgotten or six feet under.    You may remember Joe Don Looney who played football somewhat infamously at OU after transferring from I think TCU or UT then Cameron JC. Leading punter in the nation and All American running back.   He was heavy into weights and would go down to Baton Rouge in the summer to hang at a gym, where Billy Cannon did a lot of lifting.  Joe Don ran a 9.7  100 yards and was about 225 pounds.  Crazy and proud of it.  He ran track with us in 1963 or 64 to avoid spring football.  How our track coach managed that with the A.D. is anyone's guess but they didn't call Coach Bill Carroll , 'Slick Willie' for no reason.   Bud Wilkinson said that Looney was his first and last JC transfer ever, period.  Once in the spring game Looney purposely went after three unblocked tacklers and ran over each one

and went about 60 yards into the end zone and then walked back to the huddle.   Wilkinson, who was God, with a whistle and clipboard  in Norman, said, "Looney, aren't you ever going to hustle?"    Looney replied,   "Fuck, coach, I'm not ashamed to admit it, I'm tired as Hell."   Almost no one dropped the F bomb in  those days, esp. to persons in supreme authority, but that was Looney.  When OU lost to Texas next season they got rid of him about two weeks later for slugging a grad assistant.  Wilkinson retired and ran unsuccessfully for governor of Oklahoma.  It was said that losing that last time to Texas cost him the election.  Tom Osborne I think is the only football coach that won a major election after football,  becoming a Congressman.  Were there others?

George

Can any of you Longhorns help me with identifying members of this 1964 Longhorn team?

Top Row:  Left Coach Price,  Ernie Koy (football all American?), 5th from left  Preston Davis

Middle Row  2nd from left  Ricardo Romo

Front row:   second from left  Loy Gunter   , second from right  Chuck Frawley?

And finally:

Last week we mentioned a boy from Wasco, CA setting the HS HJ record.

Reynaldo Brown had a week to bask in the glory of this achievement before Wasco's (CA) Otis Hailey claims the record with a leap of 7-1¾. 

Well, friend Pete Brown, wrote asking if I knew the Merle Haggard song

"I'm a Radiator Man from Wasco", which I didn't.  If you like Merle Haggard  clik here     I'm a Radiator Man From Wasco

Roy fills in the knowledge gap:   Do you know where Wasco is located?  That would be the San Joaquin Valley, just 24 miles from Bakersfield.  The population is 25000.  There are 8000 in the Wasco State Prison.  Not sure if they are counted.  Here is our little known fact of the day.  The area around Wasco grows 55% of all the roses grown in the US.