FARMINGDALE — More than 100 years in the making and eight months in conception, Hall-Dale High School and its predecessor, Hallowell High School, will finally have a sports hall of fame this Sunday.
Induction of the inaugural class of the Hallowell High School/Hall-Dale High School Athletic Hall of Fame is slated for 2 p.m. Sunday in the high school gymnasium. The ceremony is free of charge.
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The class consists of the following: Fifteen athletes (dating from Hallowell High’s Class of 1920 to Hall-Dale’s Class of 2008); five coaches with more than 65 years of combined service to local athletics; three contributors whose behind-the-scenes efforts helped high school athletics flourish; and two legendary teams.
From the formation of an ad hoc committee in February and through months of research and votes on nominations and selections, making the hall a reality has been an exhausting process involving dozens of volunteers, Hall-Dale athletic director Colin Roy said.
Some alums and high school sports fans may read the names of the inaugural inductions class and wonder why some of their favorites aren’t on the list. Roy said consideration was given to opening the hall with dozens of members in the first class. By contrast, organizers at one time also planned on limiting the initial induction to those who distinguished themselves in athletics before 1963.
Ultimately, the selection committee decided to start with a class that represents a wide range of eras and sports, while leaving a vast reserve of future inductees for what is expected to become an annual tradition.
“We know we’ve missed people because this is just the tip of the iceberg,” Roy said. “But we can’t have 50 or 60 people in the inaugural class. The research for this was exhaustive. Just finding relatives for the deceased inductees took hours and hours.”
All living honorees were invited to attend Sunday’s ceremony, as were relatives of those deceased, Roy said. Athlete and coach inductees will receive individual plaques. Living members of the honored teams will receive medallions.
The Class of 2014:
Athletes — Harold Meader (1920); Louis Masciadri (1921); Leon LeCLair (1934); Burton Vinal (1937); Mary LeClair (1938); Richard Ballard (1938); Alton Sproul (1943); Earl Eldridge (1943); Kent Boothby (1955); Arthur Avore (1956); Mark Plummer (1970); Brad Moore (1971); Rachel Bouchard (1987); Caitlyn Laflin (2006); Laura Peterson (2008).
Coaches — John Daker (football, baseball); Bob Hurley (football); Gary Barrett (basketball); Pat Bouton (field hockey, basketball, softball); Ellen Vickers (field hockey),
Teams: 1950 Hallowell High School football team; 1975 Hall-Dale girls’ basketball team.
Contributors: Melvin H. Simmons; Carl Nickerson; Frank Hewins Jr.
Simmons played in the first football game ever held in Hallowell in 1898, a game Hallowell lost to Oak Grove-Coburn. The following year, he returned to Hallowell as a post-grad and led the club to its first victory
When Simmons died in 1972 at age 90, he bequeathed $40,000 to Hall-Dale High School specifically to benefit the athletic program. The endowment is the source of funding for the Hallowell High School/Hall-Dale High School Hall of Fame, Roy said.
For future classes, organizers have established a selection process that allows the general public or members of the hall’s three committees to nominate an inductee. All nominations will be reviewed by the research and advisory committee, then forwarded to the nomination committee, which makes recommendations to the selection committee for the final decision.
Nominated athletes must have been graduated for five years, while coaches must be retired from coaching. Contributors may qualify without a waiting period.
Nomination forms for the 2015 class will be made available through the Hall-Dale athletic department, with an April 15, 2015 deadline for submission.
Randy Whitehouse — 621-5638
rwhitehouse@mainetoday.com
Twitter: @RAWmaterial33
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