North Carolina State University Athletics
SIMON: Keeping Track of VVOFG's
10/24/2006 12:00:00 AM | Football
If anyone knows Wolfpack football, it's Leon "Fuzzy" Simon. A 1951 graduate of NC State, Simon lettered for the Pack for four years, playing the end position on both sides of the ball. A native of New Kensington, Pa., Simon has been a close friend of the Wolfpack Club and NC State Athletics Media Relations for many years since his playing days passed.
A true Wolfpack fan and sports enthusiast, Simon has been working hard for years to compile the largest and most accurate list of letterwinners throughout the entire history of NC State athletics. Researching and collecting names for all sports ever played in the red and white, Simon has provided his information to the Wolfpack Club and Athletics Media Relations on several occasions. He is the proud father of Carol Ann and Scott Douglas Simon, and currently resides in Raleigh with his wife of 55 years, Mildred Pike Simon.
By: Leon "Fuzzy" Simon
Several years ago, I started tracking the old football players of my era. I named them the VVOFG, Very Very Old Football Guys. The era is 1947-1950. I started with almost 80 names and the list is down to 35 that are still living. Along the way, I made contact with some guys “younger” than me and added about eight of them to my list. Periodically I send out a mailing updating who is no longer with us. We actually found one living after the reunion that we thought had died.
Then this year we had the All-Sports Reunion the weekend of October 13 -15. I was only able to get a few VVOFGs to come, but the prize person to attend was Bernie Watts. Bernie is living in Stow, Ohio with his son John and he drove Bernie down to the reunion and game. Bernie was a guard (played both ways) on the 1946 Gator Bowl team. He made all Southern Conference in 1948. You have to know that Bernie only weighed about 170 pounds, but he spent more time in the opposing backfield than he did on our side of the line.
Also attending were Tony Romanowsky, Buck Blomquist, Raeford Turner and myself. Tony is legally blind, but wanted to come to get together with the other VVOFGs.
I have to tell you about Rae Turner. His Dad played for NC State from 1899-1902. There is a picture in the Murphy Center of J. Platt Turner standing with Oliver Max Gardner. Gardner was later the governor of North Carolina. Rae also has a picture of the 1899 football team that he has been asked to share with the Wolfpack Club. There probably isn’t an earlier photo of that kind.
Another thing about Rae, when he was in his early 50s, he played in two Old Timers games against the varsity. He still walks around shaking his head at times.
Since we only had the four VVOFGs, I called Joe Harand. Joe played basketball in the same years. The basketball, football and some baseball players all lived in the stadium dorm that was built under the old Riddick football stands. So we all knew each other. These guys are now called the VVOBGs. Joe had some old time Everett Case greats that were coming. Eddie Bartels, Bob Cook, Bob Speight and Bob Holt's widow. I also invited Joan Sloan.
Everyone came to my condo before going to Nelson’s for the real reunion party. I have a scrap book history with pictures from several newspapers and game programs that my mother-in-law started way back when, which was upgraded with pictures from year books and even opposing teams game programs. Good viewing.
On game day against Wake Forest, we tailgated, but the highlight was taking Bernie Watts to see his name on a plaque on one of the columns. Bernie was honored.
There wasn’t enough time to take everyone to the north end of the stadium to view the temporary list of all football players that ever played at NC State that a year played record could be found. It lists name, last year played and number of years played. Since I have the most complete list of players, I was asked to provide the names.
Now is a good time to bring up my favorite topic. I maintain a list of all the athletes that played in every sport at NC State from the earliest date I could find. In all I have over 9,400 names and some addresses in over 25 sports. This list was started in 1999 and at that time there were a little over 8,000 names. The Wolfpack Club gave me their list of under 4,000 names and I built it up to the 8,000. My goal was to create a web site with the name and data on the guys. So, I created a web site. But it was too large and slow to be used. A disaster. I called on Jim Johnson with Perigee.net in Matthews. Jim is a State grad and created the web site ncsu-athletes.perigee.net. It is still on the web. You can call up a year, a sport, etc. and get names etc. Try it, you’ll like it.
Since moving to Raleigh, I updated the 1999 data to Spring 2006 data with the 9,400 names. But, repeat but, it is not on a web site. I am looking for someone that can recreate the site. I have some great ideas of how it could work. I would like to call up a name and get up to date info on the person and have it so the athlete can update his/her info. What I need, is the guy to create the web site and since I work for free, I want him to do so also.
If anyone reading this knows of a person that can create the site, please contact me at fuzzysimon@bellsouth.net or call 919-782-6081.
