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Memories flow for Marblehead, Swampscott Old-Timers

Tuesday, November, 20 By Matt Williams
Staff writer

Danny Sullivan was emphatic, even 55 years after the final whistle of his last high school football game.

The 1942 Marblehead High School graduate and former Magicians' quarterback was as boisterous as he was proud, talking about his team's annual Thanksgiving Day Game vs. Swampscott.

"We never lost to Swampscott | not even in junior high," he declared. "We did tie them in my senior year, but we never lost."

Such is the pride associated with one of the North Shore's oldest Thanksgiving Day rivalries. It's all in good fun at the 45th annual Marblehead-Swampscott Old-Timers Night, where former foes from both schools get together and relive the good old days here at the Gerry 5 Club.

This year's event drew one of the largest crowds in recent memory, giving more than 50 former players from both clubs a chance to reminisce.

"This gets better every year," said legendary former Swampscott head coach Dick Lynch. "This is one of the few, real old-time rivalries around. Sometimes there's talk about merging Marblehead and Swampscott (in football), and I hope it never happens because this has it all: the comraderie, the needling ... everything."

Sullivan, who once scored a touchdown on a short sneak through his center's legs, spoke of a pre-World War II style of football that included leather helmets and rules prohibiting free substitutions. It was also a stark departure from today's game of signals, armbands with plays and free communication between the coach and his players. "We weren't allowed to talk to the coach back then," Sullivan explained. "If the doctor came out to tend to an injured player, the official followed him to make sure he wasn't sneaking in instructions.

"In a way, looking back on it, you felt bad for the coach. Here we were, 15-year-old kids, and his job depended entirely on us."

The lack of communication 60 years ago meant quarterbacks like Sullivan called each play on their own in the huddles. That added responsibility meant there were fewer total plays, but made the signal-callers sharper and more well-versed.

"The coach always said that he'd rather a quarterback who would call the right plays instead of a great athlete. If we called a good game, he didn't care," Sullivan said.

"That's one of the smartest quarterbacks I've ever seen | and I'm not just saying that because he's standing right there," John Larkin, Marblehead Class of 1944, added. The two gentlemen, who played for coach George Moriarty, enjoyed Marblehead's 6-0 upset win over the Big Blue last November and harkened back to a time when the Magicians | who haven't won a Northeastern Conference title since 1973 | were more dominant. In fact, Sullivan quarterbacked the last unbeaten MHS squad.

"The biggest difference was we won a lot more," John Leary, Marblehead Class of 1940, quipped. "The games were also a bigger deal. People stayed in town | if we went to Salem, that was a big deal."

No substitutions also meant that teams with more depth didn't get a chance to showcase it, and underclassmen often remained on the sidelines longer than they would today. "My sophomore year I played behind Ed Barry, and he's a Hall of Famer. The coach wasn't going to be taking him out of there," said Larkin.

"I don't know about that," said the humble Barry. "It was a lot of fun. We played with a lot of nice guys and had a great time."

It's probably hard for the youngsters gearing up for this Thursday's showdown to imagine, but they'll be sharing stories about glory days of their own before long.

One thing every generation of Big Blue and Magician players have in common, though, is the enjoyment that they'll get from the opening kickoff to the final whistle on Turkey Day at Piper Field.