It was only a few seasons ago when Argus Sports Editor John Jackson assigned me to cover a Casa Grande football game, and this time it was homecoming. The contest was played at Steve Ellison Field at Petaluma High because of renovations on the Gaucho facility for one full season.
“Be sure and get the name of the new homecoming queen,” JJ reminded me.
It’s all part of the job, so I made a mental note to myself. “Don’t botch the name of the new queen, and be sure and spell her name correctly.”
Anyway, they paraded the candidates at halftime perched smartly on the back seat of decorated convertibles, and I jockeyed past a photographer to get a prime location for that special announcement.
The Gaucho student voicing the PA finally got to the winner and I dashed around to get her name. In this case, she was dressed to the nines in a nice formal dress.
But wait, what was she wearing for formal footwear on this special night when she climbed down from the car?
Many would have never guessed. Chuck Taylor All-Star basketball shoes. Those time-honored Converse kicks out of the sands of time. High top canvas shoes that we used to wear back in a time when most players completely bought into team concepts, and there were only a few pricey leather shoe styles available.
Every boys varsity basketball team that I ever coached in the ’60s and ’70s wore those shoes. Eight dollars generated a new pair black high tops with that familiar star and circle logo at the local mercantile store. Not all of our small school valley kids could afford a team shoe back then, but eight bucks fit everybody’s budget.
The boys I coached did do a bit of grousing at first, but I convinced them that we would have the look of a team, and our play on the floor would be the talking point. If the shoes were good enough for the Celtics and the Hoosiers back in the day, why not us? One kid held out for black Keds for a short time before he broke down and bought a new pair of Chucks.
My feeling was that we would quickly forget the old-school look of the shoes, and concentrate on basketball. I was lucky enough to inherit a very good group of players for several seasons, and we managed to make a successful run in division play along the way. Our school was about the size of Cloverdale in the North Central League, but the only one in the playoff games wearing Chuck Taylor All-Star shoes.
My former players still light up when Converse All-Stars are mentioned. The subject of gym shoes always gets a big smile.
One former player who came off the bench as a pretty good shooter has kept his Chucks to this day, and he gets a few smiles when guests are patient enough to listen. “We used to have a nut who insisted that we wear these things,” he chuckles.
Today, this guy is the President of the Board of Trustees at West Hills College in the Central Valley, but in his closet is a pair of Chuck Taylor All-Stars.
There is a Converse sporting goods outlet here in Petaluma, so I decided to head down to the outlet recently, and, sure enough, different colors of Chuck Taylor All-Stars are still prominently displayed. Those gems are still very stylish among the younger set.
Lynne, the cordial sales rep at the store, tells me that burgundy is the current hot color on the high-top market, but nothing comes close to sales of those old black high-top Chuck Taylor All-Star shoes. They are big sellers.
The Casa queen was wearing green Chucks. Needless to say, I was pulling for her on that special night for both of us.
(Contact George Haire at johnie.jackson@arguscourier.com)
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