By Ron P. Coderre

It’s hard to believe that it’s been 38 years.  It all started with an innocent telephone call in November 1978 from the Evans family, the owners of the Windham County Observer - Putnam Patriot.  Of course, if you haven’t figured it out I’m referring to how I got started with my avocation as a sports writer.

“Can you do a preview of the Killingly – Putnam football game?” was the question.  Once the preview hit the presses it was a natural to do a game story.  Prowling the sidelines at Murphy Park (prior to the building of the St. Marie-Greenhalgh Sports Complex) opened the door.  People automatically assumed it was appropriate to feed me sports stories, which were gladly turned into local sports news highlighting local folks and young athletes.

The pay was outstanding, gratis for months before being offered $5 per week.  New owners came along that included more pages in the paper and more sports.  Then one day the phone rang.  It was the late Don Bond the longtime Norwich Bulletin ace reporter who was doubling as the editor of the Journal Transcript in Danielson, which had recently been purchased by Norwich.  And so we moved on to the Transcript.

Suddenly one day out of the blue an editor in the Rose City read the Journal Transcript, an unusual event, and another call came.  “Your column should be in the Norwich Bulletin.”

“Oh really?  That’s fine with me.”

So it was Ramblings, Points and Comments hit the big time, the Sunday Norwich Bulletin.  Wow! 

Writing about people and events from the Massachusetts line to the shoreline of Groton-New London, greater New England and everywhere the news came from, opened the door to expanding our offerings.  We were even rewarded with some carrots, covering and reporting on local high school football games.  It was a great gig for a guy who was working more than 60 hours a week as the vice president of philanthropy and marketing at the local hospital.  It certainly helped to fill the empty hours in the schedule.

The response to Ramblings, Points and Comments was overwhelming with calls and leads coming from everywhere.  That is until my good friend Doc Cody came along.  Doc and I are really close.  I love the guy.  He’s like a brother to me.

Let me explain, Doc Cody’s a great guy, a very close associate of mine, a soul mate if you would.  Like me, he enjoyed writing about local schoolboy and girl athletes and the athletes of the past, the hasbeens who deserved having their name in the paper for their previous exploits on the fields, gridiron and courts of eastern Connecticut.  You remember, “From the Where Are They Files,” and a “Tip of the Sports Fedora.”

An anonymous caller to the Bulletin office said that RPC was plagiarizing Doc’s material and RPC’s column in the Sunday Bulletin ended. 

Writing sports and the column in the Putnam Town Crier was a labor of love. 

Since 1978 until today RPC, where ever it’s appeared, Putnam, Danielson or Norwich, has never missed a week.  Like the proverbial mail carrier, “neither rain, nor sleet, nor snow,” vacations or emergencies has stopped RPC from coming out in print every week.  

Call it dedication or call it guilt or maybe it’s just not wanting to disappoint the readers.  Whatever it is, every week for 38 years, it’s been there.  An obsession.

But don’t get me wrong, this planned hiatus is long overdue.  Sitting down at the keyboard, burning the midnight oil, or writing while wiping the sandman from the eyes in the early morning hours, meeting the weekly deadline has been a driving force.  It’s also been an obsession that I guess has to dissolve at some point in time.  And it appears that the time is now.

Yes, there will be a gap in my time.  I know I’ll miss writing.  Covering the little guy with the RPC’s sporty shoutout, to the guys in the “big leagues, all have received equal billing from RPC.  If it vaguely relates to sports, whether it be the Elks pitch league, a polo match in Rhode Island, a trip to Marco Island and fishing — which is a sport I don’t understand — to talking to Little Leaguers, it’s found its way into RPC.  Extended sports news fit for print, has always found its way into Ramblings, Points and Comments.  That was our motto.

It’s been great to write about the big boys I’ve met through this avocation.  Telling stories about Rico Petrocelli, coach Jim Calhoun, Roger LaFrancois, the late Johnny Pesky and Walt Dropo, WTIC newsman Kevin Hogan, Olympian Butch Johnson, Pete Walker, The Spaceman Bill Lee, coach Tom Moore and many others has been a most enjoyable labor of love.

We’ve taken time to memorialize individuals, going beyond the words in the person’s obituary.  Telling the story behind the person.  Giving them their final due before the final repose of their souls. 

It’s been my wish and desire to accommodate anyone and everyone who has requested space in RPC.  It’s been done more for the little guy than the big guy.  Receiving the occasional email, handwritten note, the whispered complimentary comment or the reference to something that’s in print, has been worth much more than the millions of dollars (sic) we’ve accumulated over the 38 years.  

And by the way, I’ve never stopped to calculate how many millions of words have gone from the keyboard to the presses from RPC.  That could be a contest for another day with the money going to a local non-profit, an area we’ve always supported.        

It’s been fun.  I hope you’ve enjoyed it as much as I have.  It’s with heavy heart and heavy fingers that we pound out these last few words.  It’s like breaking up with your longtime girl friend.  You always wonder if it’s the right thing to do but you simply move on.

As Gen. Douglas MacArthur is attributed as saying, “Old soldiers never die; they just fade away.”  I guess I can say, “Old sports columnists never stop writing; they just push away from the keyboard.”

I’ll close with a quote from a former college friend who’s been reading the column online from Florida, Baltimore and most recently from Kingsmill, Va. — “Your final column will be sad for me.  A passage in life.  Ron —— you are the Jimmy Stewart of Putnam —— the Mr. Potter if you will and he is going away.  I don’t look forward to reading your final column.  It was a fixture in my life.  I probably know the names of more people in the Putnam area than here in Kingsmill.  May the wind be always at your back, my man….”

May other readers feel as deeply of RPC as my college friend does.  Good bye. Adios.  Adieu.  Ciao. Addio.  Adeus.  Aloha.  Arrivederci.  Auf Wiedersehen.  Au Revoir.  Bon Voyage.  Sayonara.  Shalom.  Vale. Totsiens.  Zaijian.  Love. Peace.

RPC’s Final Thought For The Day: “You’ll find as you look back upon your life that the moments when you have really lived are the moments when you have done things in the spirit of love.”  Henry Drummond .

 

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