Oral History Program Milton Mecham Interviewed by Steve Bruno March 1971 i Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Milton Mecham Interviewed by Steve Bruno March 1971 Copyright © 2014 by Weber State University, Stewart Library ii Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. Archival copies are placed in University Archives. The Stewart Library also houses the original recording so researchers can gain a sense of the interviewee's voice and intonations. Project Description The Weber State College/University Student Projects have been created by students working with several different professors on the Weber State campus. The topics are varied and based on the student's interest or task for a specific assignment. These oral history assignments were created to help Weber State students learn the value and importance of recording public history and to benefit the expansion of the Weber State oral history collections. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to the Stewart Library of Weber State University. No part of the manuscript may be published without the written permission of the University Librarian. Requests for permission to publish should be addressed to the Administration Office, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, Utah, 84408. The request should include identification of the specific item and identification of the user. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Mecham, Milton, an oral history by Steve Bruno, March 1971, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, University Archives, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. iii Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Milton Mecham. The interview was conducted in March of 1971, by Steve Bruno. Mr. Mecham discusses his involvement with Weber State College’s football program after World War II. SB: What was it like starting the first postwar football team for Weber State College? MM: This was a very interesting experience. As we came back to Weber State College following the war there were a number of veterans returning to school and they were anxious to play football and go on with their athletic eligibility. As a result of this we had a fairly good talent aspect, as far as athletics were concerned at Weber State College. With the first football squad, we didn't do much proselyting because most of these fellows wanted to play football. As they were returning from the war, and hadn't engaged in athletics for quite some time, they were anxious to come back to school and play football. Of course, starting this football team was another interesting thing, because the equipment that we had at the school was the equipment that we had used at the school prior to the war. We hadn't had an opportunity to purchase any new equipment. So, as a result, we were using the athletic equipment-shoulder pads, hip pads, and so on, that were about four and five years old, and some were considerably older than that. So, to start a football team at that time was rather expensive, and we didn't have a great deal of money at Weber. We were a junior college at that time. Our student body was around 800 to 900 in that day. And we just didn't have a great deal of money to field a football team. 1 SB: About how many fellows did you have out for the team and were most of them local products? MM: As I recall, we had a squad of about 60 to begin with. A lot of the fellows had never played football before, not even in high school. But when they got in the service they took on quite a bit of size and thought they'd like to attempt a little football as a result. One of the first fellows I had on my squad had never played in high school and made a "Little All American," as a junior college player. When he went in the service he weighed about 145 pounds, and he was about 6'1" tall, but he filled out while he was in the service. He was about 6'2" and 230 pounds when he returned and he was a whale of a football player! SB: What kind of schedule did you play and how did you travel? MM: We had about a nine game schedule. And at that time we tried to play most of our home games in the fall. We played most of our home games in September and October and then traveled to California and Arizona, to play games late in the season so that when the cold weather hit here in Utah we were playing in California or Arizona to complete the season. We played all the schools around this area like Boise State, Carbon College, Snow College, Dixie, Southern Utah State, they were all junior colleges at that time. We also played Idaho State University. Then we played teams from California and Arizona. We used to schedule two teams in California every year. And we'd play two teams down there and two teams in Utah. We used to travel down there and play both teams while we were there. We'd play one weekend and then stay and play the next weekend. This made a nice trip for the fellows and a nice little vacation. SB: Did you bus down? 2 MM: Well, you won't believe this, but we traveled by 1946 army buses! And they were really a caution! On one trip to California, one of the exhaust pipes broke and the majority of the fellows were asphyxiated. When we stopped for lunch everyone began to topple off the bus and it wasn't until then that we realized what had happened. This was the year that we played Pasadena Junior College in the Rose Bowl. They beat us 7 to 6 that year. So we had some fairly good ball clubs at that time. SB: Did any of the athletes receive any kind of financial aid? MM: Actually the kind of financial aid that you think about that's given to athletes now-a-days, was not even heard of at the time I was coaching. We had very few scholarships. We had a few jobs around the school and we had a few jobs downtown that the fellows worked at. But they really had nothing in the way of financial aids, like they have now. SB: What made you first go into coaching? MM: I went to Box Elder High School and played football for Coach Ferguson. And after I graduated from there, I went to the University of Utah, where I played for Ike Armstrong. I enjoyed sports very much and admired the coaches that I had. I felt like I'd try my luck at coaching. When I started at the U of U I became a physical education major. When I graduated, Coach Ike Armstrong asked me if I would like to join his coaching staff. So I stayed at the university as an assistant coach and worked on my master's degree at the same time. SB: Do you think you benefited from coaching? MM: I owe a great deal to athletics. Athletics have been awfully good to me. I think that you get a development in athletics that you don't get any other way. I personally feel that 3 being an athlete and being able to coach and work with young men has been one of the finest experiences that I've had in my life. I think that I've learned to appreciate the individual differences that exist in human beings. I've learned to assess an individual's capabilities and abilities. I think I've been able to determine to a large extent about what they are thinking and about what they think they are doing. I think that is a great asset, to any young man. I'd recommend it to anyone. SB: Do you think today's athletes differ from those you coached in the past? MM: I think that the young men today are bigger and faster. I believe they have more agility, and I can't say what it's a result of. I recall when I was playing at the university, we had a fellow by the name of Carl Sleckman that played on the team. He was 6'4" and weighed 230 pounds. He was the largest man playing in the conference at that time. Now you see fellows that are 6'6", 6'8", .and weigh 250 and 300 pounds. I think the athlete in general is larger, has better ability, and is better equipped. In some cases I think he is better trained because in most schools there are three or four coaches. This way they can give more individual attention to each young man. I believe they are able to develop greater skill and ability at it. SB: Do you think athletics is as an important part of college life now as it was when you were coaching? MM: I think athletics has always been a vital part of college life, I think it will continue to be, if they control athletics. SB: Do you see any deemphasizing factor involved on college campuses around the nation? 4 MM: I don't see any deemphasizing, if I see anything it's emphasizing. I'm privileged as a faculty representative to be able to attend the NCAA meetings where I get a chance to listen to all of the outstanding coaches and athletic directors in the nation. I get to visit with all the faculty representatives from all the schools across the country. And from what I hear, athletics is certainly not being deemphasized. SB: Do you think football fans in this area expect too much as far as winning goes? And that's past and present. MM: I've lived in Ogden now since 1940, except for the time that I was in the service. And the fans in Ogden City, or Weber County, really like to see a winner. I don't care whether it's football, basketball, or baseball. It just seems that the fans in the Ogden area demand more of an athletic program than a normal fan. Maybe I'm mistaken, but it seems to me like the' Ogden area fans really like to see a winner. And I'm not sure what they would do if they had to support a school that had an athletic program that wasn't doing as well as the athletic program here at Weber State College. SB: What made you get out of coaching? MM: I had coached football as head coach at Weber for eleven years. I had been an assistant coach for three years. I had gone back to school and gotten my master's degree in educational administration. And the opportunity to move into the administrative area at Weber was presented to me, and I thought that was a great opportunity for me to put these things that I had learned as far as getting my master's degree, into action. So I moved into administration, and I'm happy that I made the move. I thoroughly enjoyed my work as a coach, but the administrative area of an institution is a real challenge. I think it is as much of a challenge as athletics. I don't think that I'd 5 care to be a full time teacher. I would like to teach and be an administrator. I think there's a real challenge there for an individual in administration because you're required to make decisions all the time. You're in a position where you are helping to make things go, you're helping to make the decisions for the institution, and all in all, I think the work in administration is a real challenge and a lot of fun. 6