THE GRIDIRON 10-2012

By Dick Engelhardt
The Fair Lawn - Eastside Rivalry

Hurricane Sandy took a terrible toll on the Metropolitan area and the entire State of New Jersey. The New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association (NJSIAA) moved the football playoff dates back a week and the area games that were scheduled for last week, except one that was played out of State, were postponed too.

Back in “the day,” the Fair Lawn – Paterson Eastside rivalry was a big deal indeed! Before Fair Lawn High opened September 13th, 1943, most Fair Lawn students, including former Mayor Lou Raffiani and former Superintendent of Schools Tom Cannito, attended Eastside. A few students from the Columbia Heights section went to Hawthorne and the Radburn section students went to Ridgewood. The senior class of 1943-44 was allowed to finish up where they were and there was no senior class that year at FLHS. The first graduating class was the 1945 group. The 1957 graduating class my twin brother, Bill, and I were in was the lucky 13th graduating class at FLHS. We began going to the football games in 1951 in 7th grade before the junior highs (now middle schools) were built. Our class opened Thomas Jefferson Jr. High in 1953 and voted on its name. Memorial opened in ’56. Bill and I “spotted” for long time popular Fair Lawn announcer Joe Hausmann 1967-96 and I was privileged to become “The voice of the CUTTERS on The Gridiron” in 1997. I’ve been writing THE GRIDIRON under various titles since 1964.

In those early years many Fair Lawn fans rooted for Eastside, Hawthorne and Ridgewood when they played Fair Lawn. After all, those schools were their alma maters! Legendary Fair Lawn Coach Frank Bennett’s CUTTERS began facing Hank Rumana’s GHOSTS of Paterson Eastside in 1947. Our CUTTERS, featuring star running back Charlie “Choo Choo” Motta, who was inducted into the FLHS Athletic Hall of Fame with the inaugural group in 2006, shared the ‘47 Bergen-Passaic Interscholastic League (B-PIL) title with the GOLDEN BEARS of Lyndhurst while the GHOSTS were a powerhouse in the old Passaic Valley Conference (PVC). Bennett’s CUTTERS won the first game 20-19 and the next 2 to go 3-0 (1.000). His 1953 B-PIL champion team, featuring running back Dave Sime, who would become the “World’s Fastest Human,” lost a 20-13 thriller. Sime also was an initial inductee into the FLHS Athletic Hall of Fame. That loss cost Fair Lawn an outright State title. Our CUTTERS shared the North Jersey, Section 1, Group III crown with the COMETS of Hackensack who represented the Northern New Jersey Interscholastic League (NNJIL).

Fair Lawn leads the 1947-54, 1983 and 2010-11 rivalry with Eastside 6-5 (.545). I look forward to the twelfth game being rescheduled for this weekend. Until then, GO GUTTERS GO!!!