[CHAPTER VI]
PICKING THE VARSITY
On the 21st day of March as Harold with the other members of the squads was in the dressing room after practice, the head coach came into the room with a slip of paper in his hand which he posted on the Bulletin Board. There was a rush to read the notice as soon as the coach had departed, and several faces, as they turned away, wore a look of disappointment, while others seemed proud and happy.
Hagner and Case finally finished dressing and turned to the board to read the bulletin before going out. This is what they read:
Varsity Training Table—The training table will start in the morning at Prettyman’s and the following men for the first squad will report there for breakfast—Everson, Delvin, Larke, Gibbs, Black, Hagner, Robb, Talkington, Dill, Case, Radams, Ross and Huyler. About the first of next month the list may be increased or changed. Breakfast at eight o’clock sharp. Members are required to be on time.
Hugh Jenkins, Manager.
“Guess I’ll get a chance to pitch after all,” said Harold. It was a great day for him and he was highly elated. The 19— Varsity had begun to take definite shape, and being named on it meant recognition by the great student body as possessing something worth while in the line of ability. The news spread rapidly through the University and wherever the boys who had been named went they were treated with honor and respect.
Breakfast the first morning at the training table was a good deal of a get-together, get-acquainted affair. I do not know what it is that makes the choice of nicknames or how it is that it comes easier to know some fellows by either their first or last names, others by an abbreviation of one or the other, and still others by adoption of something entirely different, but when boys get to a certain stage of acquaintance with each other there comes a spontaneous desire to bestow a nickname and these names generally fit in a remarkable way. Harold Case went to breakfast known as Case and came out to be forever known to Lowell men as Hal.
John Hagner started to drink his coffee that morning as Hagner and when he had folded his napkin he was known as both Hans and Honus, why nobody ever could tell, and the names stuck to him for life.
Charles Radams came away with the nickname Babe and as Babe he went down into the Lowell Book of Heroes.