Gridley's great game of the year was scheduled to begin at three o'clock.
However, a large part of the fun, at a really "big" game consists in being on hand an hour ahead of time and hearing and seeing all the fun that goes on.
Promptly at the tick of two o'clock the Gridley Band blew its first blast, to the tune of "Hail, Columbia!"
The band was stationed close to the ground, in the center of the stand reserved for the High School student body. Off the right of the band rose four tiers of bright-faced, wholesome-looking High School girls. To the left of the band sat the boys.
Across the field, on a much smaller stand, sat the hundred or so followers of the team from Cobber. The Cobbers had no band. Few feminine faces appeared on the Cobber stand. The Cobber colors, brown and gray, floated here and there on the breeze in the form of small banners.
Gridley's stand was brilliant with the crimson and gold banners of Gridley H.S. These bright-hued bits of bunting waved deliriously as the band's strains floated forth.
But as "Hail Columbia" belongs to all Americans, the Cobbers elected to flash their bunting, too.
Suddenly the music paused. Then came pressing contempt for the hostile eleven: "All coons look alike to me!"
Cobber's friends took the hint in an instant. To a man the visiting delegation arose, hurling out the Cobber yell in round, deep-chested notes.
Just outside the lines, behind a huge megaphone mounted on a tripod, stood Dick Prescott, cheer-master. At his side was Dave Darrin, whose duties were likely to prove mainly nominal.