Ultimately a Hero

One of my sports memories of Mission House days is a homecoming football game against Milwaukee Extension, now a really big school of course. We were behind 6-0 in the waning moments of the game and Coach Kregel sent me in as a substitute quarterback, along with Bill Trutschell (a really fine passer from Sheboygan North days). Coach told me, “Okay, let's try some passing (a change from our usual "run right, run left, punt"). So I called a pass play and Trutschell hit Cal Grosshuesch '48 for a 15-yard gain. One play-calling principle I had in mind was mix the plays, so instead of Trutschell passing, I called a play with Elwood “Skippy" Schukow '43 (a returned war veteran--one of many that year) as passer. Skippy put up a pass that struggled its way out of our backfield like a wounded duck! It was, of course, intercepted, and we ended up losing the game. I had been in the game for two plays and Kregel blamed me for the loss. Who knows, maybe he was right. We remained friends, and as the starting quarterback I had a really good game when we played another with Extension and won by a 32-6 score. I redeemed myself a bit. Many years later we had a reunion of the football team and Coach was there, then a pretty old man. When we went to lunch, Kregel said to me, “Gene, I love you!" So what is an appropriate comeback? I mumbled a few words to indicate that I held him in high regards, too. Actually, Mission House/Lakeland gained some sport stature in his tenure and many of us will remember him with many stories and true respect.

Dr. Eugene Jaberg '48