By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
It’s an idea that may seem a little cliché at times, but unless you’ve lived it, you can’t fully appreciate the impact that sports and friendships can have. And not just an impact during a particular season or year. These are relationships that can last for decades.
Maybe it’s the teamwork aspect of it and maybe it’s just being in the trenches day after day, game after game, that serves to ignite a common spirit that never really goes away.
Even after the cheering stops, those relationships seem to last without even a hint of an expiration date.
Peter Samuels and Mike McCarthy met in the 1940s in elementary school in Beloit, Wis. – “he says we met in fifth grade and I say it was fourth grade,” Samuels says – and then became friends with Tom Pratt when all three attended Beloit Memorial High School.
They’ve been friends ever since.
For years. For decades.
“Sports became the catalyst for our friendship,” Pratt says. “In life, you have to find something you can rally around and for us it was sports. We have maintained that friendship ever since. It’s interesting how sports will bring you together.”
Earlier this month, life brought them together again. You hesitate to say “one more time” because these are three men who have already beaten the genetic odds.
Each will turn 90 years old this summer.
They have no trouble remembering escapades from their childhood and high school days and, yes, all can remember what they had for lunch. McCarthy might have lost a step or two but otherwise this trio far exceeds the health standard of what you might expect from three men who graduated from high school when half of the households didn’t even own a television.
Not a wheelchair in sight.
“I think about that frequently,” Samuel says. “We are very fortunate and how lucky we are and what we can still do at this age.”
Samuels came from Indiana and Pratt from Florida to join McCarthy in Shreveport. Throughout the three days they were together, it was the thread of athletics that ran through almost every conversation and memory. That’s why they unofficially dubbed this as the Three Rings Reunion.
Among the many rings that Pratt has is from Super Bowl IV when he was a defensive line coach for the Kansas City Chiefs. And how’s this for longevity – he coached in the first Super Bowl (with the Chiefs) and was one game away from coaching in the 50th Super Bowl (with the Arizona Cardinals).
Samuels was a wrestling coach for 15 years at Ball State and was inducted into the Indiana Wrestling Hall of Fame in 2014.
McCarthy has been a driving force behind the Independence Bowl since its inception and was named as the bowl’s Sportsperson of the Year in 1985. He is also a staunch supporter of local college and high school athletics, among other civic endeavors.
“Ironically, we all have rings of some sort,” McCarthy says. “We have a common thread through athletics. But more importantly, we have a common thread in that we have been friends for more than 70 years.”
Rings are a symbol of a significant milestone in life and each of three has certainly made that on their own. But if there ever was a case to a have a three-man collective ring, this would be it.
They graduated from Beloit Memorial in 1953 and have kept in contact for more than 70 years. As coaches, Pratt and Samuels traveled around the country and McCarthy’s business trips enabled some visits throughout the years. There was also a similar gathering a few years ago at Pratt’s house in Florida.
“This is a great relationship we have carried through the years,” Pratt says. “You stop and think about life and how fast it goes by. We were high school kids and not knowing where were going or what we were going to be. Now we look back at it and say that we are glad we took the path that we did. Because we have all enjoyed a certain amount of success in our fields and still stayed friends through all these many years.”
“Mike and I were OK athletes,” Samuels says. “Tom was the premier athlete in our class.”
Pratt went on to play at the University of Miami where he was an All-American linebacker in 1956. He coached collegiately for four years before making the jump to professional football with the Chiefs, where he coached from 1963-77. He then coached for the New Orleans Saints for three seasons, two more stints with the Chiefs (1989-94, 2000) plus Cleveland (1981-88) and Tampa Bay (1995).
He coached so long that he was an assistant on the Saints when Archie Manning played and then was an assistant in the NFL when Manning’s sons played. As a great grandfather, he came out of retirement to coach with the Cardinals in 2014 at age 77 as a pass rush specialist.
So they gathered together to tell stories, especially about the road trip from Wisconsin to Florida to go see Pratt when he was being recruited by the University of Miami. No detail was forgotten or left out.
They poured over old yearbooks (the “Beloiter”) and reminisced about what life was like so many years ago.
“I have this rare ability to think about things I did in the first grade,” Samuels says. “In junior high, Mike and I probably spent an inordinate amount of time in the principal’s office because we spoke in class when we should have been listening to Mrs. Abel in Latin class.”
“You stop and think about what we have lived through,” Samuels says. “This is great time to get together and talk about things. Some of these stories I can’t even remember but Mike and Pete have good memories, so that carries it for me.”
But remembering old faces is nothing compared to the old sporting events, whether it was football or track or wrestling.
“Athletics were certainly a bond,” McCarthy says. “It still is with me today. But it’s more than that. We worked together during the summers. Tom, and I painted silos. One thing I know is that you cannot teach work ethic. You either have it or you don’t. All three of us grew up with work ethic.”
You simply could not look at the gathering of these three about-to-90-year-old men and not think about how fortunate they are.
“Being together is really important because we have been together for so many years,” Samuels says. “These guys are very special in my life. I love them and we’ve been through a lot together. When you think about it, we are in the twilight of our lives and we want to spend time together. It’s a wonderful experience to share time with my friends again. I think we are all hanging in there and doing the best we can. We are enjoying life and each other.”
“We have all three had our successes in our fields,” Pratt says. “I look back and I rally around the thoughts that we all had together. Some were good and some were bad. I guess we all recovered somehow.”
“Today, I have very few friends,” McCarthy says. “I have many acquaintances. I’m proud to say that these guys are two of the best friends I’ve ever had. It’s almost like we are brothers. I don’t think much of that exists anymore today.”
Only about 16 percent of the U.S. male population live into their 90s. But to have this degree of mental and physical health? That’s almost one-percent type stuff.
They can laugh about it – “I tell people I’ve got another 50 years so I’m going to make the best of them,” Samuels says – but all three certainly understand how fortunate they are.
More importantly, how fortunate they are to have each other.
Contact JJ at johnjamesmarshall@yahoo.com