If You Ask Me / By Martha Knight

It’s about time! I see by Pam’s pictures, there finally were some male cheerleaders at a game.

In the U.S. the original pep clubs were all male. The first organized cheer, led by one Johnny Campbell, had a crowd yelling “Rah, Rah, Rah! Ski-u-mah, Hoo-Rah! Hoo-Rah! Varsity! Varsity! Minn-e-So-Tah!” That was at a game at the University of Minnesota, in case you had not guessed.

That was so much fun, “yell leader” squads soon were formed. All male.

Women were allowed to cheer beginning around 1907.

Early on the men wore slacks and varsity sweaters and white bucks or saddle shoes, and used megaphones—hollow cones open at the tip, with a handle on the side.

Female cheerleaders began to predominate during World War II. Tumbling and pyramids and aerials have come into use, over the years.

But is that any reason guys can’t cheerlead? The specimens Pam photographed looked very enthusiastic and quite handsome. Perhaps they had not had much time to prepare, for one of them still had his hair in rollers, and they seemed to be wearing borrowed outfits. But if they do more of this, perhaps they will get their own uniforms. Or, they could wear flannel slacks with cuffs, and varsity sweaters and white bucks.

Seems to me it makes sense for boys to cheer for girl athletes, and girls to cheer for boy athletes. As it is, cheering is among the most strenuous and risky sports we have. It takes a lot of practice, and real courage, and amazing teamwork, to pull off those pyramids and flips. As someone who can’t do a trust fall, I am in awe of the girls who trust their team-mates to support them and toss them and catch them. No helmets, no protective gear, right?

Looking at photos of football teams from old Tiger Lily editions, I notice that the players wore very little padding, and the helmets were thin, tight-fitting, leather with no face guards. The players did not look hulking.

Boys on basketball teams wore shorts, the short kind. In some years girls who played basketball were shown in demure bloomers.

Now boys play basketball in long skorts or culottes, quite loose, apparently over some sort of spandex or knit garment. Girls play volleyball in very short uniforms.

Yearbooks from some earlier decades show the band front and many scenes of the marching band in parades, downtown. Holidays and Old Home Week were occasions for the band to perform. There would be a head majorette and a good number of majorettes, all high stepping with their white boots and tassels, all holding batons, and wearing hats about a foot high, plus plumes. Some years they wore very short, full skirts.

There are few parades now. It probably is hard to schedule for band participation in them. But parades used to help connect the school with the community, and let the band and band front could strut their stuff and show off their sound. We see the marching band at athletic events, and the concert band at concerts, but many of us miss the parades. I believe many young children used to see those displays and think they would like to be part of that band and wear that uniform, when they were big enough.

Recently I saw a video of  tryouts for the position of drum major at a state university. The candidates were impressive as they presented their routines, tumbling, dancing, doing fancy baton work. All very athletic looking guys. Apparently the winner would receive an athletic scholarship. Maybe he was from a school system where guys still cheer.

•    •    •

On our south business block there is a demonstration of two different approaches to fighting blight.

On the north end stands the Grand Theater building, obviously deteriorated, vacant, gloomy. A look at the back reveals crumbling masonry and windows agape, places where the weather has invaded, along with plants. This building is a testimony to neglect by owners.

It wasn’t exactly well maintained by George and Althea Angell. But the Hosley era was worse. Could he have made a paying proposition of that property if he had not run foolishly athwart a local ordinance or two? We’ll never know. A few years later the main ordinance that had stymied him was changed;  his initial plan would have been allowed, at that point. Residential use of the second floor of those buildings is okay, again, having been forbidden only for a short period. The wrong one, for him. By then he had made offices up there. Then he tried to retrofit again.

A few months ago the McKean County Tax Claims office was entertaining offers for the theater property, which had fallen into the county repository. Several offers were made. The best, for a while, was made on behalf of a group of local businessmen. Their plan was to restore the building to good condition. A contractor who has restored buildings of similar construction and comparable condition in downtown locations, here and in other communities, was confident the building could be made sound and useful for the group’s purpose: a movie house.

At the last minute (or in the last day or so) the McKean County Redevelopment Authority climbed over that bid, and purchased the property. The day that was confirmed, the director told me the agency did not have any plans for the building, and had not been inside it. Demolition was one distinct possibility. And for them, demolition is not very costly: “We have people who do that.” Well, yes. They have done quite a lot of that.

That would appear to be the current plan, and demolition is imminent, I believe.

Meanwhile, in the former Lake Building, now owned by a recently formed entity called 28 Main LLC, the same builder who had spearheaded the theater plan is renovating this venerable structure and fitting it for use as medical offices, for an outpost of the Olean Medical Group.

That’s a private sector approach to fighting blight, and actual redevelopment. It will pay taxes, unlike the Redevelopment Authority. It will create something more valuable than a vacant, undevelopable lot.

Peace.