The grand old school reunites

Pride never dies was the phrase written on the backs of several Maysville Bulldogs T-shirts worn at the Maysville Rec Park this past Saturday.

A gathering was held for former Maysville Bulldogs and their families, and the atmosphere proved that saying to be true. A playing of the old fight song was met with chants and cheers from everyone in attendance, and tales from the glory days were anything but sparse.

Several former Maysville athletes and coaches showed up to attend, reminisce and tell stories about their time at Maysville high school.

“All I knew was, I was graduating from college, this was going to be my first job, and I thought it would be good to, hey they’re new, they’re starting a football program, I’m new starting out a coaching experience.” said Maysville football coach, Tom Becherer, “I started here in 1967, and we started cold. Maysville didn’t have a program, we got started and we really struggled those first five years. We had some good teams and bad teams, good games and bad games.”

Coach Becherer was the original football coach at Maysville High School, having built the program from the ground up and helping to begin what was an honored tradition for the Maysville Bulldogs until the school’s closing in 1991.

“The first Maysville team, we only played seven games but we were five and two. The only team we lost to was Mount Sterling and they were one of the top teams in Class A football at that time.” said Coach Becherer.

Also in attendance was former basketball coach, Tom Creamer.

“They were all good players, the wanted to work hard. When we went down to state they just played together real well and we had a great strategy against Central, and we beat them and they were number one in the state and number five in the country, we beat them by 13 points.” said coach Creamer.

Creamer led the 1972 and 1973 Maysville Bulldogs to a state tournament appearance and helped mold the program into a formidable force on the court throughout his tenure as head coach.

“I just enjoyed going to practice and being a small unit. It was a small high school, that’s what I liked about it. Just about everybody in the high school knew everybody on the team, and knew me and I knew them.” said coach Creamer.

Each Bulldog in attendance had several stories about their time at the school, from the football field to the basketball court, to the baseball field, each former Maysville student had nothing but fond memories to share, and were excited to reunite at the Rec Park and look back on their high school careers.

“It’s just so much fun to be here. I noticed I remembered several people and that was a shock to me. When you’re away 50 years, it just seems like it’d get away from you but I remember it and I’ve got stories about every one of them and it’s just so much fun to remember them, and then remember the stories.” said coach Creamer.