On the eve of the start of the Presidential Candidate Debates of 2016, current events that have highlighted the cultural, political, and social turmoil of our times have no doubt stimulated wistful thoughts of a simpler and more genteel era for those who enjoyed their adolescence during the 1950s and ‘60s. My teen years came in the late ‘50s to mid-1960s and few would call the last half of the Sixties “simpler and more genteel” as anti-war protests, civil rights unrest, and social, political, and cultural upheaval highlighted what seemed to be every day’s news. Yet the “psychological environment” produced by the game of football seemed to have a calming if not stabilizing effect on much of the nation, in part reflecting the relative innocence of the1950s. By the end of the Sixties, football itself would be a bit of a battleground with some college campuses hosting heated debates about the sport’s perceived brutality, relevance, war-like analogies, and “dehumanization.” Without meaning to sound insensitive, and expressing opinions that are solely those of this author and not necessarily reflective of HELMET HUT or other staff members, recalling and re-reading numerous accounts of college campus and football related protests and their underlying reasoning and specific complaints make one think, or at least make me think, “What a waste!” To know that careers were ruined and choices were made to forfeit scholarship money and the loss of being able to play a game every involved athlete no doubt loved because they believed that their “personal freedom was violated” when asked to insure that their hair did not protrude beyond the bottom of their helmet, or that their “civil rights were violated and cultural traditions disrespected” because the team rule forbade facial hair seems short-sighted from the perspective of one of my age. I can recall that even in the late 1960s, feeling as if there were many aspects of athletics and “just life” that were forever altered from the dominant tenure of the previous decade.

If ever a reminder of “all that was right” about 1950s football was needed, Jim Swink is the embodiment of that construct. He grew up in Sacul, Texas, the son of a logger and his wife who both fell to illness when Jim was thirteen years of age. He moved in with a couple in the nearby East Texas town of Rusk where his athletic abilities became apparent. He was an All State football player and All District in both football and basketball. He was chosen for the Texas High School All-Star Basketball Team his senior year and was named the game's Most Valuable Player.