In the Front Row: Hall of Fame adds to rich tradition

• Bob Burrows

Bob Burrows

Talk about it

Two weeks ago, River Falls High School Pep Club advisors Ryan Bishop and Steve Trudeau were worried about how many people would show up at the first Wildcat Hall of Fame Induction and Banquet Friday.

Turns out they had nothing to worry about.

Two hundred eighty people packed the Great Banquet Hall at Kilkarney Hills Golf Club for the dinner and ceremony after 88 had participated in the first Wildcat Golf Open during the day. All to honor the 14 members of the inaugural hall of fame class and add another chapter to the rich tradition of Wildcat athletics.

Butler University baseball coach Steve Farley, Class of 1977, had flown in from Indianapolis, and Cleveland State University basketball coach Kate Peterson-Abiad, Class of 1987, interrupted a recruiting trip to Georgia.

Lowell “Red” Dawson’s daughter, Adrienne Dawson, had traveled from her home in Tennessee to represent her late father, who was being inducted into the Legacy category.

So when ticket sales were lagging a few weeks ago, Bishop, Trudeau and the Pep Club members were concerned about whether the community would turn out.

But as Master of Ceremonies Tom Carroll said in his opening remarks, “Nobody in River Falls buys tickets early.”

It’s easy to say the night was a resounding success. The inductees and their families accepted their awards with humility, grace and humor. And Carroll was the perfect emcee, injecting personal stories into each inductee’s introduction before ending each introduction with: “Welcome to the Wildcat Hall of Fame.”

There were plenty of memorable moments. After accepting his award, Paul C. Wehking, Class of 1983, talked about how he was just an average athlete in high school.

“But then two things happened,” he said. “First, people started to believe in me. And then, people started to expect things from me.”

He went on to earn all-conference and all-state honors in football and was a three-time conference champion and a state champion in wrestling.

As his football coach Carroll said, “Not bad for an average athlete.”

Ron Wunrow and Deb Timmerman were inducted into the coaches category. Wunrow’s wife, Roberta, remembered Ron blowing her a kiss across the parking lot after coaching the Wildcats to a playoff win over Durand. And Timmerman talked about how her former gymnasts stepped up when she and her family were struggling with her daughter Abby’s illness and death.

“These girls I had coached were now all strong women who were helping me,” she said.

Near the end of the ceremony, Carroll pointed to the members of the high school’s Pep Club and asked them to stand and be recognized.

“There’s our future hall of famers,” he told the crowd to a round of applause.

One of the goals behind the Pep Club establishing a Wildcat Hall of Fame is to celebrate the rich history of River Falls athletics. And while many schools measure success based on the number of conference or state championships their teams and athletes have won, I think a better measurement can be made based on the character of the athletes and coaches they produce.

If that’s the case, Friday night’s inaugural class set the bar high.

Tags: river falls, sports, columns, wildcats