I attended Booneville public schools each year except for my sophomore year, when we lived at Alma. For some reason, after we moved back to Booneville just before my junior year, I got asked by the Editor of the Booneville Democrat, the local weekly, to write the stories about the football games. It was a lot of fun.
My by-line was continued into my senior year, in which I was persuaded to play football by one of my close friends, even though I had not played since my freshman year. Beginning in summer practice, Head Coach Gene Bradley had bought Gatorade mix in bulk and provided it for us at breaks, to be drunk out of a large barrel with dippers or cups. In one of our earlier games (I think it was the second), we won a tough contest against Danville, which featured a fullback who went on to play for Arkansas Tech. The defense played a key part in the victory, and so I dubbed them the Gatorade Gang in my story about the game. That got a good bit of comment locally, so I continued to use it throughout that year. If I remember correctly, the name even stuck a little while after I graduated.
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