(6/2/2007) John Dowdle and I spent four years together at New Mexico Tech. We started there as freshmen in 1956 and graduated together in1960. John was first in our class while I was nearer to the other end. In fact we also spent two years together at Carnegie Tech although we rarely ran into each other while there. John and I were friends at NM Tech, not close friends but still friends. John was married and lived in the married student housing while I lived at the other end of campus in 84 Fitch Hall and later in 19 Presidents Hall. We didn’t socialize together but we both participated in Techs intramural sports program so most of my memories of John are from intramurals. John was a star athlete. I think that he lead our class to the basketball championship each of his four years there. He had a hook shot that the opposition couldn’t stop. It was kind of a fading hook shot. John would get into position directly in front of the basket and someone would feed him the ball. The shot began with his back to the basket and both hands on the ball. Then he shifted the ball to his right hand as he began a 90-degree turn to his left, and as I remember it, he hooked the ball directly over his head and into the basket. While at Carnegie Tech I remember reading in the school newspaper how John had lead his intramural team to some basketball championship. So, apparently the Carnegie Tech students were no better at stopping that hook shot than were the NM Tech students.
 
All of this brings to mind the highlight of my career as a basketball player. I was only allowed into the games under the 20/20 rule – we had to be 20 points ahead with 20 seconds to play. In this particular game we were at the opponents end of the court when I intercepted a pass while running towards our end. I had such a jump on everyone that no one except Clyde Richards - Clyde was on our team – followed me down to the other end. When I got there I shot and missed, I took the rebound and shot and missed, I passed the ball to Clyde but he passed it back saying “third times the charm”. I shot and missed once again. By this time the other team had arrived and they took the ball away from me. So I never scored, but I almost did.
 
When I was at Tech there was a lot of complaining about the fact that intercollegiate sports were not allowed. Thinking back now I think that that was a good thing. At that time Tech put an emphasis on the intramural program and the participation was high, even the faculty participated. As I recall the faculty teams were made up of not only the faculty but anyone with any association with Tech that was not a student. I think that colleges today would do well to put less money into football and more money into their intramural sports programs.
 
Perhaps at a later time I’ll relate the highlights of my endeavors on the gridiron.