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All 1894-1944
Quarterback: Joel Hunt
Running Backs: Dick Todd,
John Kimbrough, Jim
Thomason
Ends: TR “Puny” Wilson,
Herbie Smith
Offensive Line: Joe Routt,
Joe Boyd, Joe Utay, Charles
Henke, A.C. “Loggy” Sprott
Defensive Line: Marshall
Robnett, Jim Sterling,
Tbmmie Vaughn, Caesar
Hohn
Linebacker: Bill Sibley
Defensive Backs: Fred
Coston, Bill Conaster, TF
“Puny” Wilson, John
Kimbrough
Punter: Harold “Rip” Collins
Kicker: Dick Todd
All 1945-1994
Quarterback: Kevin Murray
Running Backs: Bob Smith,
John David Crow, Darren
Lewis
Receivers: Bobby Joe
Conrad, Bob Long
Offensive Lineman: Jack
Little, Dennis Goehring,
Maurice Moorman,
Richmond Webb, Charlie
Krueger
Tight End: Rod Bemstine
Defensive Lineman: Sam
Adams, Ray Childress, Jacob
Green, Sammy OBrient
Linebackers: Bill Hobbs,
Ed Simonini, Aaron Wallace,
John Roper, Johnny Holland
Defensive Backs: Yale Lary,
Pat Thomas, Kevin Smith,
Dave Elmendorf, Lester
Hayes
Punter: Steve O’Neal
Returner: Carl Roaches
Kicker: Tony Franklin
Returner: Leeland McElroy
Honorable Mention: Bucky
Richardson, Edd Hargett,
Curtis Dickey, Bubba Bean,
George Woodard, Mark
Dennard, Robert Jackson,
Marcus Buckley, Quentin
Coryatt, Aaron Glenn, Patrick
Bates, Tbmmy Maxwell
Junction: Gatew
1954 quarterback Elwood Kettler dives for a touchdown against Rice giving him the Soutl
with a lone win over Georgian Two years later the Aggies won the 1956 SWC Championshi
Bryant makes
rag-tag bunch
into winners
By David Winder
The Battalion
Legendary coach Paul “Bear” Bryant
won six national championships and 15
conference titles during his career.
When Bryant died in 1982 of heart fail
ure though, the only piece of jewelry
he was wearing was a commemorative
ring given to him by his 1-9 Texas
A&M team of 1954.
“I don’t remember what the ring said,”
said Darrell Brown, a guard on the 1954
team. “But he once told somebody that
he wouldn’t trade that ring for the world
because it was given to him by his Junc
tion boys.”
Junction training camp, the place
where Bryant took a rag-tag bunch of
boys, out into the middle of nowhere,
during a blazing summer and made
them into winners. It was a place where
Bryant could get his players to live and
breath his brand of football.
Assistant coach Willie Zapalac came
up with the idea of having the camp at
the A&M Adjunct in Junction after
Bryant told him he wanted a secluded
place to practice away from College Sta
tion. The Adjunct had no football facili
ties, it was being used in a summer
training program for Texas A&M physics
and geology majors.
“At our first meeting, we were told
to take our clothes to Walton Hall after
they gave us our room assignments,”
said Bill Cranberry, who played nu
merous positions. “They told us not to
unpack, just grab some clothes for sev
eral days because we weren’t going no
place special.”
After grabbing their clothes,75 to 80
players loaded on to two buses for the
two week training camp.
“When we got on the buses, one of the
assistant coaches fanned out some tick
ets and told us to come and see him if we
ever wanted to go back to College Sta
tion,” Cranberry said. “We didn’t know
what to think then.”
On the way, some of the players found
out that they were going to Junction.
Dennis Goehring, who had been there
the year before taking summer school,
told all his friends on the team about
what he remembered.
“Dennis described it like (it) was some
kind of paradise,” Brown said. “We all
forgot about the drought though, that
place was dry and hot.”
Guard Marvin Tate remembers he
and some other players thinking that
Junction would be a place free from the
Texas heat.
“We thought it was going to be this
cool place with streams and that we
would have these cool practices,” Tate
said. “Little did we know that they would
have the worst drought in 25 years.”
After getting off the bus players went
to their sleeping quarters, which were
army barracks called Quonset huts. They
slept 12 to a room in bunk beds without
air conditioning under roofs made of tin.
The only relief from the heat came from
any cool air blowing through the
screened windows.
“That night he (Bryant) told us we
were going to practice as soon as the sun
came up,” Brown said. “The trainers
woke us up at 5:30, and we got dressed
into our uniforms. There was Coach
Bryant out there standing on the prac
tice field waiting for the sun to come up.
“We just waited in our cabins until
Bryant blew the whistle. He had miscal
culated what time the sun was supposed
to come up.”
When the sun finally did come up, it
was constant football.
“We would wake up pretty early in the
morning, put on our uniforms and drink
some orange juice or grape juice,” Tate
said. “Most of us would throw it up in the
first hour of practice.
“The practices were strenuous and
tough because Coach Bryant was a real
disciplinarian. After breakfast, we would
have meetings then go to lunch and have
another practice session which was pret
ty intensive.”
Sometimes the team would go and
practice at Junction High School, but wa
they spent most of their time on a primi- sid
tive field newly cleared of brush and gm
mesquite trees. i
“I remember there wasn’t a whole lot eve
of grass there, it was mostly sand and hee
goatheads (grass burrs),” said Gene
Stallings, an
offensive end
on the 1954
team. “The
fields weren’t
very good and
neither were
the practice
facilities, as
Coach Bryant
was led to be
lieve.”
The fields
also caused
great frustra
tion when
scrimmaging, Cranberry said. guj
“I remember it being hot but not kne
that humid, it was just real rocky and to (
dusty,” Cranberry said. “But the thing 1
"We would wake up |
morning, put on our i
drink some orange jui
Most of us would thr(
first hour of practice.
— Marvin Tate, Bryan