It was, in the poetry of former Band
Announcer Hal Michelson, a clear and promising Saturday. A
sunny, warm “Indian” Summer afternoon.
The contest lived up to its billing. To
paraphrase San Francisco Chronicle sports columnist Ron
Fimrite, in his piece the following Monday, a better schoolboy
game would be hard to find.
Stanford, Cardinalmaniacs™ will fondly
recall, triumphed that day, 24-14, on its way to its first Rose
Bowl win in 30 years.
But Fimrite’s column also captured
another dimension to the festivities on that Saturday. During the
morning, someone phoned the University claiming that a bomb was
planted somewhere inside the stadium and would explode right
around kickoff. It was not a threat to be dismissed: 1970
was not a vintage year for America and the symbols of the “establishment,”
– such as big-time college football – were presumable
targets. Remember the “Weathermen?”
University President Dick Lyman got on the
public address system just before kickoff and actually asked the
crowd to report any suspicious looking packages – or people.
Minutes later, when the field cannon fired
during the playing of the National Anthem – using real
gunpowder in those days – there were more than a few
startled spectators.
“This is not so much the Age of
Aquarius,” Fimrite began his piece, “as the age of
Bakunin.” -- referring to Mikhail Bakunin, 19th
century Russian anarchist, the so-called “father” of
modern anarchy.
(As erudite as he was entertaining, Fimrite
was the perfect chronicler of Stanford football. Even if he was a
Berkeley grad.)
Fortunately, the only bomb that day was the
one thrown by Jim Plunkett to Bob Moore. Fimrite’s
words, not mine.
And, thirty-one years after Stanford’s
perfect season in 1940, the heavy-underdog Indians smashed down
Ohio State and its many All-Americans.
Fast forward another 31 years to a far
different world. But is it so different? Suddenly, threats to
public safety in large, symbolic settings – in landmark
buildings or high-profile athletic events – are more ominous
and more sinister and more immediate than ever.
What we’re looking at 31 years after
the bomb scare at the U$C game makes The Weathermen of the late
‘60s look quaint by comparison. Almost like Halloween
pranksters.
There won’t be a full-house Saturday
night when the Cardinal begin conference play against Arizona
State. But I would expect full-house security.
And from now on, you won’t hear me
bitch about cooler bans.