Raymond Elledge, Class of 1963 asked a question under the thread titled “Teen Hangout’s”:
How and when did Marcy Martin Field and Cody Wardlaw Gym get their names and why?
Does anyone have memories they would like to share of Marcy Martin or Cody Wardlaw?
Please use the Website Contact button to send comments, and please include your class year.
Shearley (Alexander) Forrest, Class of ‘56
I don’t have any memories regarding the naming of the field or if a bobcat/wildcat is really buried under the turf somewhere. It was where we played all our football games and practiced and performed our halftime shows all four years I was in the band.
However, I do have memories. I’ll never forget BYD up in the press box calling out our marching mistakes when the band practiced. Having my name blared out over the PA system was something I never wanted to happen once, much less more than that. I don’t believe Mr. Pauley ever did that, but I well remember him as our band director. Both Mr. Dickenson and Mr. Pauley are prominent in my fond high school memories of all the parades, football games and the trips to Brady.
Does anyone remember the time we were performing for the judges in our auditorium there at DRHS and we somehow got started all wrong? Someone didn’t count the measures correctly and came in too soon/too late which threw everyone totally off. We had to just stop and start over. That is a rather difficult memory.
This is just my small contribution to our great Del Rio High School and our “Moments to Remember.”
Winnie Thompson, Class of 1940
Marcy Martin was my husband's uncle. Marcy was married to Harold's aunt Blanche. Harold's father, Jeff Thompson, was the manager of the first HEB grocery store. He had worked in Kerrville for Mr. H. E. Butt and when Mr. Butt opened the store in Del Rio, Jeff Thompson was made manager. Marcy Martin was his assistant manager. On the opening of the first HEB store (during the depression) people gathered outside the building and live chickens were thrown from the roof top as opening prizes. Anyone catching a chicken could take it home. When my husband Harold was fourteen years old his father died from pneumonia. March Martin became manager of the store. He was later killed in an automobile accident. I believe around 1943. His wife, Blanche, adopted son, Max, and Marcy Jr survived him.
Ed Palmer, Class of 1969
One of my earliest memories of Marcy Martin Field itself was going down with my mother and buying Christmas trees - my guess is that this was the late 50's. I can still remember the smell of the trees and that it seemed the field was covered with them. It seems that it was the Junior Class selling the trees, though at the time, I had no idea what a "Junior Class" was. Does anyone remember selling Christmas trees?
And, that may be the first time I heard that there was a real Wildcat (Bobcat?) buried at the field! Can anyone confirm?
Patricia (Alexander) Leonard, Class of 1954
To add to the discussion about football in the 40s, my husband, James Leonard, graduated in 1947 and played football through the 1946 season. He says that the grandstands of the old football field on Garfield Street, the later site of Marcy Martin, were condemned in about 1945. They then began playing at the racetrack, which was mostly grass and was on the infield of the track.
At that time, there was a baseball game at the same location; no doubt the site of Hank’s Pittsburgh baseball game.He doesn’t remember what year they finished Marcy Martin field, which they were building his last year in high school but believes it was ‘47 or maybe ‘48. His coach was Jimmy Jacks who was there through the ‘46 season, which was James Lee’s last as he graduated in the spring of 1947.He believes that Jimmy Jacks was followed by Earl Glassie but is not sure about that.It was the season of 1947 that the Wildcats played Hondo out at the racetrack and beat them 7-0.It was quite an event because it was the first time that Del Rio had beaten Hondo in 22 years.Bobby Taylor, who was mentioned by someone else, was in that game. Someone also asked about the track and he says that they continued to use the track at the old football field.
Kay (Harlow) Ochoa, Class of 1966
This strays a bit beyond the focus of all things Wildcat, but you might find it interesting.
My mother, Frankie Lee (Greenwood) Harlow, class of ’39 told this about the old HEB. It was the second HEB store in Texas (the first, of course, was in Kerrville) and the Butt family purchased the land at Main and Losoya from her grandmother, Eula Miers Markwood. Mrs. Markwood lived for years at the Roswell Hotel. I often went by to visit on her way home from Central Elementary.
Speaking of the Central Building, in fifth grade Susan Adams Harrison and I would walk from Central Elementary to the high school to wait in the library while Susan’s mother, Thelma Adams, finished up her day there as school librarian. The library then was on the second floor of the main building. When I got to high school later I had chemistry in that same space because the high school had constructed a separate building (on the Wardlaw Gym side) that housed the new Library.
Juan Garcia, Class of 1967
Nelson Cardwell, Class of 1944, who will turn 85 on July 18, 2011 (my father-in-law) played in a Wildcat basketball game against the Uvalde Coyotes – in 1943! Nelson remembers the game as if it were yesterday because he led the scoring and the win over the Coyotes! The game was played on the outdoor court before Cody Wardlaw Gym was built.
Nelson and his wife Bertha, former San Felipe Mustang cheerleader has lived in San Antonio for many years.
Hank Woodward, Class of 1956
I remember going with my mother to pick up my older brothers after a football game, Hondo I believe, at the Race Track. This must have been in 1946, I would have been eight years old at the time. This was in the days when Gene Salmon and J. D. Centilli and maybe Bobby Taylor were big stars for the Wildcats. I don't know if the field was grass or dirt, but if on the racetrack itself the field was probably 25 yards wide and at least 200 yards long. No doubt, the field was in the infield of the track. I did see the Pittsburgh Pirates play a pre-season baseball game at the racetrack in that era. The opponent was another major league team, maybe the Phillies, but I am not sure now. They were traveling by train back to their hometowns for the regular season.
I would like to know when Marcy Martin field was first used, I would guess in the '47 season. Maybe Dan Cobb could answer this or other of our more senior members who were in high school back then.
I started attending football practices on a regular basis during the '48 season, and coach Earl Glassie allowed me to shag balls during practice in the undefeated '49 season. We tied Uvalde 7-7 that year, but the strong Coyote team advanced based on penetrations and they did quite well in the state playoffs. Old timers will remember the Gibbens brothers, John and Bobby, and Albert Racer. But I digress.
Dan Cobb, Class of 1954
One more bit of trivia which I forgot to include in my rush to get that e-mail sent this morning: Hank remembered that the Wildcats played at the racetrack before Marcy Martin Field was built. What he may not know, but I remember well because Tim, my brother, class 45, and all his buddies were on the team at the time, is that the Wildcat playing field that preceded the racetrack was at the same location as Marcy Martin Field, only instead of running east-west like the newer field, it ran north-south.
John Keyes Finegan, Class of 1945
Football, baseball, track and rodeos took place at Cowboy stadium or field.
It was at the same location as Marcy Martin Field only it ran perpendicular
to the street rather than horizontal to the loop road. It had a wooden
fence surrounding it so that you had to be inside to see activities or use a knothole in the wood fence to see.
I never knew of any games being played at the present racetrack.
Robert Brockwell, Class of 1954
My aunt, Blondie Brockwell Trent, was in the class of 1945. She was a twirler for the band. One time at a football game, which would have been the fall of 1944, she had Freddie Brockwell and myself come down on the field with her at half time. That game was played at Marcy Martin field. Don't know if the games played before that were at the race track or not.
Del Rio did have a professional; baseball team that was in the Class D Longhorn league. They played their games at the racetrack. Sam Harshanney was the manager and I was the batboy. They played there until a new ballpark was built in the Chihuahua area.
Dan Cobb, Class of 1954
John Keyes Finegan and Hank Woodward both have good memories, but I think I can shed a little additional light. Marcy Martin was a well-liked manager of the Del Rio H.E.B. store, which was located at the corner of Main and Losoya in what had previously been a Piggly Wiggly store. He died in a car wreck, and when the local schools decided to build a new football field, H.E. Butt himself donated a large part of the cost of that project in exchange for naming the field in memory of his deceased store manager. (Some trivia: the unusual lighting fixtures in that old H.E.B. location were recycled when St. James Episcopal Church built its new sanctuary and incorporated the old church into the structure as a wing designated as the parish hall. The light fixtures were hung in the new sanctuary, where I suppose they remain today. (It's been many years since I last entered St. James Church, so they could be gone by now, I suppose.)
John Keyes has things right on Cody Wardlaw gym. The Wardlaw family gave a very substantial sum toward the cost of the new gym in memory of their lost family member. The tragedy of the elder Cody's death was compounded when young Cody Jr., who as I recall it, was with his father in the accident that took his dad's life, was himself killed in the accident near Laughlin that John Keyes remembers. A very, very sad story. Two fine young men lost to their loved ones and friends.
Hank Woodward, Class of 1956
Before Marcy Martin Field opened for the '47 or '48 football season, Wildcat football games were played at the Race Track at the north end of Main Street.
Cody Wardlaw gymnasium replaced an outdoor asphalt basketball court near where the gym is now located. Wildcat high school games were played on this asphalt court. When Cody Wardlaw gymnasium first opened for the '49-'50 basketball season, new multicolored M&M candy was first sold during basketball games. What a change from the primitive outdoor court to the beautiful Cody Wardlaw gymnasium!"
John Keyes Finegan, Class of 1945
As to the naming of Cody wardlaw Gym and Marcy Nartin Field.
Cody Wardlaw was Dink, Walt, Rachel and Mary's brother. He and his young son were in a wreck near the junction of Hwy. 277 and 377. Cody Sr. was killed Cody Jr. survived only to be killed later in life near LAFB. This was the wreck where Tullisha Shahan was hurt so bad. I am virtually certain the Wardlaw family contributed to the building of Cody Wardlaw Gym.
Marcy Martin field was named for a prominent business man of Del Rio who if I am not mistaken had the Piggly Wiggly catty cornered from the Del Rio National Bank building on Main and Losoya. His son resides in Oklahoma - I think. He was at one time married to Slyviia Stewart.
I am not absolutely certain of some details and look forward to others comments.
Jimmy Carter, Class of 1970
The Cody Wardlaw Gymnasium opened in 1950. It was built in memory of Cody Martin Wardlaw, Sr. The gym was a memorial gift by Cody's parents, C.B. "Dutch" and Emma Wardlaw and their family to the high school. Cody attended Del Rio schools and Southwestern University at Georgetown, TX. He was born in 1913, was the oldest son of Dutch and Emma and the husband of Aileen Tennille. They had two children, Cody, Jr. and Tennille. Cody, Sr. died in 1944.