Members of the Holly Hall of F... HOLLY, Michigan – While it may be difficult to imagine Holly High School’s colors being anything but red and white, it’s even tougher to fathom that they were once the very same colors as Holly’s arch rival - Fenton High School, but it’s true.
And how did Holly High School become the home of the “Bronchos” with the ever-questioned “chos” at the end?
Facts and questions like these prompted Holly High School Athletic Director, Deb Van Kuiken to set up a Q and A session in which three notable Hollyites, all of whom are members of the Holly High School Hall of Fame Committee, met to set the record straight in Holly High School’s book of history.
Over the course of her tenure at Holly High School, Van Kuiken said she’s had the pleasure of hearing unique facts and stories about the school, and wanted to give others the same opportunity.
“Every time the committee meets, an interesting fact or two about Holly High School’s past comes up,” Van Kuiken said. “The guys get into these fascinating stories and it’s just such a great part of our school and community’s history, I wanted to preserve it.”
Joining Van Kuiken was well-known Holly businessman Bruce Dryer, former Holly High School football coach and teacher, Chuck Keefer, and resident, Pat McKenney – all three lifetime residents and graduates of Holly High School.
A graduate of Holly High School in 1946, Bruce Dryer is like a walking history book when it comes to Holly High’s rich past.
Prior to 1945, Holly High School was without a mascot. Dryer was one of the student council members in 1945 that did the research in determining what the new nickname for the students should be.
“We sent out letters to all the people in the areas that played sports against us, asking them what their nicknames were so we wouldn’t duplicate,” Dryer recalled. After receiving return letters from places like Walled Lake, Keego Harbor and Brighton, student council members chose “The Bronchos.”
“There were two names to choose from – Bronchos and I can't remember what the other one was,” Dryer said. “They decided on Bronchos, and why the Bronchos has a ‘chos’ on the end rather than just a ‘cos’ was because it seemed to rhyme together in rhythm,” he said. “‘BRON-CHOS’ instead of ‘BRON-C-O-S.’”
In the fall of 1946, HHS students were officially known as the Bronchos.
By then, Dryer said the school colors had already been changed from orange and black to red and gray.
Dryer said he believed the colors officially changed in 1938 to red and gray after the former owner of the Holly Hotel, Dallas Winslow, purchased new band uniforms for the school.
“I heard he wouldn’t buy orange and black – he would only buy red and gray,” Van Kuiken said.
“Good for him,” Keefer said laughing about the duplication with Fenton High School’s colors.
“I can’t tell you what his reasoning was, but I know the band uniforms became red and gray and these were handed down from year to year to year,” Dryer said.
Shortly after the band received red and gray uniforms, Dryer said Wilbert McKeechie and Bob Bravender wrote the fight song.
“It used to be ‘The red and gray will lead the way to fame and glory, come what may,’” Dryer said.
In 1966, that would all change again.
Chuck Keefer took part in a Q ...
“It happened during my sophomore year,” Keefer said. “We had an assembly and it was explained to us as athletes that they couldn’t get gray in the uniforms anymore – textile places or whatever weren’t putting gray in uniforms anymore, so they decided to go with white.”
Just like that, the fight song was changed to as it’s sung today, with the red and white leading the fight.
Keefer graduated in 1968 and afterward, returned to the high school as a teacher and head football coach in 1981, retiring there after 21 years of service to the district.
Keefer said he was responsible for redesigning the Broncho logo in the early 80s, transforming it from a “rearing horse silhouette” into today’s “Snorty the Broncho.”
Additionally, Keefer takes credit for reintroducing gray into Holly High School’s color scheme.
“I’m probably most guilty of putting gray back into the uniform,” Keefer said. “I had heard from a lot of classmates that they still longed for the gray, so I decided to add it back in.”
Dryer remembers Holly High School’s first nighttime football game very clearly. “Holly’s first night game was Oct. 12, 1945 under the lights of Cyclone Park,” he said. “It was a Saturday night - until then, all football games had been played on Friday afternoons before it got dark.”
Located directly behind the old Holly High School – the Mable D. Bensett building, a chain link walkway between the houses led to the park.
“We used to go to Cyclone Park – the football field ran north and south, and they used to have white wooden cedar posts with a cable going between them and I remember going there and watching games, sitting on the sidelines by the cable up against my dad’s legs,” Keefer said.
McKenney, who has been a resident of Holly since the tender age of 3 and was a graduate of HHS in 1967, also remembered the games at Cyclone Park.
“They had very little in the way of bleachers,” McKenney recalled. “There was a concession stand which was very small and an announcer’s booth up top,” he said. “What was great about it is that we lived in town and could walk to it,” he added. “It cost a quarter to get into the game.”
While the passing years may have caused certain things to change, time has not dulled the former Bronchos’ spirits, or their blistering rivalry toward Fenton.
“We played a Thanksgiving Day game at 10 a.m. every year against Fenton,” Dryer said. Alternating between Cyclone Park and Fenton’s football field, Dryer said the stands were always packed for the game.
As for the continuing rivalry with the Tigers, all three men agreed that it is and has always been “fierce.”
“It takes a while for people to understand that the success of your season is based on how you did against Fenton,” McKenney said. “It doesn’t matter much about anything else – just how you did against Fenton.”
“A great number of Holly students married Fenton students, and I was one of ‘em,” Dryer laughed. “But she’s been converted now - all our kids and grandkids went to school here!”
|
NOCFA board rejects late evaluation, loo...
NOCFA board rejects late evaluation, loo...
NOCFA board rejects late evaluation, loo...
NOCFA board rejects late evaluation, loo...
Brotherly love: HHS student honored for ...
