Re: Les Vogel Powergliders

03/06/12 - posted by Angus Macfarlane

I was #23 for the Pop Warner Powergliders in 1962. At the time I lived in the Haight Ashbury and one day a bunch of my friends said that they had signed up to play football for a team that had uniforms and equipment and coaches and organization.

This was a quantum leap from playing tackle football in the street, two or three on a side, with three completed passes making a first down.

So I tagged along to the practice site at the triangle just west of Kezar. Dang if I didn't make the team as a wingback on offense and safety on defense.

After school started and Poly's football team took over the triangle, we shifted to the arboretum in Golden Gate Park. Our locker room was in the old fire station on 10th Avenue. I remember seeing on the side of a building just north of the fire station, peeking out from the whitewash, HORSES BORDED HERE.

We played other teams around the Bay Area, but the biggest treat was flying (my first airplane flight--and true for probably most of the team) down to Southern California to play another Pop Warner team from Buena Park. It was over Thanksgiving Day Weekend. We played the Falcons in the Disney Bowl, a night game under the lights in front of--I don't know--more people than we played in front of before.

That was my only year. I had dreams of playing for Poly's football team, but my PE teacher signed me up for track and cross country. No complaints. Track bean berry, berry gud to me.