(in Kremandala yard, under the coconut tree, around 10:15 a.m. to 12:00 noon, Wednesday, January 18, 2012.)
Continued from previous issue of Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Speedy (S): And he used to be very athletic. In fact, he was a sprinter. They used to call him, “di Fly.”
Amandala (A): Oh, yes! (laughs) Now, you said the word!… I remember that name… from the annual track meet at the MCC Grounds. I remember “di Fly.” (Lloyd Henry)
S: Yaa, that’s my only brother. So, my mother she worked, did different jobs in order to raise two sons. And so, when I spoke with the teacher, he said, “Well, man, if it is books you want, we can provide you with the books.”
So I said, “No problem.”
And I went home and I told my mother that, you know….
A: But you said, he heard that you played football…
S: Yes, because my friends told him. That…
A: Before leaving Cayo to come to Belize City, you weren’t playing football already?
S: I was. I was playing footall because… remember that we had all these…
A: You had primary school competitions?
S: We didn’t have primary school competitions; but there was always Broaster Stadium. It wasn’t called Broaster Stadium at the time; it was just a field. But we would all gather out there in the evenings and play football until late. And then, later on, when we had the…. Because remember, we had the Inter-District competition…
A: Yaa, I remember that. I don’t recall when it began…
S: I don’t recall when it began, but I was caught up in it; and at that time, it was a competition among all the districts. And so, as a young player, some of the older players, like Earl Haylock, who is now deceased..
A: Ahaan?
S: Yaa, Earl passed. And some of the others, like Alwin Smith, Toby Smith, Dave Smith, “Maya” Ortega, you know, those were the guys who used to form the “Western District” team, as it was known.
A: At that time… that was before Avengers, then.
S: That was before Avengers. That was before Rocking-R. We used to call ourselves simply, Western District. Our greatest rival around that time was Dangriga, Stann Creek Selection…
A: With Tubuk (Ivan Martinez)?
S: Yaa, with Tubuk, and that little crowd there, a very, very solid team…
A: So, at sixteen you went to Sacred Heart. That’s before you began playing with the big team, Western District?
S: Yes. When I was at Sacred Heart, in 1962, that was the time when I was selected to form part of the Western District team, around that same time. So that was how I got into the sport.
A: So, at sixteen you were right up into the big leagues.
S: Yea. In fact, I will tell you, the first time I met… you know…. When we had a game in Cayo against Stann Creek, you know, there were players like Elmo, Tubuk, Leslie,…
A: Roddy Leslie?
S: Roddy Leslie, you know, all those guys; and in fact, when I, a very slim fellow, I mean… you’re not developed properly yet…
A: What position you played at that time?
S: Midfield.
A: Which side?
S: Right… And, I mean, when I looked at… for instance, I recall in my mind, Tubuk…
A: Tubuk. That man’s legs were like…
S: Something like this (shows with his hands), and I said, “Man,” I tell you… I said, “Man, I don’t think I could clash with this guy,” you know. And, eventually we had to; because, you know, once you’re on the field of play, there will come a time when you… And so, yes, when we clashed the first time, I went a little bit cautiously, because I said, “The next thing you know,” when you looked on his legs, you know, I said, “Boy, this thing might knock me down”…. But, surprisingly, it was not like that. It was just like any ordinary player, you know, according to me. And so, after that, the fear left, and I just tackled him when he was coming, you know. But that was actually the beginning.
A: ’62 Western District. You don’t recall any others of the players besides… you mentioned the Smith brothers, Earl Haylock… on the team at that time. Who was the captain?
S: Yaa, I think it was Earl. Because there were other players…
A: Was “Waggie” with the team then? Wagner, the goalie.
S: No, no, no; he came during Rocking-R, the days of Rocking-R. That’s when we had the two brothers, the two Wagner brothers, if you recall…
A: Yaa, two goalie…
S: George and Tony. Two goalkeepers, very solid guys.
A: So in ’62 you played with Western District; and then after that…?
S: Then, after that, I remember that… We…
A: At that time you weren’t… you were still going to school at Sacred Heart…
S: Well, I graduated from Sacred Heart in ’65.
A: Okay, so you were still at Sacred Heart (during that period)…
S: Yaa, I was still at Sacred Heart. And then, you know, the Inter-District was every year… so I played throughout that period… after leaving…
A: You don’t recall how the Western District went… They didn’t win any of those Inter-District…
S: No. Our greatest rival was always Stann Creek…
A: Stann Creek was the winner?
S: Yaa, Queens Park, you know, they were always part of…
A: Queens Park Rangers, they were practically a semi-pro team at that time, right? They all worked with the (citrus) company…
S: Yea. What happened was that, the company at that time used to draw… because at that time, you know, some of those boys like Kenny Gray, and so on, they were actually from out of Cayo, you know; but they ended up at Stann Creek because of the job situation. And then, I think, Mr. Sharp used to make sure that…. He would give them jobs, and then they played for the area… which I felt was a good thing.
A: Joe Mendez used to play (with them) at that time?
S: Yaa… I think, yea, Joe Mendez… but I… not during my time… I don’t recall ever playing against him… but that was a name…
A: You heard that name around there…?
S: Yaa. Yaa. Very good, I was told, very good player. But…
A: Griga ruled at that time…
S: Yaa, Griga was very strong.
A: So, up until… you played with Western District a few years… you graduated in ’65 from Sacred Heart… then what? You got your first job?
S: Then I started working with Government, in San Ignacio, at the Sub-Treasury up there. And then… but during that time, I was still playing, you know, I was still playing… you still go out and exercise… and then…
A: They had a competition in Cayo?
S: Yes. We would have our own district competition… And I played for a team at the time named Moraton, because the area that I lived was Moraton…
A: Moraton? Not Marathon, like the Spanish name (team) in Honduras?
S: No, no; Moraton. The team was sponsored by Gus Torres at the time, who had a bakery. In fact, we were even… when we came out for the first time, you know, because the uniform we used resembled the empty flour sack…
A: (laughs) So dehn boy must-i call unu “flour bag team”?
S: (laughs) Yaa. So they would call us “the flour sack team.” But it wasn’t bad, you know.
A: You remember any notable players on the team at that time?
S: With Moraton? Yea, we had “Pappy” Smith…
A: Pappy was with you?
S: Yaa. We had Nayo Waight, we had Russel Waight, we had…
A: It sounds like you were one of the top teams…
S: Well, we… no, but you had Tio Lennan and some of the others…
A: “Steeler” (Garbutt)?
S: Steeler????.. No… I don’t remember… No, yaa… I think Steeler played with us, you know, but I’m not sure… I’m not sure…
A: Anyhow, you played…
S: But we played; and we won the competition. The other teams… like Highlanders had Tio Lennan; they had, you remember “Lacio” Martinez?
A: That’s Mike? (brother of San Joaquin’s famous striker, Fred Martinez)
S: Yaa, Mike Martinez… those were some of the other players…
A: How about the Trapp brothers? “Haabat” (Herbert Trapp) wasn’t playing then?
S: They were Esperanza. Right. So, that competition we would play for our own area.
A: Okay.
S: The Trapp brothers would play for Esperanza. And then you had guys like… from Santa Elena… like Maya would play for Santa Elena…
A: Maya! That name always rings out.
S: Maya Ortega. Yaa, the control man…
A: Yes, man.
S: Very… man, he bring ball from his chest to… you know…
A: I had heard talking that he was from the older group… he spent a while in Guatemala or something like that…?
S: He studied… Well, he played football in Honduras, himself and Alwin Smith.
A: Alwin too?
S: Yaa, Alwin was there, at the time when there was a Catholic priest in Cayo; and he arranged for them to be attached to a team in Honduras. So they played there.
A: So, Maya would be senior to you by about how many years?
S: Maya is in his seventies. I’m sixty-five, so I’m quite certain he has me by, maybe about eight years…
A: He was the center-forward at the time?
S: Yea, he was; he was the man, the man with lot of control. And so… you don’t slip with him when you’re in that area, because he was very, very good on controlling the ball…
A: So, Moraton. And then you said… and after that you go on to the Western… you still played with the Western…
S: No, no. We still played… yaa… and when we had, we had… and then we moved to Rocking-R.
A: That would be about ’66 then?
S: That would be… somewhere around there… yaa, that would be somewhere around there, the… early… I think it was a bit later than that, when we had Rocking-R. But that team was controlled by a gentleman by the name of “Bull,” who… they had a business out in Esperanza, a tobacco business out there, where they would grow tobacco and then ship… And so, he wanted to, you know… He liked the game, and so he said, “Look, I am willing to sponsor a team, to enter the Belize City competition.”
A: Up to that time, the Inter-District, where you mentioned that Stann Creek ruled, Inter-District involved all the districts – Belize, Corozal, Orange Walk, everybody…?
S: Yaa, yaa… I don’t remember… Belize City wasn’t. We never had Belize; it was only for the districts, the other districts.
A: So, Belize City, they had their own competition.
S: They had their own competition, right.
A: But individual clubs… I can recall in the Belize City competition used to come… San Joaquin used to always visit Belize City to play in the competition from Corozal. And we also had… at different times we had R.A.C., Salada Eleven (from Stann Creek)… used to come in and play in the Belize City competition on their own.
S: Yea, all of that you had… one of our rivals during the Belize City…
A: So, Rocking-R played in the Belize City competition?
S: Yea.
A: You had some guys from Belize City also on that team, did you? Or just Cayo…?
S: No. Mostly Cayo players… But, we played against “Mugga” (Louis Garbutt), “Palmer” Davis, you know… guys like those. And, as Rocking-R, we made a name for ourselves… Because, I remember, the song when we would arrive in town, you know… “Who will take out the Big-R?” (laughs)
(to be continued in the next issue)