Bridgewater State College to celebrate 50th anniversary football season

September 3, 2009

By Jim Fenton, Enterprise Staff Writer

BRIDGEWATER --  The football program at Bridgewater State College disappeared from the scene for more than 30 years after the 1927 season.

Thanks in large part to the efforts of Athletic Director Ed Swenson, though, the team was revived in 1960, and students who had only soccer as an option in the fall were able to play some football.

"Ed was the catalyst, the father of Bridgewater State football,'' said Jim Argir, a co-captain on the 1960 squad. "It was a dream of his to make it happen. He had to work two or three years convincing people that it would be good for the school.''

Swenson was able to do that, and now the program has reached a milestone in the 2009 season.

When the Bears open their schedule by hosting Mount Ida College on Saturday at noon at Swenson Field, it will mark the start of the 50th season in the modern era.

To commemorate the occasion, BSC will honor past players throughout the season, starting with the opener this weekend.

Some 15 players from the 1960 team and assistant coach Frank Jardin are expected to be on hand to watch the Bears take on Mount Ida.

"It is going to be a nice way to pay tribute to those who made such a historical contribution to Bridgewater State College football,'' said Rich Florence, who played for the Bears from 1971-74, was an assistant coach at BSC and now has a son, Casey, serving as a captain. "From my perspective, these are the guys who planted the seeds, and the obstacles they had to overcome were big.

"Ed Swenson had to sell the idea to the president of the school to start the football program, and at that time, I'm sure it wasn't a far-reaching idea.''

The players from the 1960 team will have breakfast with members of this year's team on Saturday morning, tour the campus and attend a tailgate get-together.

Players from teams that played from 1960-69 will be marching in the Homecoming Weekend parade on Oct. 31 and be recognized at a game that day against Worcester State.

The first team in the modern era compiled a 1-3 record with Swenson as the coach, and the Bears were 14-33 in his eight years on the sidelines.

The players from that era got the program off the ground, getting it headed in the right direction after football had been on the shelf for so long at BSC. The school was the first state college in Massachusetts to have football in the 1960s.

"In my first three years at Bridgewater, we played soccer and we were in two soccer conferences,'' said Argir, an offensive tackle and linebacker. "We won five championships and lost once in the finals. It was at that point that Ed was hoping to get football.

"We didn't have a lot of men in the school in those days. We were starting from scratch. But everybody was excited about being able to play football.''

BSC, which played its home games at Legion Field, defeated Nichols and lost to Newport Naval Station, Maine Maritime and the Brown University freshmen that season. The Bears also won a scrimmage against Miramar, a Catholic seminary located in Duxbury.

"I remember there was no preseason for us,'' said Jim Tartari, who was a freshman running back in 1960. "There was a notice posted on the board to come and try out. It was like a week into the academic year.

"Ed Swenson (who had been the soccer coach) bought some equipment from the Abington town team that was defunct. We had old pads, boots, game pants, jerseys.

"It was really different. A lot of us had come from decent football backgrounds in high school, but we got to Bridgewater and there was really no history to rely on. Coach Swenson did just about everything to make it work. He had a great way about him.''

There were about 35 players on the first team as the school had about four times more female students than male at the time. Some of the soccer players made the switch to football, making the move with Swenson.

"It was a labor of love,'' said Argir, who also played basketball and baseball and threw the shot put. "We had several people playing both ways. We weren't big people, but we got the job done.

"I take a lot of pride in being on that team. I felt fortunate to be there. There was a lot of camaraderie. We knew that if we didn't put our best foot forward, football was going to have a short life at Bridgewater.''

Tartari remembers that after the first season, BSC played some games against inmates at the prisons in Norfolk County and Walpole.

"It was just exciting to be able to play ball in college,'' said Tartari. "We played as well as we could have that first year. We just used straight-on blocking with no traps. We were putting an offense in.''

Pete Mazzaferro took over for Swenson in 1968 and went 195-137-7 in 36 seasons, and Chuck Denune has a 30-10 record in his five seasons. The Bears own a 243-185-7 mark in the past 49 years.

In addition to Argir and Tartari plus the assistant coach, Jardin, players from the original team expected to attend Saturday's game include Paul Callahan, John Corcoran, Paul Doherty, David Fee, co-captain Peter Flynn, Bill Wassel, Al Strondak, Ronald Hatch, Robert Mason, Joseph McCarthy, Ed Meany and David Morwick.