The Making of the Explosion

By Glenn Taylor

This book is about a group of guys who became a real family on and off the football field. It will tell you about the things that these kids went through just in order to be able to play in the leagues that they were in. It also lets you see how and what they were playing for and how they stayed together throughout the season as well as during the off-season also. The book talks about how they had to find Rasse in order to make the travel games that were more than one hundred miles away for every game. So you will get to see from the inside on how much work they had to do in order to just be a part.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jan 29, 2018
• ISBN: 9781543476804

Glenn Taylor

Glenn Taylor is the author of the novels A Hanging at Cinder Bottom, The Marrowbone Marble Company and The Ballad of Trenchmouth Taggart, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. His writing has appeared in The Guardian, GQ, and Electric Literature, among others. Glenn was born and raised in Huntington, West Virginia, and he now lives with his wife and three sons in Morgantown, where he teaches in the MFA Program at West Virginia University.

Book preview

The Making of the Explosion

Glenn Taylor

Copyright © 2018 by Glenn Taylor.

ISBN:                  Softcover                     978-1-5434-7679-8

                             eBook                         978-1-5434-7680-4

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 01/15/2018

Xlibris

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CONTENTS

Chapter 1     The Beginning

Chapter 2     Greater Northwest Community Football League

Chapter 3     Packers Vs Knights week 3

Chapter 4     Game 4 Knights vs. Saints

Chapter 5     Knights vs. Denver

Chapter 6     Knights vs Packers

Chapter 7     Knights vs Saints

Chapter 8     Falcons vs Knights

Chapter 9     Miami vs Knights

Chapter 10   Introducing The Dragons

Chapter 11   Another Change is Going On

Chapter 12   Dragons 22 vs Dubarry Panthers 8

Chapter 13   Dragons 35 vs Eagledale Bears 28

Chapter 14   Indiana Senior Varsity League

Chapter 15   TNT I 28 vs Garfield 0

Chapter 16   TNT Jr. 6 Eagledale Cowboys 8

Chapter 17   Marion County League

Chapter 18   TNT Jr’s 14 Eagledale Bears 6

Chapter 19   September 13, 1998

Chapter 20   September 19, 1998

Chapter 21   TNT I 7 TNT II 0

Chapter 22   Double D No.40

Chapter 23   TNT Explosion 35 Caudhay Wisc. 28

Chapter 24   TNT Explosion 30 vs. Annieock, Illinois. 14

Chapter 25   The Ride Down US 40 Highway

Chapter 26   The Meeting of Two Indiana Teams

Chapter 27   The Merriville Challenge

Chapter 28   Hammonds, Indiana

Chapter 29   Back -N- The Saddle

Chapter 30   Atomic Dawgs 28 Hammonds, Indians 10

Chapter 31   The Return to Gary, Indiana

Chapter 32   Back To Merriville

Chapter 33   Chicago Land Bound

Chapter 34   Season’s Ending Game

Chapter 35   The Return Of TNT Explosions

Chapter 36   The Assignment of Coaches

Chapter 37   Central Indiana Pop Warner Weigh In

Chapter 38   Central Indiana Pop Warner Game I Mighty Mites

Chapter 39   Central Indiana Pop Warner Game III

Chapter 40   Central Indiana Pop Warner Game

Chapter 41   TNT Explosion I 21 Chicago Land Jr’s 14

Chapter 42   Northern Indiana Pop Warner Game II For Jr’s

Chapter 43   TNT Explosions Sr. 35 Chicago Land Sr. 6

Chapter 44   Arlington High School

Chapter 45   TNT Dynamites 14 Delphi 7

Chapter 46   TNT Explosion A 20 Delphi Jr. A 14

Chapter 47   TNT Explosion B 21 Delphi B 28

Chapter 48   TNT Explosions Sr. 45 Delphi Sr. 32

Chapter 49   Back Home Again

Chapter 50   TNT Dynamites 13 Panthers 8

Chapter 51   TNT Explosion A Team 6 Panthers A Team 20

Chapter 52   TNT Explosion B Team 21 Panthers B Team 14

Chapter 53   TNT Explosions A Team 21 Panthers A Team 14

Chapter 54   Let’s Recap Some Things!

Where Are They Now

From Boys to Men Intro:

Pledge of Commitment

My Name is:

I am a boy with good qualities. I am somebody. I am a child of God. I am not a man. I am a boy. I recognize my place in life. I will walk as a boy and when I become a man I will put away childish things. I will honor my father and mother whom the Lord my God has given me all the days of my life. I will dedicate my life to become the son, student, friend, Christian, and citizen that God has called me to be. So help me God.

Shout out to LWBC

The Making of The Explosion

Intro: My name is Glenn Taylor, aka or better known as Coach Taylor. Ready for a great story? Sit back, get relaxed, pour yourself a good tall drink and begin to read as our journey to become one of the most exciting and fun to watch youth programs ever comes alive.

CHAPTER 1

The Beginning

It all started for me many years ago back in the 1970s.. I played basketball and softball at Tab for years under a man named Russ Earl. Now Russ as we all called him was well loved in the community by all races. This man set an example that was really out of this world. I was tied to Russ in other ways outside of the rec center. His son Rick was a member of Boy Scout troop 72 with me so we did a lot together, as we grew up in friendship. Back in those days you couldn’t even get a seat in the house for the basketball program. Then there was the softball program; well, this program also was great and filled the seats. You see back then the city of Indianapolis was booming with nothing but talent, raw talent that is. This man along with his staff and coaches were able to bring races together. I am not saying it was easy, but that he made it work for everyone. Then there was the football program that came along, and the tab travel team. This is where it really started for me working with that coaching staff and learning all along the way. Well, after school and entering the service, there were different things going on, so we fast forward a few years to 1990 and we said we were going to sign Roosevelt up to play football. We signed him up for football with EYAA, which was out on the East Side of town; you see, at Tab you couldn’t play at five years old, but at EYAA you could play flag football. We went on to let him play flag which he seemed to enjoy very much.

After the year was up my thinking was it was time to let him play some real football and like all mothers, his was scared to let him play full contact football at age six. After talking to her and trying to reassure her that he would be fine, she went out and bought every pad made for football. I mean, he had so much stuff on that he couldn’t even move around in the gear!

His first year of contact football went very well being he had never played before, so he was somewhat excited to be on the Broncos. Meanwhile, I was sitting back watching the practices and the drills, some of which I really did not like, but who was I, just a parent looking on and wanting more out of the kids than what I was seeing being done.

One day I was standing on the sidelines watching the game, talking crazy about what the team should be doing and one parent said to me, If you know so much why aren’t you out there coaching instead of talking about what needs to be done?

So, after the season I went to the league president and asked if I could coach or have my own team. Mr. Greg Sutton told me that he would love to have some help with his league, EYAA. So EYAA became our focus and we just happened to be rewarded with the East Side Knights junior varsity team. This team would end up taking on coaches such as Anthony Boyd, Jerry Townsend, Carlton Hayes, and me, Glenn Taylor. These guys would become the first coaches for the Eastside Knights Junior Team. At that time, we played in two different football leagues, the Greater Northwest Football League, and the Christian Park Football League. The first year we played out at Northwest. We had to have a weigh in and a birth certificate check of every kid on the roster and this would take place every game. Back then was when they really made kids, I mean the kids in that era were big boys, and I do mean big boys. We caught hell every week in weighing these kids in. This was our first year playing away from where we had played our league games. All the kids were excited to be playing someone other than the kids that that they had seen on a weekly basis. Now, the stage was all set