Eastern Adams County's Only Independent Voice Since 1887
Eastern Adams County's Only Independent Voice Since 1887
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The coming weeks will be devoted to one of this city’s sport’s heroes, coaching legend Benner T. Cummings. — M. M. Athey & The Ritzville Swim Club Part Eleven: The Summer of 1965 Benner Cummings came back to Ritzville for one more year, even though he could have chosen to take a $1,000 offer to go elsewhere for the summer. “Why do you keep coming back each year to Ritzville?” Journal reporter John W. Lyman asked Benner at the end of the 1964 summer. “Nobody is paying you anything.” “A man has to share what he knows,” Coach...
The coming weeks will be devoted to one of this city’s sport’s heroes, coaching legend Benner T. Cummings. — M. M. Athey & The Ritzville Swim Club Part Ten: The Summer of 1964 Five of the best swimmers the Inland Empire had ever boasted comprised the core of the Ritzville Swim Club in 1964. This quintet possessed 13 of the 33 all-time records still held by the club. Tom Thomas, Tom Baumann, Bob Wood, Brian Miller and Jim Thomas were the most formidable opponents the swimmers from Spokane, Pullman and a dozen other clubs...
Editor’s Note: This is the sixth in the series of 11 articles. We published installment No. 7 instead of this one last time. Next week we will publish article 8. Part Nine: The Summers of 1962 and 1963 “The day of the summer swimmer is coming to a close in this area because so many clubs are now able to train the year around,” Cummings said to The Journal Times. “Also, our teams have set so many high standards that the competition has definitely taken notice. We are the targets in the Inland Empire and this state. But is...
Editor’s Note: This is the sixth in the series of 11 articles. We published installment No. 7 instead of this one last time. Next week we will publish article 8. Part Eight: The Summers of 1960 and 1961 By the summer of 1960, the Ritzville Swim Club was beginning its ninth season. Since 1952, the team that Benner Cummings had nurtured with such care and precision, had set, broken and re-established an estimated 300 men’s swimming records. These marks included pool records in a dozen Inland Empire pools plus swim meet, ass...
Editor’s Note: This is the sixth in the series of 11 articles. We published installment No. 7 instead of this one last time. Next week we will publish article 8. Part Six: The Summer of 1958 The Amateur Athletic Union of the United States (AAU) was founded in 1888 to establish standards and uniformity in all amateur sports. Its motto is “Sports for All, Forever.” The AAU serves as the representative of the United States within the international sports arena working closely with the US Olympic Committee and the Olympic Games...
The coming weeks will be devoted to one of this city’s sport’s heroes, coaching legend Benner T. Cummings. Here is the seventh installation. — M. M. Athey & The Ritzville Swim Club Part Seven: The Summer of 1959 “It is always a pleasure to see a group of young unknowns from a small community such as yours come through and surprise perhaps even the better known clubs. It is significant enough to note that one of your swimmers (Tom Jones) achieved the second fastest recording in the state last year for the mile swim. And othe...
The coming weeks will be devoted to one of this city’s sport’s heroes, coaching legend Benner T. Cummings. Here is the fifth installation. — M. M. Athey & The Ritzville Swim Club Part Five: The Summer of 1957 The summer of 1957 was when a younger group of Ritzville swimmers emerged as genuine contenders for future swimming championships. While the senior record-setters of Grayson Hand, Vern Kiehn, Tim Kiehn, Gordon Gering, Arnie Moeller, Dan Schwisow and Al Vermeeren were still with the team, coach Benner Cummings and as...
The coming weeks will be devoted to one of this city’s sport’s heroes, coaching legend Benner T. Cummings. Here is the second installation. — M. M. Athey & The Ritzville Swim Club Part Four: The Summer of 1956 The first swim meet of the summer for the Ritzville Swim Club was the Washington AAU Open Meet held at Pasco on July 14-15. With only two and a half weeks of training, the local swimmers placed fourth behind Tacoma Swim Club, Multnomah Athletic Club and the Olympia Swim Club but managed to out-swim all other Inland Emp...
The coming weeks will be devoted to one of this city’s sport’s heroes, coaching legend Benner T. Cummings. Here is the second installation. — M. M. Athey & The Ritzville Swim Club Part Three: The Summer of 1955 A new swimming pool, wading pool and bathhouse were constructed by the City of Ritzville, the Lions Club and the Jaycees for $40,000. Half of that cost was the 4,000 hours of in-kind-services provided by the volunteer labor of most of the local citizens. The process included tearing down the old bathhouse and buildi...
The coming weeks will be devoted to one of this city’s sport’s heroes, coaching legend Benner T. Cummings. Here is the second installation. — M. M. Athey & The Ritzville Swim Club Part Two: The Summer of 1953 The Ritzville Swim Team competed in the Inland Empire AAU Swimming Championships in Spokane on Aug. 3 and 4. The event attracted 350 competitors including six former Olympians. The Ritzville Swim Team was short-handed for this meet with only Dan Schwisow, Gordon Gering, Vern Kiehn and Benner Cummings able to compet...