Elder grad Dennis Janson, sports anchor at WCPO channel 9, and Elder grad of 1968, shared his memories on WCPO.com this week. He wrote, “One time I mentioned to him that I wanted to go to Australia. Why he wondered? ‘Just because I’ve heard it’s neat.’ Well, you should go then. ‘I fully intend to Father,’ I responded.
“Somehow he always held on to that dream with me. When I would see him over the ensuing years, he would eagerly ask, ‘Dennis, did you ever make it to Australia?,’ to which I always had to reply, ‘Not yet Father, but it’s gonna happen.’”
Janson, more affectionately known as “DJ”, shared numerous tidbits about news and sports, all things Elder and not when I worked as a sports intern at WCPO last year. He and Sports Director John Popovich were always looking for ways to help me out, and share stories about their time in sports reporting.
Popovich, the man most know as “Popo”, asked me to come in and screen phone calls at WCPO for his show “Sports of All Sorts” on Sunday evenings at 11:35 p.m. I obliged. I got to meet many important people in the sports world from Chris Mack, Xavier men’s basketball head coach, to Chick Ludwig, former Dayton Daily News Cincinnati Reds beat writer.
Ludwig lost his job as Reds beat writer when the Dayton Daily News cut jobs last summer, but he’s found a job with the Cincinnati Enquirer, writing a blog titled “Typing Away”. Yesterday he posted a story about Fr. Rudy.
Ludwig graduated from Elder in 1972 with Fr. Rudy’s nephew Dr. Mark Rudemiller. Ludwig’s poignant article about Fr. Rudy reminded me why I love the high school I call my alma mater.
Ludwig wrote, “The tight-knit boys Catholic school at the convergence of Vincent and Regina avenues in Price Hill has always had but one flaw — it makes you graduate after four years. But to every one of us purple-blooded Panthers, we really, truly and honestly never leave.”
It's like the Hotel California, but better, "You just never leave" (Me on the far left with friends after our graduation mass at St. Teresa of Avila, on Glenway Avenue, the heart of the West Side)
The most famous Elder t-shirts read, “It’s a Purple thing, you wouldn’t understand.” “The West Side is like a cult”, I’ve heard from outsiders. “Once you get over [here], you might never leave.” Guilty as charged.
Just these two Elder grads, who were around when Fr. Rudy was still at Elder, have shown me what it means to by true and loyal to your school, true and loyal to your friends, and truly loyal to those who made Elder High School mean so much. While some people I know have tried to cut out their high school friends, Elder guys still flock to one another.
Ludwig also wrote, “Father Rudy never met a stranger and never forgot anyone. To know him was to love him. And everyone loved the man whose unbridled enthusiasm and passion for life mirrored his compassion for people, especially the students and faculty of Elder High School, his alma mater, my alma mater, our alma mater.”
As the most famous school song says, “We are loyal to thy colors, to the Purple and the White; These reveal the Elder Spirit, teaching us what’s true and right.”
Without a doubt, Fr. Rudy taught many young men what was true and right in life. I’m sure that many more Elder grads than just these two men have so many Fr. Rudy stories, but in these two men I found more than enough evidence to once again reaffirm my belief that Elder High School is a lifelong place.
As the magnets that Elder’s alumni association prints state, “Tradition Never Graduates”.
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