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October 24, 2012

Kids pull a fast one to get in to witness heartbreaker

By Judge Doyle Arge The Norman Transcript

NORMAN — Editor’s note:This is one in a continuing series of reader-written stories about the Sooners and Irish. This item first appeared the The Transcript’s publication “Glory Days” on Sept. 3, 2010.

My most memorable experience is not only from the game, but how my friends and I got into the stadium.

Bill Long, Tom Edwards and I were approximately 10 years old as we walked to the stadium on Saturday, Nov. 16, 1957, to watch OU play Notre Dame.

During that era, students could purchase a ticket for $1 to sit in the bleachers in the south end zone. However, we found that OU had sold all tickets for the game and, thus, no student tickets were available.

We explored all options trying to get into the stadium, including a method we had used in the past of climbing the approximate 10- to 15-foot-high chain link fence that ran the entire length of the south end zone bleachers.

This time, though, OU had three guards patrolling the fence, instead of the usual one, and thus there was no chance we could scale the fence and get into the stadium before being caught.

We thought we were out of options as we stood on the north side of the stadium watching people enter, when Bill suddenly told us to follow him. He cut in front of a couple who were entering the stadium, and as he approached the ticket taker, he pointed behind him and said that his parents had his ticket.

Tom and I did the same.

When the ticket taker asked the man behind us for our tickets, we ran. The security guard who chased us was no match. We ran up a ramp in the northwest corner of the stadium and blended in with the crowd. We watched the security guard come up the ramp and look around for us, before he gave up and went back under the stadium.

We made our way to the south end zone, where we stood the entire game. We saw Notre Dame make that long drive in the closing minutes, to win the game 7-0, ending OU’s 47-game winning streak.

The crowd was stunned and I know I wasn’t alone as I stood there with tears running down my cheeks long after the game was over.

I still despise Notre Dame.

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