By David Peck
When it was new, it was the envy of basketball fans throughout the Big Horn Basin. It’s gleaming hardwood floor has seen many a classic battle. Later, the aging facility with its tight baselines and sidelines gave its home teams a decided advantage.
But Friday night, the last scheduled varsity high school basketball game will be played at the venerable Rocky Mountain High School – formerly the Byron High School – Gym.
A special ceremony will be held at halftime of the boys game between the Rocky Mountain Grizzlies and the Greybull Buffaloes, and all members of the seven state championship teams from Byron High School – five boys basketball teams, one girls basketball team and one volleyball team – are invited to attend and be recognized during the brief event.
The teams to be recognized Friday include Coach Wilford Mower’s Class B state title teams from 1948-50, Coach Bob Doerr’s Class B title teams from 1969-70, the Class C state championship girls basketball team from 1979 and the Class C state title volleyball squad from the fall of 1979.
There have also been four Rocky Mountain High School state championship teams: the 1993 girls team and the 1995, 1997 and 1998 boys teams.
The Greybull-Rocky action begins Friday at 2:30 p.m. with the junior varsity girls game, followed by the JV boys at 4 p.m. and the girls varsity at 5:30. Senior Night introductions will be held following the girls varsity game, and the boys varsity is scheduled to tip off at 7 p.m., with the gymnasium ceremony at halftime.
Actually, there are two more high school games scheduled at the 73-year-old RMHS Gym: freshman games Monday at 7 p.m. (Riverside) and Tuesday at 7:30 (Powell), but Friday’s games complete the varsity home schedule.
Gym history
Byron High School built its state-of-the-art gym in the fall of 1936, and it was ready for activities in January of 1937.
The Sept. 3, 1936, edition of the Lovell Chronicle reported:
“Byron is to have one of the largest and most modern gymnasiums in northern Wyoming, according to a statement from Architect C.C. Cohagen, who has drawn up the plans for the new combination gymnasium-auditorium addition to the Byron High School. The floor dimensions will be 56 by 94 feet, Mr. Cohagen said, with the playing surface of 50 by 84 feet.”
The article said that the cost of the gym project was $36,000 and that bids were let the previous week and work started on Friday, Aug. 28.
“General construction was awarded to Charles M. Smith of Thermopolis at $31,703; the plumbing and heating to Green Company of Lovell, at $3,177, and the wiring to J.A. Faught of Lovell at $1,151.
“An election authorizing the sale of bonds for the project was voted on by electors of school district No. 1 Monday.”
Construction continued throughout the fall and into the winter, and young Norma Abraham, attending second grade with her twin sister, Naomi, well remembers the disruption the construction caused in the second-grade classroom next door.
“The buzz saws and the noise was annoying, that’s why I remember it so well,” said Norma, now Norma Perkins. “It was next to our second-grade room.
“It was supposed to be one of the very best gyms at the time, and it served for a lot of years.”
The new gym was ready in late January of 1937, and the Chronicle reported on Jan. 28 that the gym was nearing completion with a basketball game and later a dance scheduled for the new facility.
“The erection of this building, which was begun last August, fills a long-felt need in the Byron community,” the Chronicle reported. “It will serve not only as a basketball court, but its arrangement and large amount of wall space make possible its utilization for a great many games such as handball, tennis, badminton and others, which usually call for special courts.
“An inspection of the gym reveals that one of its most up-to-date features is the complete utilization of space. Built-in seats on one side will accommodate 600 spectators, with an excellent view of the playing court from any seat. With bleachers placed on the other side and ends, it is estimated that 2,000 people could be seated. The floor measures 76 by 117 feet, making possible a playing court of 44 by 82 feet.”
According to the Chronicle and the BHS student newspaper, the first event at the new gym was the Byron-Thermopolis basketball game on Saturday, Jan. 30, 1937. The school paper reported: “Saturday night, January 30, the new $36,000 Byron Gymnasium will be unofficially opened with a basketball game between the Thermopolis Bobcats and the Byron Eagles. Interest in the new building, added to the fact that it is the first game in Byron this season, will probably bring out one of the largest crowds ever to be assembled in Byron.”
Home games were also scheduled for Monday and Wednesday nights, Feb. 1 and 3, according to the school paper – Greybull on Monday and Cowley on Wednesday.
The Thursday, Feb. 4, edition of the Chronicle reported that Thermop won the inaugural game at the new gym, although no score was given. The paper did report that the BHS pep squad entertained the two basketball teams at a party following the game and that the BHS faculty was also invited.
“After dancing, games and refreshments filled the remainder of the evening,” the Chronicle reported. Members of the event committee included pep squad president Pearl Anderson, Rosy Pryde, Marjorie Sessions, Artelle Egan, Marybelle Cozzens, Vera Powelson, Nona Deaton, Evelyn Sessions, Luneata Wardell, LaRue Snell, Phyllis Sessions, Gwen Sessions, Cleo Jensen, Dorothy Snyder, Afton Jones and Geneva Sessions.
The Chronicle reported that Greybull beat Byron 33-21 in the Feb. 1 contest, calling the game “the most exciting game of the season.” The game was tied in the third quarter, but Greybull pulled away in the fourth, according to the article.
The story also reported that the new gym would be “formally opened” with a dance on Friday, Feb. 5, with music provided by the Hip Partington Orchestra of Cowley.
Memories
Bob Doerr, who coached the Byron Eagles for many years and won back-to-back titles in 1969 and ’70, remembers that the gym was one of the finest facilities in the area and often hosted district tournaments. The balcony was added to provide more seating for the tournaments, he said.
For many years, there was no seating on the east side of the gym, with just the players and the scorer’s table on that side of the floor, Doerr said. A 1943 Lovell High School graduate, he said he first played in the “new” Byron gym when he was in junior high.
The multi-purpose facility had a stage on the north side of the gym where the hallway to the main office and the athletic director’s office is today. The locker rooms were under the seats on the west side of the gym, Doerr said. An outside staircase in the northwest corners of the building took spectators to the top of the seats, he recalled.
Originally, the gym interior featured the red bricks of the building’s exterior, but later bricks were painted and plastered over in white, and acoustic tiles were added to help with the facility’s sound quality.
Over the years, the gym was modified. The balcony was built, a new school sprang up around the gym, and when the new auditorium was constructed at the high school, the stage was removed and the gym remodeled.
The original wood floor remains, however.
“It’s a good floor. It has a pretty good spring to it,” RMHS Athletic Director Dave Beemer said during a tour of the gym with Doerr Tuesday. “It’s regulation width and two feet short of regulation length at 86 feet. They built floors really well and kept ‘em up.”
Beemer recalls a state-of-the-art scoreboard hanging in the middle of the gym for many years.
A tough place
As other schools built new, larger gymnasiums, Byron High School and later Rocky Mountain High School still played in the close quarters of the aging gym, which became known as a lion’s den for visiting teams.
Longtime RMHS coach Tim Winland, now the principal, who coached the Grizzlies to three state titles in the mid to late 90s, said players enjoyed playing on the floor, which had good spring and “not a lot of dead spots.”
Winland recalled the floor being completely re-sanded, repainted and refinished in the mid-90s, and the contractor said at the time that it was the last time the floor could take a major reworking due to the thinning boards.
“We really liked playing on it,” Winland said. “Our maintenance crew and our custodians have done a good job refinishing it over the years. They’ve taken good care of it.”
The gym was always a tough place for visiting teams to play, Winland said, not only because of the quality of the teams the Eagles and Grizzlies put on the floor but also because of the gym’s tight dimensions, with very little room on each end of the court and on the sidelines.
“The walls and fans are so tight, it almost feels like they’re on top of the players,” he said. “When it’s packed, it’s really loud, and it’s hard to hear. Officials have a tight space to work in, and games are physical in the heat of battle.
“There’s not as much room to cover when you press. When you practice on it, you don’t notice it, but opposing teams have to adjust to it. They try to spread their offense, but there isn’t the space to do it. You can cover the floor easier and contest shots and passing lanes easier.”
Did Rocky coaches build strategy around their cozy quarters?
“I did,” Winland said. “If I was under-matched, especially against Lovell and Wyoming Indian, our best chance was on our home floor. We didn’t have to cover as much of the floor to guard their best players. We could play a zone at home that we would never play on the road and apply pressure, too. We could be undermanned and still do those things effectively.”
Both Winland and Doerr said they have many fond memories of coaching in the gym.
“All of the Lovell games were memorable in their own right,” Winland said. “People would try to get into the (packed) gym. When Terry Hopkin was coaching at Riverside, we had some good battles, and with Wyoming Indian we had a few games where we would either beat them or play them really tough.
“We even beat Cody once at home. It was exciting for us to get a chance to play a 4A team in our gym.”
The Greybull Buffs will be the final varsity opponent at the 73-year-old gym in Byron this Friday night, with play moving to the new Rocky Mountain junior-senior high school in Cowley next season. Coaches and fans alike are hoping that lasting memories will be made, once again, Friday night.