Lower Dauphin Wrestling: An Uncommon Heritage 1960-2024

Why a book about wrestling in a high school? Why a book about a sport that at the varsity level lasts only six minutes-or less, if there is a pin?

This is that book, and six minutes into it you will see why

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Written by one who was intrigued by the quiet intensity of the young wrestlers in her English class-boys from a wide spectrum, some with heavy home burdens, this author (who had never seen a wrestling match) soon learned a lot about wrestling, as will the reader.

In 1960 Lower Dauphin High School, seated in quiet farmland only twenty minutes from the state's capital city, was composed of students from one small town and four surrounding townships-all rural. Very few of the new students yet knew any of the other students who would become their teammates. And the former home town high school would be losing its sports players to the new jointure. This was a potential nightmare-your senior year and you are surrounded by mainly strangers-some from a power house in football and the other with many years' experience as "a wrestling school."

Sixty years later, Lower Dauphin High School is the proof of such success. And with that has come An Uncommon Heritage.

Lower Dauphin Wrestling: An Uncommon Heritage does not provide a list, guide, or an instruction book on "how to be a wrestler." What we do have, however, are adults who encouraged young men to find something in the sport of wrestling that they had not found elsewhere and to guide them to use the skills that wrestling provides, including the opportunity for positive changes and for opening many doors, beginning in competition and ending in lifelong friendships.

More particularly, the human stories not widely known deserve to be seen in retrospective daylight. The triumphs and defeats of the wrestling mat are, in many cases, not even the most compelling part of the story. The athletes of these pages climbed a mountain of effort, emotion, and sacrifice before ever stepping onto the mat or hearing a referee's whistle. And excelled!