Messages from select founders: Bob Pace October 23, 2010 It is a Saturday afternoon in Cape Town, South Africa and I have been nostalgic thinking about the three wonderful years I spent in the USA and wondered what had happened to the rugby teams that I had tried to start at Indiana University in 1962 and at U of C in 1963. So I googled both and to my surprise I am now informed that not only do the rugby clubs at both still exist but appear to be flourishing. I went to IU as a graduate law student from the Univ of Stellenbosch in Sept of 1961 and as I loved rugby and had played the game for 12 yearsI wanted to continue playing in USA. But no team existed at IU and when I tried to get involved in the IU Football program I learned that no graduate could play football at college level. So in the fall of 1962 , with the arrival of John Schofield, a scrumhalf from Durham in England, we decided to try and start a rugby team. With so many graduate students at IU, many of whom had played college football as undergraduates and were longing to play a contact sport, recruiting was easy and with the aid of training movies,obtained from the British consulate, and on field coaching we soon had a team and with great optimism we challenged Notre Dame to a game. With John at scrumhalf and me at flyhalf, we won the very first scrum of the game and I got a gap and scored the first try. It was the only scrum that we won that day and it was the only ball that we had that afternoon-needless to say ND gave us a beating. But it was a start. During that fall and in the spring we managed several games against St Louis (the Univ and a semi pro side called The Bombers) both at home and away and a return game against ND and a game against Michigan State.Our home games were played on the old football field in the middle of the campus and the football coach gave us some old crimson football jerseys to play our games.I see from the website that the IU team is highly rated and wearing better jerseys than we had. In Sept of 1963 I went to the law school at U of Chicago and found there was no rugby team there. So I continued to play for IU in that fall but having made enquiries at the law school and discovering that there was some enthusiasm for a rugby team (you may or may not know that at that time football was not played at U of C so rugby seemed like a good idea). So with the help of various other existing rugby clubs at Wisconsin, Michigan, St Louis, and IU, I organised a mini rugby tournament for a Saturday afternoon in Mid November to be played on the old U of C football field next to the field house with the four aforementioned teams participating. At the end of the afternoon, I had about 25 recruits...several from the law school. And, we started playing rugby at U of C. In Feb 1964, U of C together with other rugby clubs in the region including universities of Wisconsin, Michigan, and Indiana created and founded the Mid-west Rugby union with Vic Hilarov as our president and this union organised a big rugby tournament in Chicago during April at which about 8 teams participated. During that spring, we played games against Wisconsin, Michigan, Palmer College (which had a very good side what with Australian, New Zealand, and South African rugby players all aspiring to become chiropracters-there seems to be some irony in there), the Chicago Lions from North Chicago, and Illinois. During the easter break, I organised a rugby tour to the East with an invitational side comprising U of C, Indiana, and Palmer college players. We had games against Duke, U of V, Johns Hopkins, and the New York rugby club. I see in your website that the U of Chicago rugby club has existed from 1933 but it may have gone into hibernation because of the 2nd WW and thereafter. Unfortunately, it was not active when I arrived there in 1963. At that time we did not have rugby jerseys so we borrowed white football jerseys from the old lockers in the field house because, of course, U of C had no football team. I am pleased to see that you now have striking rugby jerseys - far better than what we played in. Kind regards Robert Pace Bob Pace October 23, 2010 I am forwarding to you a copy of my email to the U of Chicago rugby club which contains details of my involvement with the founding of the rugby clubs at both IU and U of C. I did not realise that the IU rugby club was not just still in existence but is flourishing. I recently met a student from IU who had come to Cape Town for a semester at the Univ of Cape Town and I asked him whether the rugby team still existed and he said he knew nothing about it so I decided that my efforts in 1962 -63 had been shortlived. Great was my joy when I tried to Google both IU and U of C RUGBY today to find that both rugby clubs are still in existence. I am particularly proud to see how well your (our??) team is doing considering that the very first game we ever played in 1962 (against Notre Dame) although we scored the first try we lost rather badly -I think the score was about 25 to 5 with the try at that time counting 3 points. I don't know how much of the first year of the club's history you have or even whether it is important but I could let you have more information if you are interested. John Schofield who assisted me in the founding of the club in 1962 recently visited me in Cape Town and we spent quite a while reminiscing about our team at IU ( we visited the Univ of Stellenbosch where I had played my rugby whilst doing my law degree and which is probably one of the best rugby clubs in the world so you will realise that rugby was a big part of our discussions whilst he was here). Although he was a professor in Victoria BC in Canada he also had lost touch with the progress of IU rugby and we speculated as to its status. Had we but googled at that time we would have had much more to have enjoyed. Congratulations on the team's achievements and whenever you play against ND remind the team that ND is the team to beat as we were not able to do so in the early days. Kind regards, Robert Pace LL.M at IU Law School, May 1963 Bob Pace October 25, 2010 Thanks for your prompt reply and the good news that you beat the Irish-not once but TWICE. Great!!!!! I certainly do fondly remember Phil Bryant. He knew nothing about the game but was a quick learner. If you ever see him tell him Hi! Besides the games against ND the really tough games were against the St Louis Bombers-semi pro with a sponsor and tough, hard working men not the softies of the college milieu. Ask him if he agrees and if he remembers them. Our first game against them in St Louis was really hard and they beat us quite soundly but we put up a good fight. Our return game at IU was a far better effort and we almost beat them. I think we may have lost about 11-8. I have a fair amount of info from our first year (1962-1963) including newspaper clippings and a newspaper photo of the team. If you are interested and want it for your archives or any other purpose I can send you copies. Apropos your earlier email, I would love to be involved with IU rugby but re your question as to my whereabouts, I am in Cape Town, South Africa, some 10 000 miles from Bloomington and about 16 hours flying time from there. And of course currency wise our Rand is very weak against the Dollar so I have to spend R7,00 to buy $1,00. Thus a trip to IU for the old boys weekend is probably out of the question. But if there are any old boys from 1962-1963 please convey my very best wishes and my regrets of not being able to be there. I am going to forward these emails to John Schofield in Canada who asissted me in the founding of the club in 1962 and who captained the team in 1963-1964. I am sure that he will be as pleased as I am about the great heights that you guys have achieved and still will. Please keep me in the loop. Kind regards, Robert( or Bob as I then was known) Michael Sharwood October 27, 2010 The below string of emails found their way to me. For you alumni records I am Michael Sharwood (formerly Schaiowitz) and a member of the original IU Rugby team along with Bob Pace, John Schofield and the others, playing as Hooker. I left IU at the end of 1963 to work in BC Canada from where I ended up In Australia in 1965 where I still live (I was originally from South Africa) in Sydney. My best wishes to you both and of course to the team. I have managed to dig up an old photo of what from memory was the very first team at our first game in Notre Dame. Regards Michael Sharwood Bob Pace August 14, 2012 Hi Phil, John, Michael, Joe , Issy and the rest, I hope y'all can rememder the sequence of the matches we played in 1962 and 1963. As I remember it we played as a opener at ND and we got drilled - but we got the first try. Then we played St Louis Univ at home and again we lost. We must have been impressive but the St Louis Univ then sent a 2nd team to us and we beat them. I have some photographs of this match but I dont think I have no inkling to scan the photos- just a pity for even Issy, John, Mike, Phil, and Joe appear. I will have to bring it with me. Then,John, I cannot remember but I think some team from Michigan Univ came to play us. Then we played some rugby in the old fieldhouse and the snow was not thick, we played on the field then it was time for the BOMBERS- and that was a rude awakening-but our team was better. I think Pete Mitchell broke a leg in that match and although we got beaten (I think it 25-5) we got much better in the return game - we lost that game 11-8. Somewhere we got to ND - did we play them again? The memory does fade. Regards, Bob Last Updated 1-12-2012