Gifts of Memory

It's been more than 40 years since the scrappy Borger High Bulldogs proudly represented their little West Texas oilfield town in the Texas high school football playoffs.

Since then, their trophies have been lost and their legacy forgotten by the town that has never had another team go that far. Their beloved coach was named to the Texas high school hall of fame in honor of his outstanding career a couple of years ago, but recent attempts to name the Bulldog stadium or playing field in his honor were rebuffed by the school board.

El Jefe grew up during that era and was inspired to write a book for himself and his classmates that would keep the memory of those days alive for the future. A couple of months ago, I posted about our trip to Borger where he spent a couple of days researching old newspapers to complete the project. My role was to publish this little opus, which thanks to my experience with the RevGals Advent and Ordinary Time devotional books, I did using the Lulu print-on-demand service. Thanks, RevGals!
Now it is finished! The new link on the sidebar takes you the website where it can be ordered. Mayfield's Borger Bulldogs may never make the New York Times Best-seller list, but the emails and phone calls El Jefe has been receiving confirm that the book has touched the hearts of many of his classmates and members of the teams of that day.

Fond memories are one of God' great gifts, and it is the first part of gift El Jefe has given to those who share his experiences growing up in his old hometown this Christmas season as they get a chance to relive their days of glory on the gridiron and share them with children and grandchildren.

The second part of the gift is that all profits from the sale of the books will be given to a scholarship for the Borger High School honoring the top scholar-athlete of each graduating class--a scholarship El Jefe established a number of years ago in memory of one of his good friend, a football star on the Bulldog team who graduated from Rice and became an attorney before his untimely death from cancer.

Sales so far: 53, but who's counting?