Baltimore-Chesapeake Old Boys RFC
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Classic Old Boy Picture from the 70's... The two gentelman standing are Bud Aldrich, and Dennis Murphy, who is leaning with his back against the beer truck. The guys kneeling are (from left to right) Bill Motscheidler, John Metcalf, Joe Austin, (he worked for Natty Boh at the time), Burt Hopkins and Ingo Lahnemann. We know Burt liked to drink, but name me a rugby player who doesn't. We also know he was a hooker who didn't know how to hook the ball, but instead, he would kick the crap out of the ankles of his opposite. This picture is rumored to have been used by Natty Boh as a billboard at one time. We have learned that Bill Motscheidler is no longer with us, so we would like to extend our condolences. We do value our pioneers. On an up note - Ingo Lahnemann is well and living in Tunkhannock , Pa. He has expressed his appreciation at being contacted and looks forward to renewing old, and making new acquaintances. A blog from John Graham Wade, Thanks for all your effort pulling together the Old Boys for the Yeoman. It is always a pain in the ass but it was appreciated. Please forward this to the club. Hosting, Russians and Zimbabwe BC, if you didn’t host anybody then you missed out on one of the better experiences that rugby has to offer. They are grateful for the experience, a place to sleep and a hot shower. Your wives and girlfriends will like it because they will be treated with adoration and politeness by guys with accents. I did most of my hosting with Chesapeake from a row home in Rodgers Forge, with babies and a pregnant wife. One night I called my wife on the way home from a Tuesday practice and told her that I was bringing home two Russians for a few days. The marriage survived that and yours will too. The Russians were starving. The USSR had just fallen and their economy had crashed - for you young guys this was before the Russian economy was revived by organized crime. They didn’t speak English and ate a lot but it was a great time. Apart by being wildly impressed by my mansion and enormous wealth, there were actual KGB guys on the tour, and the club guys liked to drink and sing in Russian while the KGB glared at them. Another time I hosted these two guys from Zimbabwe (the former Belgian Congo for the Old Boy Warren Zevon fans). The majority of the guys on the team were white but the fact that the side was integrated was a big deal for the Zimbabweans since apartheid was still going strong next door in SA. I mention this for two important reasons: The first is that mentioning race issues is not very PC and I relish that. In fact if I could work bestiality or NAMBLA into this email like I just did I would. The second is that the white guys did not have relations with the native Zimbabwean women because Aid’s was raging out of control in the native population and the white male to female ratio was 15 to 1. So basically these guys had zero rap with babes. Our club’s solution to this was to take the entire Zimbabwe side to the Baja Beach Club on a Saturday night. The only woman who went with us was Nancy Graham, truly my better and gamer half, who was 8 months pregnant at the time. After getting the Zimbabweans past the Memory girls at the beer tub which was not easy, there entire club of 25 guys settled into a tightly bound group around my wife, who they knew, drinking rapidly and staring exasperatedly at the multitudes of mostly East Baltimore girls who were all 110 lbs, blond and aspired loftily to someday work the lucrative beer tub as a Memories girl. If these guys had only used those glorious accents instead of drinking dumbly in the middle of the room the girls would have found them. I once watched an Australian rugger pick up a waitress at the Hooters Inner Harbor (which I told him would be impossible), with nothing more than his accent. These guys didn’t give the local girls a chance. Look, I know individually our battered rugby faces are rugged and attractive but taken as a group rugby player look scary. As a glaring silent group it can be downright intimidating even to the likes of Patterson Park ’s most inebriated. Remember all they had to do was talk and they couldn’t pull that off. This went on for quite a while until right in front of us two of the aforementioned little 110 lb blonds began clocking the living crap out of each other. I reached into my wallet looking for $1 bills with the full intention of paying them to prolong this when I realized the two guys staying at my house were yelling “John, John” in my face except they pronounced it “Joan, Joan” which was confusing because Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” was cranked up and I am a little deaf anyway. It took me a moment to figure out that they were beyond confused at what was happening and they needed an explanation. So I just told them what it was. “They are just fighting over some guy”, who was in fact standing to one side of the brawl laughing. My house guests turned to their mates who all leaned in closely to hear and said with a kind of awed reverence, “The women in America actually fight over the men, here they fockin fight over us.” They never spoke to a single woman in that bar that night but they told once we got back out on the street that Baltimore, Maryland was a greater city than New York which was the only other place they had been in the US. The Yeoman I hosted two of the A side Yeoman and took them through a pub crawl of Annapolis where I live. I was pleased to note that both of my guys were fragged the next day in the game and had to be relieved early on due to an onset of the Irish flu. They were both extremely interested and somewhat relentless in getting the real dirt on what Americans actually think of Canada all the time reminding me that Canada is a world leader and greatly respected outside the US. Their big concern was we just dismiss Canada altogether from our thinking. I told them that I was not a good person to ask because I was a rabid fan of South park and at the same time I was really pissed that hockey just wasn’t produced as well for US TV as it was for Canadian TV, while the global warming thing had f---up my Banff ski trip two years ago and had they noticed how cheap our beer was compared to theirs? (Are you non-hosting mutts taking notes?) I explained that no one really cares what middle aged white guys think in the US anyway and that instead they should ask the opinion of the group who basically drives 100% of everything in the United States from foreign policy to our economy to what we watch on TV. In other words we need to query some teenage girls. Now, my daughter was in the City Dock area with a girl friend and they are both 18 so I called her to come meet us. We were in O’Brien’s where my daughter is not allowed to go because the bouncer could get the crap kicked out of him by her father so I told the Yeoman to sit tight and I would run outside and ask these girls who they could now see through the window what the girls thought of Canada. (Yes these girls left their friends to come stand outside O’Brien’s so I could ask them what they thought about Canada and this is the same sex that intimidated us in high school). I asked them what they thought about Canada. They had heard of Canada but were not quite sure what it was. Then my daughter’s girlfriend, whose father is in the Navy, we’ll call her Einsteinia, brightened and said, “Canada is America’s hat”. She did this by pretending like she was putting a hat on her head with both hands. A minute later back in the bar I got the “Well” from the Yeoman clearly digging the concept that America was run by teenage girls. “Dudes” I told them, “Canada is America’s hat.” Hence, a lesson for George W Bush. When middle aged white guys say anything, no matter how logical, people take them for blithering out of touch idiots. But when a cute American teenage girl says anything no matter how vacuous, people are riveted to the American Idol cosmic truth of it. The Pack I am proud of the regular side. I really am. You guys are fast and open and enthusiastic in your rugby. But where are the friggin big guys particularly in the front row? The only thing the Yeoman had to hang their hats on was their front row play Saturday. Now front row guys don’t get down on yourselves. I blame your coaches. Yes, I blame Jim Bonner and Steve Elliott. They are horrible examples to emulate if you are a tight five player but particularly if you play in the front row. I mean physically. Let me tell you right now both of these men are far less than they were when they were playing “A” side. Literally. They both weigh about 50% of what they did when they were kicking ass and taking names. And Elliott was a back! Stop buying into his “two glasses of wine, lo-carb, lo-fat diet” puffery. Did you see Bonner take off like a rabbit for 80 yards Saturday? He couldn’t do that when he was a brawny 8 man for the Chesapeake “A” side. He didn’t have to. We pushed their pack 80 yards back then. And laughed and passed a bottle of Schnapps around while we did it. Our back line was tanned rested and ready. You guys make your back line work like Chinese children making them carry an embarrassing amount of the load. Look, the loads carry the load. If you are a front row player get to the weight room, install a kegerator at your house and for god sakes have some vertebrae removed in your neck. Hank, will you not go to a practice and show them what a prop looks like? Pat McElroy looks just like he did before he was an Old Boy and he played in the back row. And you young guys please stop asking me if I am a prop. I am a wing forward. The highest paid professional rugby players are now tight heads. They demolish people for a living and look the part. Please for the love of the Almighty eat more. Mac Lastly, It was great to see Mike Mac again. Mac, I missed you, my kids missed you. We missed your little green dog who I am sure is dead now and I actually missed you being still pissed off about the merger. I love you man. By the way Mac also looks just like he did when he was playing. He is a lock. Not some slim Paris Hilton look alike lock but a puking before the game strict Irish diet lock. John Graham Here's an email I wanted to share with everyone from an old boy who played with us last weekend against Norfolk on March 24, 2007: Gentlemen- I would like to thank you for letting a 46 year old boy- with a plate in his head (thus helmet) play at hooker today- the front row I was in was great- it had the "old feel" of when I started in Scotland in '82 (we didn't know we were supposed to be bad so we hammered them). I loved it- If I can sneek out on a training night, I would like to run with ya'll for a little bit. To my Props- We scared the HELL out of them when we set up-- good lineout as well- Cheers Franco- by the way- glad you missed the match Wade- cause I was able to hook then- an it was soo cool- |
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Are you over the age of 35? Did you play for Baltimore RFC, Chesapeake RFC, BACON, or Towson Old Boys? Did you play before rubber scrum caps and protective gear were part of the regular uniform, and you couldn't leave the field unless you were unconscious? Do you miss watching or playing rugby? |
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Baltimore-Chesapeake RFC has a growing membership of Old Boys who want to be involved again on a social or athletic level. Contact Wade Gowl for a schedule and current event information. |
| Contact: Wade Gowl 3811 Jarrettsville Pike Jarrettsville, MD 21084 (410)557-8325 Building lifelong partnerships -- www.wadesworldllc.com |
 October 27, 2007 |
 November 7, 2004 |
 BC Old Boys first match |
 Chesapeake Old Boys 1998 |
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 October 1981 |
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