Photo provided The 1959 Marietta High football team, above, will be honored Friday at the Tigers’ home football game.

Marietta High is currently having a good season on the gridiron.

But the 1959 Tigers football team had a great one.

Several of those former orange and black players from 57 years ago will be honored at Friday night’s scheduled Marietta-Magnolia contest at Don Drumm Stadium.

“It’s also Senior Night then, so we’ll be recognized between the third and fourth quarter,” said 75-year Phil Offenberger. “After the game, we’ll be going to the restaurant at Quality Inn for a get-together, and gift bags and knickknacks will be given out.”

Offenberger said the group will also be meeting at a place to be announced for breakfast on Saturday.

Helping to organize the reunion have been current MHS head football coach Jason Schob, Bert Goddard, and Offenberger.

Along with Offenberger, the group is expected to include former Tiger players’ Bob Fogle, Bill Jones, Steve Miner, Bill “Butch” Wigton, Dave Schafer, Neil Gregory, Jim Farley, John Matthews, Steve Robinson, John Wilburn, Bob Warden, Dick Wendelken, Jeff Weihl, Frank Spriggs, and John Huston.

Dick Croy and Frank Spriggs will not be in attendance.

Steve and Joanna Gearheart (representing Frank Christie), Barb Hadley (representing John Hadley), and Rob Hadley (representing John Hadley) will also be there, as will be assistant coach Bill Bonar, manager, Ernie Wetz, public address announcer Bob Wark, and cheerleaders’ Judy Marple Burkhart, Phyllis Acker Miner, and Pinkie Hays Tucker.

Fans will be able to identify the 1959 team members by their orange t-shirts.

The ’59 roster also included Tom Baker, Gary Cheeseman, Jon Schafer, Larry Metts, Tag Wetz (manager), Dick McKenna (manager), Paul Casto (assistant), Chuck Stocker (assistant), and Ron Corey (assistant).

According to Offenberger, the deceased members of that storied Marietta football team are Bill Miner, Bill Forte, Ed Crumbley, Bart Simon, Fred Farley (older brother of Jim), Bill Baker, Fred Gall, Larry Slack, Jim Apple, Bob Beaver, Paul Sewell, John “Digger” Hadley, head coach Scotty Hamilton, and Christie.

According to the late, legendary Marietta Times sports editor/scribe Bill Robinson, the 1959 MHS football squad “had it all” — speed, power, and savvy. Plus, the Tigers just refused to lose.

Coached by Hamilton, Central Ohio League (COL) champion MHS was undefeated that season with a 9-0 record. The Tigers finished sixth in the state in the AP rankings.

MHS averaged 35 points and 300 yards of total offense a game. The defense allowed the opposition an average of only nine points per contest.

Offenberger, an 18-year-old senior middle linebacker back then (He was also Christie’s backup at QB.), was one of four players on the team to earn All-Ohio recognition. Six-foot-three, 210-pound Jim Farley (tackle), Gregory (guard), and Christie (quarterback) were the other honorees.

Robinson wrote that “there were several others of All-Ohio caliber.”

Farley was recently inducted into high school’s Hall of Fame.

“That was just the greatest year and the greatest team,” Farley said. “We had a great player for every position.

“The whole community was behind us, and the fans were just great. We usually had 3,000 or more at all of our home games.”

In Marietta’s season finale on the evening of Friday, Nov. 13, 1959, it blanked Newark, 14-0, in front of some 5,000 “hysterical fans” (as Robinson wrote) at Don Drumm Stadium (then called Municipal Stadium). Locally that season, the Tigers defeated Williamstown 64-28 and Belpre 30-8.

Interestingly, the year before, “MHS football was in ashes,” Robinson wrote. The Tigers started off 0-2 but then won six of their last eight games to set the stage for the 1959 fall campaign.

According to Robinson, that season “produced 50-car caravans to away games and SRO crowds at Municipal Stadium.

“We were a together team,” Offenberger recalled.

“We palled together, did things together, and even today, we still stay in contact.”

Offenberger paused and smiled.

“The 1959 season, it went really great,” he said.