A Town Divided Against Itself

In 1980 Taft and Garfield merged to become Hamilton High School, with an enrollment of 2,054, in the building that was formerly Taft High. Garfield is now a junior high school.

Marvin McCollum officially remains the coach at Hamilton, although he has been on sick leave since last September and last week announced plans to retire in June. Don Gillespie continued working as a vocational coordinator in Hamilton until December 1981, when he left to take a job as government rep for a company in Cincinnati. Martin Protzman is trying to get on the faculty of Hamilton High.

Scott Grevey went on to play basketball, though not as a star, at Pitt, where he's now a senior. Andy Kolesar graduated last spring from VMI, where he was captain of the basketball team and a two-time Academic All-America, and is now doing graduate work in engineering at Ohio State.

None of the Garfield starters went on to college. Robbie Hodge, who still lives in Hamilton, is a senior production specialist for Boise Cascade Corp. He's still friends with Tony McCoy, who's in the Army.

Last year, in its first season after the unification, Hamilton's basketball team finished the season with a 25-1 record, losing in the regional final of the state AAA tournament.