WESTWOOD—With this photograph we go back 90 years to Westwood High School’s football team of the 1932 season. What makes this one extra special is that the individual players signed it — and we are loving those nicknames, like Larry “Stud” Greenip, second from left in the top row, and Quested “Beef” Meisten, team captain, at bottom center.
The boys had pretty good handwriting back in that era when penmanship was rigorously taught as part of the school curriculum.
Meisten and Greenip were among seven 1931 lettermen who returned for the 1932 season. Others included Fred Sturm, Frank Olsen, Alfred Lillienfeld, Stephen Straub, and Ralph “Suede” Anderson. The boys were coached by Charles Lucid, pictured at far right in the top row. Lucid was in his second year as athletic director of the high school. He lived in Westwood with his wife and two sons. The family had just taken a big trip over the summer, motoring across America to see the 1932 Summer Olympics held in Los Angeles.
When this photo was taken, Westwood High School was located at the corner of Third Avenue and Mill Street where there are now townhouses. The sports fields were located a little ways south on Third Avenue, where the Westwood Regional Middle School (formerly Ketler Elementary, built in 1952) stands now.
While these days the Westwood Regional School District is limited to kids from Westwood and the Township of Washington, the structure was different in the 1930s. Back then, the only high schools in the Pascack Valley were Westwood and Park Ridge, so Westwood High would have accepted students from all surrounding towns.
The 1932 season started out rough, but Lucid’s crew got it together halfway through. In the first three games, they lost to Fort Lee, 12-0, Pearl River, 7-0, and then Teaneck, 14-0. Perhaps something clicked at that point, because they went on to defeat Park Ridge, 19-0, Butler, 20-0, Spring Valley, 33-0, and Hasbrouck Heights, 10-0. It was a season of shutouts, but in the end Westwood had found itself on the right side of them. In the Hasbrouck Heights game, Westwood’s Frankie Olson scored the first field goal of the Bergen County season.
One of the most interesting elements of old sports photos is always the uniforms. Note the minimal padding, the lack of player numbers on the shirts, as well as how plain the uniforms are compared to those you see today.
Also, back in 1932 the team would still have been wearing leather helmets, if they wore them at all. Even in professional football helmets were considered optional throughout the 1930s. Plastic helmets were not invented until 1939.
Kristin Beuscher, a former editor of Pascack Press, is president of Pascack Historical Society in Park Ridge and edits its quarterly members’ newsletter, Relics.