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Optimists opener was rained out. Two days later they played it against Brantford at temperatures that would freeze a brass monkey in the batter‘s box. Resultingly, there were more people in the press box than in the stands. Now Sheppard is no Jack Nicklaus (or should I say Tom Watson) but because the moon‘s gravity is one/sixth that of earth, his Titleist felt no compelling urge to come down in a barren crator before it had to. At the time, everyone on earth chuckled at the mischieâ€" vous stunt, but now, a decade later, we‘ve found Out that someone was not amused. No, not Queen Victoria, Mother Nature. And around here the ones singing the blues most are the local athletes, more specifically the Interâ€"County Tigers, Expos and Optimists, the Interâ€"City CHYM‘rs and above all the weekend golfer. Do you know that it has rained at least a part of every weekend since April 14? Every game I‘ve covered, the topic always comes around to the weather. Baseball, softball, even the track meet last week have all been adversely affected. Allan Sheppard, you‘re to blame. Blame for what? For causing without a doubt the worst spring of weather Waterioo has had since Sheppard, the gallavanting U.S. asâ€" tronaut, made his muchâ€"publicized trip into space many moans (oh brother) ago. Not his first trip to the stars almost two decades ago. No, I mean the one in 1969 where he walked on the Earth‘s moon, the one with the big smile. + It was bad enough that predecessors Armstrong, Aldrin et al stirred the virgin surface one year earlier, but Sheppard had the audacity to sneak a collapsible sixâ€"iron into his buiky space suit, took it out on the moon, and whacked the ball about four and a half miles before it settled. Page 12 â€" Waterloo Chronicle, wm May 30, 1979 ai»s for the ;’ _1 s Tez O e 5oc e l ie Cy ® l t t P /T & 0 Reach ULTRA SEC 5Bs foarthi Hasn‘t been that long since the CHYM‘rs played though. In fact, it was 2:30 a.m. Monday morning in St. Thomas when they put the Cambridge Gores to bed. Reason â€" the tourney was delayed two days because of â€" you guessed it â€" precipitation. _ How do you think the Expos feel? Haven‘t played a game yet and it‘s June already. Opener cancelled last week when patches of Bechtel looked like Florida everglades. Before the juniors hit the field Saturday, manager Nels Grigg will probably have to explain the rules of the games to his starting nine, it‘s been so long since they‘ve played. Dream on Leo. It‘s not good baseball that draws fans to Bechtel. Here in Waterloo you have to have 40 days of rays to get the crowd out. One cumulus cloud on the horizon and there is a mad panic to the bomb shelters. So no wonder only 75 or so turned out Sunday against Windsor, what with the altoâ€"nimbus layers threatening. You‘ve heard of fairâ€" weather friends? In this town we‘re known as fairâ€"weather fanatics. ‘"Give us sun or give us none,"" is our metto to the man who hands out the weather. â€" The midgets were rained out again two nights ago, makâ€" ing it almost impossible to get in the "groove‘"‘ so to speak. Tigers were no better off as they opened in Stratford last week. General manager Champ Glassford had four coffees before game time, not an easy feat considering Ne had inchâ€" thick leather gloves on while drinking them. And Tiger P.A. announcer Bob Hannah was wellâ€"equipped in his snowâ€" mobile attire. Looked funny, but he was the only one at Naâ€" tional Stadium with any brains. â€" © \~ _ _ Tigers luck did not improve when they returned home. About 60 people turnedâ€"out in the meatâ€"locker Wednesday it Bechtel as Tigers dumped London 11â€"1, but after the game coach Leo DeRocher was bubbly. ‘"Maybe a score like this will bring the fans out."‘ It doesn‘t take a jogfree expert to figure out that since man wasn‘t satisfied with playing in his own backyards Mother Nature has decided to dot them with unplayablé lies. Thanks for nothing, you crumbun Allan Sheppard. You might have thought your stunt was hilarious, but there are plenty of athletes around here who don‘t consider it a laughâ€" ing matter. In fact. it makes one sick(s) of the gravity of the si tion. 5 And the reason? When Allan Sheppard did hit variation of the Led Zeppelin hit by playing Fairway to heaven, he really blew it. He disturbed the Royal and Ancient St. Peters sandâ€" traps, which in turn affected our ocean tides, which in turn affected the evaporation rate, the number of dust particles in the air (Sheppard took a big divot) the amount of moisâ€" ture the upper stratosphere here will hold, and over a 10â€" year cycle, the amount of water our pasture playgrounds won‘t hold. * Correspondent Ken Buckley walked in Monday with the CHYM‘r story. He hadn‘t been to bed since Saturday and his eyes looked like actionâ€"trak of a screaming line drive. Ag this weatherâ€"the slits, Ken? & " _ The hardest hit though are the weekend golfers, m whom never see the sun between 9â€"5 during the week. Haâ€" ven‘t seen it much on weekends since the links opened either. Drowned rats have a more pleasant existence. â€" When I read the coâ€" lumn in the paper on Wednesday. I felt I had done the right thing, yet I was a little disappointed that I had to resort to neâ€" gative reporting to get So with those thoughts preying heavily on my mind, I quite uncharacâ€" teristically last Tuesday wrote a bitchy column, complaining about my bad treatment by those bullies, and a few others as well. That incident brought to the surface several inâ€" stances in the past where I‘ve been treated like a secondâ€"class reporter just. because the Waâ€" terloo Chronicle is not the bestâ€"known newspaper in the world. By Rick Campbell Chronicle Sports Editor Dear Mom. Last week I was in an especially good mood until Monday night when some nasty men in Stratâ€" ford wouldn‘t let me sit in their pressbox to watch the Waterloo Tigers play baseball. So Therek Who cares? Champ Glassford, that‘s who! Have to close now, I‘ve got 53.998 others to work on See Mom. someone in this city does care Merle (Champ) Glassâ€" ford, Waterloo Tiger genâ€" eral manager, was so moved by my predicaâ€" ment in Stratford that he personally drew up a sign that was put in front of the best seat in the pressâ€" box at Bechtel Park. It said that seat was r served for me, and no on! else. Not someone fro the Stratford paper. nor the Kitchenerâ€"Waterloo Record. Nor the New York Times ‘‘The Waterloo Chroniâ€" cle is this city‘s newspaper. and we want to treat its people right." said Glassford. And guess what Mom. In this city of 54,000, there was at least one person who agreed with my point across. But most important. I stuck to my guns and got what I wanted off my chest. Love Ricky