Celebrating a Century of the Ramly Art
of Wrestling at Rose Hill
by Lou DiGiorno ’88, School Historian
The 1974-1975 year was important in the history of Prep
wrestling. With faculty members Fr. Russell Sloun, SJ and
Mr. Daniel Gurfein as program moderators, Coach Steven
Corso, Class of 1972, would send a Prep team of thirty to
the mats for the first time in the modern era. Mr. Gurfein
had wrestled on his college team and Coach Corso —
who also had some wrestling experience — was the
defensive coach for the freshman football squad at the
time. Those thirty intrepid, mid-70s Prepsters would
wrestle on both the varsity and junior varsity levels and
in twelve weight divisions that year. Seniors John Renzulli
and Mike O’Brien stepped up and served as team captains
for the first Prep grapplers of the Shea Hall years.
During WWI, sports programs continued as best they
could even as wartime austerity measures began to be
felt at Rose Hill. But since its matches depended on
individuals as opposed to rosters of positioned players,
organized wrestling was seen as another opportunity for
physical training for both the Prep boys and for those
remaining college athletes who found themselves
displaced as other teams were temporarily suspended.
And so, a hundred years ago, on February 7, 1918, in the
very first issue of the Fordham Ram, the call went out:
“The greatest trainer we ever had is taking up a wrestling
team. Jake isn’t a bit wrong at that. There is some splendid
material in the College and Prep, and the venture should
prove a pronounced success. Luck to you, Jake!”
The Jake referred to is Coach Jake Weber, “The Diminutive
Dutchman,” longtime Rose Hill trainer, founder and first
coach of Fordham wrestling, a legend in the sporting
world and a beloved part of the Rose Hill athletic scene
during the first half of the 20th century. Coach Weber
arrived at Fordham in 1907 to work with the track and
field team.
Like so many of the greats in our school’s history, it
appears that Coach Weber was a quite the character —he
called his barber’s chair in the basement of the Rose Hill
Gym his “office”, as a rule would never reveal his age, and
was given to fabulous yarns — including stories of the
back alley wrestling [and backfield cattle-wrestling!] days
of his youth. He was never shy about his love of Fordham
and was always willing to talk about the pantheon of
maroon athletes with whom he had worked generation
after generation. Among his favorites was Frankie Frisch,
“The Fordham Flash,” Prep Class of 1916. In Coach
Weber’s own words: "There never was an athlete like
Frisch. He could do anything,”
"We Want Jake"
For over three decades, no Fordham athletic banquet,
gathering or reunion could proceed without a resounding
chorus of “We want Jake!” and he was more than happy
to regale his audiences with “a few thousand well-chosen
words.” Sure he had a stutter, but he was far too tough to
ever let it get in the way of a good story.
But aside from his more than thirty years of service in
the Bronx, Coach Weber also rose to international
prominence as a six-time Olympic trainer, accompanying
the American track and field teams to the 1920, 1924,
1928, 1932, 1936 and 1948 games. As was noted at his
induction into the Fordham University Athletics Hall of
Fame, “he also trained America's Davis Cup tennis team
and Charlie Paddock, the 'World's Fastest Human'. The
legendary [Finnish runner] Paavo Nurmi would let no
American hands touch him except those of Jake Weber.
He was the best athletic trainer in America for the better
part of his 80 years of life... and was truly a Fordham
sports immortal.”
In other words, the Fordham Prep wrestling team can
boast proudly of their pedigree.
It has been a century since Prep boys first answered
Coach Jake’s call and hit the mats. Through the decades,
the program has waned and waxed — reduced to an
informal intramural club in the 1940s, and even relegated
to a component of the phys ed curriculum in the years
that followed. Since 1974, however, Prep grapplers have
been fulfilling Coach Weber’s wartime wish, carrying on a
tradition that was born during the WWI of a spirit of
victory.
As for Coach Weber, he retired in 1942 and passed away
on November 11, 1950. He was laid to rest in Woodlawn
Cemetery in a mausoleum he had built during his lifetime,
and with which, it seems, he was quirkily quite pleased.
W IN T E R 2018 | 47