A 9-11 memory of Cleveland and many signs of patriotism

On 9-13, 17 years ago, when the eastbound train I was riding from Chicago to Hartford, connecting in New York, rolled through Cleveland, it passed so close to huge FirstEnergy (football) Stadium, it felt like a passenger could reach out the window and touch the huge “God Bless America” sign hanging on the side of the structure.

Our country was rallying from the murderous attack on the World Trade Center in New York on 9/11/01. The national rebound, the sunburst of patriotism, began almost as soon as the reeling citizens of New York and the USA regained their balance. Recoveries such as this take time, and this would take time but there wasn’t a true American who didn’t get up off the ground where the vicious sucker punch had landed them, brush themselves off and set about the business of making things right again. And that they did.

My flight from Chicago, where I had been visiting a friend, was canceled, like most airline flights, so we drove to downtown Chicago and I was able to purchase an Amtrak ticket to Hartford, leaving at 4:30 a.m. on Sept. 13. I made the connection and finally got home. But all the way, as soon as daylight arrived, I saw wonderful patriotic displays, set up near the tracks. American flags were most numerous.

And signs like the one on the stadium had been erected all along the way. In a time of national shock, it was heartening.

Interestingly, when I think of the horrific assault on America 17 years ago, the city of Cleveland and that wonderful sign spring to mind, first thing. Somehow it has come to represent for me the spirit of America.

And today (Tuesday) I’m thinking football, also symbolic of America. Maybe that’s because the Browns have opened their season against strong, upper-tier Pittsburgh with a tie. While a victory would have been more pleasing, the tie represents a long stride forward for Hue Jackson’s team,

which didn’t win a game last year.

The Browns have a proud history and strong ties to our state. Gray/whitebeards remember the era of the great Otto Graham, who died at at 83. Graham’s Hall of Fame football career began when he attended Northwestern University in Chicago. He had enrolled there as a music major on a basketball scholarship. (Oh yeah, Otto could do it all). Graham’s athletic focus soon shifted to football, when a coach saw him playing in an intramural game and invited him to join the varsity team.

When he reached the pros, the NFL hadn’t yet been formed and Graham won championships in its predecessor, the All-American Football League. Yes, I do remember it. I also remember when the Browns won titles in the freshlyminted NFL. Otto was quarterback, handing the ball off to bulldozing runner Marion Motley and throwing laser-beam passes to ends Mac Speedie and Dante Lavelli.

Connecticut got to know Graham well when he became coach and athletic director at the Coast Guard Academy, leading the Bears in 1963 to the Tangerine Bowl in Florida, a 27-0 loss to Western Kentucky.

John Dorsey is the current general manager of the Browns, a post he held previously with several NFL teams. Followers of UConn football remember him as one of the toughest linebackers ever to play at the university or in the Yankee Conference. A Marylander, he achieved all-Yankee Conference status twice, was player of the year and was named a Division II All American. These days, at 57, he enjoys running marathons and is a first-class water skier.

As a GM, well, the Cleveland people like him, that is why they hired him. It may be a happier season at First Energy Stadium, where the Browns play, I’m thinking.