Brown and White Vol. 65 no. 41

              billy sheridan pictured with his complete collection of 74 medals and trophies won while advancing to the featherweight and lightweight wrestling championships of the british isles billy posed at the request of his mother before sailing for the united states in 1908 at the age of 23 he was undefeated during his entire period of british competition 54 festival salutes dean of wrestling coached 40 years tribute will be paid tonight and tomorrow night to the most famous figure in lehigh's sports history billy sheridan who was coach of wrestling here for 40 years be fore he became assistant director of athletics in 1952 will be the sub ject of the billy sheridan story to be presented by the spring music festival in grace hall the festival will begin at 8 p.m although tickets for tomorrow night are sold out there are still many choice seats available at the box office for tonight's performance which will also include piano soloist william fairlamb and dancers john begg and betsy drew in two other parts of musical entertainment sheridan who has recently returned home from st luke's hospital and is now recuperating from a serious illness has been missing from his familiar stand in taylor gym for several months now however if he is able he will put in an appearance at the festival the billy sheridan story will narrate billy's life from the day when he scored nine falls in 22 minutes over opponents who weighed as much as 32 lbs more than he when he was a youth in loch lomond scotland the story follows him to the united states where he started as a pro fessional fighter but left the fight game to return to wrestling becoming coach of the university of pennsylvania team it takes him to lehigh where he began his 40 years as wrestling coach on south mountain it takes him through the years when he produced champions like johnny engel jimmy reed ben bishop and george feuerbach during that period sheridan became the dean of wrestling coaches and lehigh became the wrestling capital of the east dan hake 54 and rose marie —————————————— — — — navarro will play the lead roles of billy and his girl jeanie al greener 54 everett van hoe sen 55 and bill martin 55 will narrate van hoesen and martin will also play the parts of toughies george lemmon 54 will be a preacher ken verostick 55 mac kenzie art roth 56 a bookie and bob clark 55 a soldier five members of the varsity wrestling team will help pay tribute to billy they are alex mccord dick whited roger taylor dave gallaher and joe comly also to ap pear are other wrestlers posers tumblers and weight lifters sup plied by prof fay c bartlett of the physical education department seventeen songs sung by solo ists and the glee club and played by the band brass choir and bagpipers will be presented dur ing the sheridan story among them are old favorites such as loch lomond sentimental journey and auld lang syne see festival page 8 whitaker lauds inspiring work of sheridan president martin d whitaker in the following statement join ed the music festival and the brown and white in paying tribute to billy sheridan the choice of billy sheridan as the subject of the current music fes tival as well as of this special issue of the brown and white is one that will be received with enthusiasm by the lehigh family as well as alumni throughout the world the character of any campus is established by the sum-total of many things one of the most important of these is the influ ence of individual faculty mem bers upon suceeding generations of students occasionally such influence by example and by teaching skill is be yond the ordinary less occasionally a university may benefit by the presence of such an individual for an extended period prof sheridan has contributed notably to lehigh university in his see wiiitaker page 10 maker of champs the engineers second mat in structor in the school's history within two years lehigh under billy's guiding hand moved to its first eiwa tourney triumph billy served as coach of the american wrestlers competing in the first pan-american games in march 1951 billy's interests at lehigh have not been confined to wrestling in 1940 he took over coaching of soccer and during the 1951 season the team had its best season since soccer was started on south mountain in 1914 becoming middle atlantic champions during the five war years billy coached lacrosse because he wanted interest in the old in dian game kept alive on the le high campus in bethlehem he was chairman of the city recreation commission for three years completed his fourth see sheridan page 10 the knute rockne of collegiate wrestling — that's what wrestling fans and coaches throughout the country have called lehigh's own william billy sheridan assistant athletic director and former wrest ling and soccer coach in his 40 years as the engi neers mat coach before he re tired to take his higher office in 1952 sheridan's team had won 222 dual meets from some of the top wrestling schools in the na tion lost 82 and had seven ties billy developed 59 eastern inter collegiate champions five national collegiate titleholders five national aau winners and three wrestlers who competed on olympic teams since 1927 lehigh teams have won 13 eastern intercollegiate wrest ling association titles — more than any other rival in the circuit of 16 colleges billys men have been run ners-up eight other years it was in june of 1889 when billy was born in a small scottish hamlet four miles from scotland's pic turesque loch lomond at 15 he witnessed a troup of professional wrestlers at an exhibition in his town and decided then and there to make wrestling his career in the sight of three short action-packed years of barn storming about the country as a wrestler at highland gather ings billy had captured scot land's 126-pound championship he climaxed his feat by tossing nine consecutive opponents in the average time of two minutes and five seconds per man by the following year billy added the featherweight and lightweight scottish crowns to his string of ac complishments averaging between eight and nine matches a week he became british isles champ during his entire period of british competi tion he remained undefeated by the time he sailed for north america at the age of 23 he had chalked up victories in 74 open tour naments billy had intended to go to california in search of gold but he never got that far landing in canada he went to work in a piano factory in oshawa billy continued to wrestle at the local ymca gym following up a newspaper adver tisement for boxers to perform at adam ryan's athletic club billy went to philadelphia he got his first break in america shortly after in a highly irregular and amazing way one day while watching the university of pennsyl vania's mat team work out he en tered the ring and tossed the entire team one after another from the lightweight up to the heavyweight in 1911 he heard that lehigh needed an equipment manager and trainer he took the job and shortly after he was appointed sheridan story premiers at 8 lu bethlehem pa volume 65—number 41 friday april 23 1954 billy wrestling's knute rockne set record of wins in 222 dual meets lehigh university brown and white billy sheridan