The Fighting Cubs – a storied history of local football

In my era of growing up in Leland, our high school football team had a twenty-one-game winning streak. There was a victory flame that burned outside Mr. Woolly’s office, the principal, in the front yard of the school.

The Leland High School marching band was known all over the state as one of the top high school bands. Our band director, Earnest Cadden, was voted one of the top ten high school band directors in the United States. The band supported the football team, performing at all the pep rallies and half-time shows.

One of Leland’s early football teams, the 1925 team, made it to the state championship game. The team and half the town loaded up on a train and went to the game in Hattiesburg. Although they lost the game, that team started a long-standing football tradition in Leland.
Sons and grandsons of that 1925 team played for Leland all the way to the seventies. Many Leland High School players went on to play for college teams – Bobby Carollo, Mike Carollo, Johnie Cooks, Antonio Johnson, Mickey Fratesi, Phil Greco, Cedric Bush and Emile Petro, to name a few.

Charles Dean told many stories of playing center for the Leland Cubs with four of Charlie Carollo’s sons, Junior, Billy, Otis and Alphonse. He said Otis and Junior would get in fights in the huddle, and the Leland coaches would have to come off the sidelines and break up the fights. Billy was a running back, with the other three brothers being linemen.

Indianola was one of the Leland Cubs’ big rivals. A brawl broke out during one of the games they played in Indianola. The players started fighting on the field. Then the players from both teams and the coaches started fighting from the sidelines. Then the fans from both bleachers emptied on the field and joined in.

Jerry Santucci and Dominic Fratesi were standing back-to-back and knocked out several of the Indianola fans. They were both big raw-boned guys, and, when they hit you, it was all over. John Webb was in the Marines. He took off his belt and went through the crowd swinging his belt over his head. That big brass buckle knocked several Indianola fans out of commission.

I don’t know who won the game, but Leland won the fight. The Mississippi High School Athletic Association stopped Leland and Indianola from playing each other for a few years. The next time they played each other, another big fight broke out, this time in Leland. When one of the Leland preachers got knocked out, Mr. Bufkin, the Leland School superintendent, turned out the lights on the football field. That broke up the fight.

Cecil Lamberson recalled Red Cook being one of the best fight starters that ever played for the Leland Cubs. Cecil said that Leland was playing Grenada, a team they normally did not play. Leland was losing the game, and Red Cook started a fight. The Leland team got all fired up and not only won the fight, but won the game, as well.

Cecil got knocked out in a game in Winona. For a long time, Leland would play Winona in the first game of the season. The next morning, he was still knocked out, and they loaded him up in another ambulance to take him to a Jackson hospital. There was a big hill in Yazoo City that old Highway 49 went over. When the ambulance got to the bottom of that hill, Cecil woke up. He told Billy Boone, the ambulance driver, that he was hungry and thirsty. After a big meal, he made a full recovery.

Leland High School’s most accomplished football player was Johnie Cooks. He went on to play at Mississippi State, where he was voted most valuable defensive player in the nation. Johnie was the number two draft pick in the pro draft. He went on to have a successful professional football career with the Baltimore Colts and the New York Giants, winning the Superbowl while playing for the Giants.

A display celebrating Johnie Cook’s football career can be seen at the Our Town and Beyond Museum at 101 North Broad in downtown Leland. In the hundred-year history of Leland High School football teams, the Fighting Cubs might not have won all the games, but they never lost a fight.