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Quite a summary Bob, thanks.  Lots of fond memories nestled in those
paragraphs
attached are some of those times around ten years ago

On Wed, Jan 13, 2016 at 5:14 PM, Robert Traller <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> What’s in a name?
> We call ourselves the SLACers even though few of us that gather and play
> regularly still work at SLAC. Several who still work at SLAC have played
> with us, including Victor, Denis, Luis and Rafa Miranda, but since
> Arrillaga built that nice facility and field behind the radiation fence
> those who aren’t SLAC employees have to have a pass to play there and SLAC
> employees would rather play on their beautiful new field. They play there
> regularly at noon. The SLAC Soccer Club has split in two: the SLAC SLACers
> and the Stanford SLACers. The SLAC SLACers are predominantly SLAC employees
> with a smattering of outside payers including some Stanford SLACers. The
> Stanford SLACers originated at SLAC but now consist of players from all
> over the local community including many Stanford staff and professors and a
> few SLACers. Maybe split is too strong a word…more like evolved.
> People were playing soccer on the lawn in front of the cafeteria at SLAC
> when I came there in the early eighties. I lived in the East Bay, was in an
> over 30’s league there commuting to work swing shift. I played at SLAC
> occasionally in those days but with the commute and all it was not very
> regular. Rafa I’m sure was there and probably Dave Freiberger. Rafa has
> worked in the Klystron Department at SLAC forever and was a regional soccer
> star in his youth. Dave is a SLAC physicist who played with us regularly
> until he was about 75.
> In 1993 I moved to Redwood City with my wife and our 18-month old son. I
> started playing more at SLAC. The games at SLAC were popular and crowded.
> The primary area of play was a shallow bowl with a large Cork Oak on one
> corner. The field drained very poorly and the most downhill portion would
> get soggy. Chasing a ball through that area was like running across a
> waterbed. The field was surrounded by asphalt and concrete pathways. Balls
> would some times get away and roll down a path toward the SLAC main
> entrance. If not caught a ball could end up at the Stanford Shopping
> Center. Guys occasionally slipped chasing a ball across asphalt in cleats.
> The uphill side of the field had a low concrete wall and a short distance
> from it a full-sized iron manhole cover.  It is amazing there weren't more
> injuries there.
> Many of our coworkers and everyone else at SLAC would be walking by, to
> and from the cafeteria. Jonathan Dorfan was director of SLAC then; he was
> friendly to us and something of a soccer fan (though he never stepped on
> the field). Perhaps that is why the games continued. Aside from all the
> safety hazards for us there was the possibility of hitting some elderly
> Nobel laureate in the face with an errant shot. That such a thing never
> happened is in part because we were all pretty safety conscious and there
> were rules such as no overly aggressive play, no slide tackling and
> everyone called their own fouls, no questions asked.
> In the early days we played with traffic cones for goals until, a player
> named Tony got some small goals made from steel tubing. We never played
> with full sized goals or goalies except when special gameswould get
> organized off-site. Charlie Young, a physicist at SLAC who played with us
> was involved in the SLAC Summer Institute which brought a bunch of grad
> students to SLAC every year. He would organize a SLACers v. SSI game. We
> had an SSI game up on the field above the Alpine Inn and another I remember
> at Churchill fields. I’m sure there were others.
> There were The Americas v. The World games, and famously, the Old Farts v.
> Young Guns game. An accounting would be made of all available players and
> anyone older than the median age was an Old Fart. I don’t have the exact
> score but the Old Farts won most of the games. The median age of the group
> has increased over the years to the point where now if you’re 47, you’re a
> Young Gun.
> The SLAC soccer group was always a very nice group of people and
> accommodated players of all skill levels yet some people were very skilled
> players. People like Rafa Miranda. I don’t know if Rafa started the group
> but it seemed to originate in the Klystron Department. The field was right
> next to their shops and the games would begin as people started coming out
> of the Klystron Dept. on to the field. Someone (Lou?) started a klystron
> group soccer mailing list. Eventually the noon time games spread well
> beyond just the Klystron Dept. and the all inclusive SLAC soccer list was
> started. Some people are on one list or the other, some people are on both
> lists.
> The games were popular and people from outside SLAC were participating
> including Jeff O and others from Lockheed Martin. Glenn was at SLAC by then
> and a major player. Certain people just naturally take responsibility
> because everyone else is too slow responding to the need. There would often
> be recaps of the games on the mailing list written by Dave F. or Glenn.
> Game summaries would have a detailed account of each score. Since I would
> occasionally write something I felt it was expected of me to know something
> about the score but I would never know the score and really didn’t care
> much about it. In some early games there would be long arguments (by Dave
> most likely) about whether or not a ball passed below or above an imaginary
> line connecting the top of the cones. If sides were too lopsided perhaps we
> would have a roster adjustment but really: it’s not as if one or the other
> side was in danger of relegation.
> So many were showing up to play soccer at noon that we actually split into
> two games. We had a secondary field, even worse than the main field which
> was bordered on the downhill side by a grove of Redwoods . Otherwise it was
> surrounded by concrete pathways. Near the uphill border was a large
> aluminum pedestal atop which was mounted a window from an old SLAC bubble
> chamber detector. I don’t know the exact dimensions of that thing but the
> whole structure is about eight feet tall  and resembles a giant lens with a
> handle. The window looks like a hunk of glass 3 feet in diameter and about
> 6 inches thick. We would often have to dribble the ball around it. That
> area has since been eaten up by new buildings.
> Many SLACers longed to play longer games on bigger, better fields so Glenn
> contacted Stanford Athletics and told them we were a SLAC soccer club and
> would like to use one of Stanford’s fields a couple of times a week. I
> can’t remember the name of the woman in charge then but she sent an email
> acknowledging our use of the smaller field of those off Sand Hill Rd. I
> think that was about 1999 and we started playing Tuesdays and Fridays after
> work. Sometimes others would be there and we would show them a copy of the
> letter and they would not bother us. She wrote a new email for us each year
> for a few of years.
> It wasn’t long before our games were very popular and began to be
> oversubscribed. You all know how it is: a group starts playing somewhere
> and passing soccer players notice and ask to join in. That is when the
> “pinnie”, or practice vest scheme began. With two sets of 11 colored
> pinnies we could close the game when the pinnies ran out.
> Once we started wearing colors we looked official and occasionally some
> Stanford staff person, maybe the head groundskeeper, would come and ask who
> the hell we were. They wanted to know we were from Stanford. We assured
> them that most of us were. Stanford then informed us that we needed to have
> 80% of our people able to produce Stanford IDs. We tried to be ready but it
> was never really enforced. If someone did come around we could produce
> enough IDs to send them away. They weren’t going to wait for 22 people to
> rummage through their bags for ID.
> But then they got a new director for the athletics facilities and she did
> not want to write us a note. If we wanted to use the field we could reserve
> it for $50/hour she told me. We had been playing for some years without
> having to show written permission so we just continued and never had a
> problem.
> It has now been some 15+ years we have been playing at various fields
> around Stanford. The old-timers among us now include many Stanford Staff as
> well as members from all over the community. Our games have had the same
> rules and spirit of the original SLAC games. For years we played with PVC
> goals approximately 5’X7’ . Some we built ourselves, others were
> commercially made which just appeared. Then Chuy had made for us some steel
> tube goals similar to those Tony had made at SLAC. His were beautifully
> made of 2” steel tubing precisely bent and welded. Chuy had gone to
> considerable trouble and expense. They were very heavy and Chuy delivered
> them to the field in his pickup. Glenn provided some old full-sized goal
> nets which we cut up for them.
> There were other pickup games being played in the area and those used some
> of the original PVC goals but sometimes our steel goals would be found
> moved and we had to hunt them down. Then one day we found our goals chained
> to a tree and padlocked. I made a stencil with “SLAC SOCCER CLUB” and my
> SLAC phone number. I stenciled the lettering on the cross bar. I got a
> large set of bolt cutters and cut the lock someone had put on them.
> More than once Stanford Hospital used our field as a helicopter landing
> pad. During the recent construction at Stanford Hospital a semi permanent
> helipad was constructed and we began playing regularly between fields in
> front of the cricket cage. Our goals moved around and were found locked up
> again. Again I cut the lock. The PVC goals were also getting locked.
> Construction of some sort seemed imminent at the fields and a yard for
> construction materials was set up under the trees behind a tall chain link
> fence and locked. One day we found the goals locked inside that yard. We
> got them out; no easy task getting those things out of there. Then one day
> the goals disappeared completely.
> We found out through Freddie, a Stanford groundskeeper who used to play
> with us, that our goals had been stored in a yard next to Stanford Stadium.
> Freddie told us the goals were heavy and got in the groundskeepers way. We
> got the name of the guy responsible and tried emailing him to try to work
> out some sort of accommodation but with no response. A couple of us took
> Chuy’s truck and retrieved the goals. We made sure that after we played the
> goals were stored well out of the way but if someone else used them we
> couldn’t control where they left them. Again the goals disappeared but then
> so did our field. Construction began on all the soccer fields off Sand
> Hill.
> Since then the Stanford SLACers have been orphans playing wherever we
> could find a field. We have yet to miss a Tuesday or Friday game and even
> picked up a few new players but we had had to move from field to field. If
> we are to apply to Stanford/Palo Alto for official permission to use some
> facility, perhaps we should call ourselves the Stanford SLACers F. C. or
> SSFC. Having some affiliation with Stanford, SLAC and Palo Alto may help.
>
>
>
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