Two Guys From Uhrichsville

My wife and I left Columbus for Wheeling today on the latest leg of our summer sojourn of historical sites, ball parks and visiting relatives. We got to stroll the beautiful Ohio State campus and be awed by the massive presence of Ohio Stadium, home of the perennial nationally contending Ohio State Buckeye football team. Columbus, Ohio is a place I've always wanted to visit because if it weren't for The Ohio State University my life situation might be a lot different.

My grandparents Giuseppi and Rosa Natoli immigrated from a town just outside of Palermo, Sicily around 1918. He went to work in the clay mines near Uhrichsville, Ohio, close to Canton. The Natolis had three children: my Uncle Jim, my father Joe and my Aunt Rose.

Prospects for advancement for immigrant families in the 1920s were difficult but not impossible. But when the Depression hit at the end of the decade, they became remote for just about everyone. My grandfather was adamant. No school after high school. Twelve years of school was enough for anyone. After that it was time to get a job. The coal mine or the brick mill were good enough. My father and uncle disagreed. They were smart and saw college as the way to get ahead. But how could they afford to go to college?

The opportunity came from Ohio State football. No, neither of them played there. My father played offensive tackle and defensive end on the high school team at 133 pounds. Uncle Jim played too, though he was a little smaller. Not exactly Ohio State varsity material. But a guy from the neighborhood, Lou Groza, did go to Ohio State to play for Coach Paul Brown. He was a tackle and the first of the great kicking specialists. Lou "the toe" was his nickname. Groza mentioned his two intelligent but poor friends back home.

Coach Brown invited them to Ohio State to be football team managers. They could live in a room within the walls of Ohio Stadium. They would take care of the football equipment, wash the towels and uniforms, and keep things ready for the players. They could enroll in classes and if they could cut it they could stay.

Well, they were able to cut it. The coach helped them get jobs in the summer to make enough to come back the next year. Dad used to tell me how the University Chancellor's wife would invite the students from poor, immigrant and rural backgrounds (Joe and Jim Natoli fit all three categories) to her home to teach them etiquette and the manners expected of college-educated people in American society. The Natoli boys were grateful.

After their sophomore year World War II came. Dad wound up in North Africa and Italy; Uncle Jim served in France. When they came back they had the GI Bill to finish their educations. Dad got his degree in business while Uncle Jim studied the law. Lou Groza went on to a long career in the NFL and election to its Hall of Fame. Paul Brown founded the Cleveland Browns and built them into a power. Later he founded the Cincinnati Bengals. The new stadium there is named for him. He's in the NFL Hall of Fame too.

After they graduated, my father and uncle came to California to seek their fortunes. Dad wound up as Vice President of a manufacturing company. Uncle Jim retired as a Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge. Not bad for two sons of a coal miner whose first language was not English. And all only made possible by the good word of a friend from the neighborhood and the generosity of a nationally-famous football coach who had no reason to take a chance on two kids he didn't know. If it weren't for their perseverance and the help of those good people and the University I might have grown up working in the coal mine or brick mill in Uhrichsville, Ohio. Such is the serendipity of life.