Celebrating Sully, a biography of Bob Sullivan

This past Saturday, I had the opportunity to celebrate the launch of a biography on Sully, Bob Sullivan, my college football coach. The book was superbly written by Jeff Appelquist, a Carleton football alum and noted writer.

 

Saturday was terrific. It started in the stands of Sullivan field—yes, named after Bob Sullivan. I sat next to Sully in his place on the thirty yard line about three rows up. I’ve been going to games and sitting next or near to him for years. When Patrick Reusse interviewed Sully three years ago right before Sullivan Field was renamed, he took the picture at the bottom of this blog that made it into the Star Tribune.  This past Sunday I again brought Carle—the bronze knight that my wife, Amy, bought me as a Christmas gift a few years ago. At the first game of last season, I didn’t bring Carle to a game. The first thing Sully said to me when he saw me was not, “good to see you” or “how have you been.” It was “Where’s Carle?”

Carle will accompany me to every Carleton football game.

 The game became a laugher for the Knights—51-7. Jack Curtis, the quarterback for this year’s team, is really good. Because it was a blowout, the football alums and I started telling Sully stories. All of us were recruited by Bob Sullivan. Most likely none of us would have gone to Carleton without Sully’s persistent recruitment. I’ve shared in previous blogs the story of Sully recruiting me to Carleton—quite improbable

 After the game over two hundred of us gathered in the Northfield theater to celebrate the launch of the new book. At the gathering on Saturday Jeff Appelquist shared the story of approaching Sully at last year’s Olaf game and asking him if he could write a biography about him. Jeff said that Sully said, “why not.” When Sully told the story, he shared that his response was “why.” Whether Sully’s response was one word or two what is most important is the book was written.

The book is marvelous. In twenty-one chapters Jeff Appelquist chronicled Sully’s life. He wrote about Sully growing up in Marshall, Minnesota—not far from my hometown of Worthington—something Sully has always reminded me. He went to St. John’s and learned many lessons about coaching from John Gagliardi. He coached football at Hill High School and then Cooper. He was successful at both places. He came to Carleton as the football coach in 1979 and coached for twenty-one years. He became the winningest football coach in Carleton’s history. He coached the famous 1991 team which won the MIAC and his teams beat St. Olaf from 1985-1996. 

I certainly remember the 1985 game—the famous medallion game. Sully had given us a medallion at the end of the previous season with the number 10-19-85 inscribed on it. He asked us to carry it for the entire year. I did that and like many of my teammates taped the medallion under my uniform on 10-19-85 as we beat the ‘Oles, 35-7. 

Beating the Oles was always of paramount importance to Sully. He’ll be in the stands this Saturday at Sullivan Field as Carleton hopefully beats St. Olaf. I’ll be there too--probably sitting next to him rooting on the Knights with all of our strength.    

One of many qualities I’ve always appreciated about Sully is he is a renaissance man. He got his Master’s in English and probably could have taught courses on English at Carleton. He encouraged his players to find other interests besides football. It didn’t bother him at all that I was the concertmaster of the Orchestra when I attended Carleton. Though Sully was passionate about football he knew that players needed to find interests beyond football. 

In the book Sully shared the top players he coached at Carleton at each position—which I was fortunate to make. 

In the book Jeff Appelquist created an incredible resource of an incredible man. I encourage everyone to buy a copy on Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/Sully-Football-Legend-Coach-Sullivan/dp/1634897994

The dedication of the book describes what it means to play football.

“To all Carleton Knight football players

Past, present & future

Whose warrior spirit & fraternal bonds are forever

As the great King Henry V proclaimed (according to the Bard) to steel his soldiers’ hearts on the eve of the Battle of Agincourt in 1415,

“We shall be remembered, we few, we happy few, we band of brothers

For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother …”

The British archers, vastly outnumbered but profoundly inspired by their heroic leader,

Went bravely forth, filled the sky with their arrows,

And cut down the flower of French chivalry and young manhood

To win a great victory.

GO KNIGHTS!”