OPEN HOUSE VOLUNTEERS AT GLOUCESTER'S SARGENT HOUSE MUSEUM CARRY ON THE INCLUSIVE LEGACY OF THE HOME'S FIRST RESIDENTS. - The Boston Globe (Boston, MA)

A small bronze statue of a woman on a horse sits on a table in thehall of The Sargent House Museum in downtown Gloucester. In a rush ofinspiration, volunteer Kathy Slifer embellishes it with holly.Moments later, fellow decorator Peggy Flanagan sneaks up and redoesit with red-twig dogwood.

'That statue's been rearranged three times this morning,' saysMartha Oakes, museum director.

In a forgiving holiday humor, Slifer only laughs at Flanagan'sartistic ambush as they continue in the community effort to decoratethe 1782 Georgian-style house for Christmas.

'The fun part is, it's such an improvisation,' says Slifer. 'Happythings happen.'

The house was built for feminist philosopher and writer JudithSargent (1751-1820) and her first husband, John Stevens. Sargentchampioned equality, justice, and opportunity for all, so the househas always been a place of cooperation and innovation. It has evenbeen a rectory. After Stevens's death, the young widow married theRev. John Murray (1741-1815), the founder of Universalism in America,whose 1805 church (now a Unitarian Universalist Church) still standsacross the street, its Federalist spire, then as now, a beacon for mariners.

The house, which opened as a museum in 1919, has become arepository for important portraits of the early Universalists as wellas for Sargent family artifacts, including a number of paintings byJohn Singer Sargent (1856-1925), whose father was born in Gloucester.

Inclusiveness, a guiding principle for Sargent and Murray, is alsoa priority for Oakes. Rather than appoint members to a committee,she places a notice in the local newspaper inviting aspiringdecorators to help prepare the museum for the Middle Street Walk. Held each year on the second Saturday of December, the eventcelebrates the historic neighborhood. Middle Street is closed totraffic to make room for pedestrians, horse-drawn wagons, and English-handbell ringers.

Because the museum is decorated for just one day, volunteers cango all out with fresh materials, arriving with evergreens, fruit, andyards of orange zest.

While the museum aims for historical accuracy, circa 1790, it isnot rigid or exclusionary when it comes to holiday offerings. Talented amateur florists often leave flower arrangements at the doorlike foundlings, sometimes including scarlet poinsettias, which wouldnot have been available in Judith Sargent's time. But the plants areput to good use. More often, though, the materials used to deck themuseum halls are from no farther away than the arborvitae and boxwoodon the property, which is above Gloucester's West End with a view tothe harbor.

'It's a good time to trim them anyway,' Flanagan says of themuseum's shrubs. She's moved on to the dining room, making micro-adjustments of pine cones and sea grass in a Canton bowl. The tableis set for tea, a meal chosen because all that the museum owns of theSargent silver is the pudding spoons.

As if to compensate for the lack of cutlery, the table is laid outwith decorative orange kumquats and yellow baby squash from Henry'sMarket in Beverly. While a supermarket might not be in historiccharacter, the exotic produce is. Gloucester, being a seaport,would have had access to a variety of tropical fruits, including thepineapples, oranges, and pomegranates tucked into displays around thehouse.

Some fruits, though, are regional, such as the heirloom Ladyapples that line the fireplace mantel, over which hangs a seascape byanother local favorite, Gloucester artist Fitz Hugh Lane (1804-1865).

In the front parlor, newly restored with glazed finishes on thepaneled wainscot, the faux-marble fireplace sports no stockings hungwith care. ('This is not a Victorian Christmas,' says Oakes).

But the fireplace is not bare.

Cranberries, holly, and orange slices dried to an aromaticcrispness and tied with bits of red raffia combine to create aholiday atmosphere.

While the decorations differ from year to year, depending upon whoresponds to the notice in the newspaper, the museum has sometraditional mainstays. Topiaries fashioned from sprigs of boxwood arefestooned with garlands of orange peel, an amazing feat of fruitdexterity performed by museum board member Roger Pheulpin. After heremoves a thin layer of skin with his zester in long spirals,everyone joins together pressing cloves into the artfully scoredfruit, which is then placed at nose level on mantels and shelves.

Every volunteer brings his or her own special gift to thedecorating experience, from zesting oranges to wiring apples tomaking wreaths. But other less-tangible virtues - such as the goodwill shown even in the face of adversity and red-twig dogwoods - areas vital to the cause. Judith Sargent and John Murray would havewanted the house decorated in no other way.

Reebok Hopes New Exercise Product Will Boost Company's Apparel Sales. - Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News

By Chris Reidy, The Boston Globe Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News

Feb. 24--CANTON, Mass.--Step aerobics sold a lot of shoes for Reebok International Ltd., and the company is hoping that a new exercise product called the Core Board will do the same.

'We think there's an opportunity to define a look around this program,' said chief marketing officer Angel R. Martinez.

Translation: Expect to see Core Board-inspired shoe and apparel lines late in the year.

While Core Board won't generate anywhere near the revenue of important shoe lines, it offers intriguing insights into Reebok's plans to use the online medium and 'viral marketing' as a more cost-effective way for promoting its products than signing up large numbers of sports stars with expensive endorsement contracts.

Just what is a Core Board? It's an unstable oval platform. Imagine indoor snowboarding movements performed while standing in one place, and that's part of the idea.

Training with a Core Board improves balance, Reebok says, and it strengthens muscles in the body's midsection that are underworked in many exercise routines.

With a suggested price of $190, the Core Board recently debuted in health clubs as part of group exercise classes. It can be purchased at a Reebok Web site, www.reebokcoregear.com, and it should reach stores later this year.

As Martinez sees it, the Core Board offers opportunities beyond selling new shoe and apparel lines. At a time when the company is rebounding from several subpar years, Core Board is part of larger strategy to help reposition the Reebok brand.

'Our goal is to be known as a fitness company,' Martinez said. 'Our goal is for consumers to think of us as their resource for fitness.'

The Core Board isn't the only thing Reebok is counting on to accelerate momentum. It recently signed tennis star Venus Williams to a big endorsement deal. It launched its new 'Defy convention' ad campaign. It also obtained the apparel licensing rights for the National Football League.

The company's financial performance reflects Reebok's improving fortunes. The stock has tripled since bottoming out below $10 a share a year ago, and net income in 2000 was the highest in three years. On the New York Stock Exchange yesterday, shares dropped $1.36 to close at $26.18.

As for the Core Board, outside observers are taking a wait-and-see attitude. A similar product called the wobble board has been around for a while, and its sales have been too small to turn up in surveys of the $3.3 billion market for exercise equipment, according to the National Sporting Goods Association.

Undaunted, Reebok is out to promote the Core Board with missionary zeal. At core.reebok.com, people can get an online tutorial on Core Board training and learn why its tilting, torqueing, and twisting movements are beneficial.

Parts of Reebok's Web sites are aimed at health club owners and professional trainers. Get those folks excited about Core Board, the reasoning goes, and the buzz should spread to the consumers who take group fitness classes at these clubs.

At Reebok's Web site, meanwhile, soccer star Julie Foudy and Chris Slade of the New England Patriots promote the Core Board in Web versions of TV commercials. The theme? 'Enter the power zone.'

Reebok wants consumers to view its Web site, particularly pages designated as part of 'Reebok University,' as a huge repository of information about fitness.

If Reebok can gain the trust of its customers by providing tutorials about such products as the Core Board, perhaps these customers will be willing to share information about themselves; that, in turn, could help Reebok both in designing new products and in marketing them more efficiently.

With the Core Board, Reebok is hoping history repeats itself. The first company to recognize aerobics as more than a fad, Reebok rode the women's fitness movement for much of the 1980s.

'There was a parade, and we jumped out in front of it,' Martinez said of the aerobics phenomenon.

Ever since, Reebok has been trying to orchestrate new fitness phenomena. One success came in the mid-1980s, when a trainer named Gin Miller devised Step Reebok, a series of aerobic exercise and dance movements originally based on stepping up and down on a milk crate.

Reebok refined Miller's idea and sustained it with a series of videos, each adding a new wrinkle to the basic routine. To promote it, the company tapped into a network of club trainers it often provides with discounted sneakers and apparel, and Step Reebok soon became a popular group class at many health clubs.

An investor who decided against backing Miller later told her, 'I missed out on a $750 million business.'

Reebok sees a similar opportunity with Core Board. Plans call for $25 videos with Core Board exercises designed to help golfers. Another Core Board video might be aimed at yoga practioners.

According to inventor Alex McKechnie, the Core Board is partly the outgrowth of physical therapy sessions with Paul Kariya, a hockey star with the Anaheim Mighty Ducks and, previously, with the University of Maine.

By 1996, Kariya's regular exercise routines were causing repetitive stress injuries, weakening muscles around the pelvis to the point where he could barely play.

Using a prototype of the Core Board, McKechnie devised exercises that worked the body's central muscles in an unpredictable sequence that avoided repetitive stress.

Two years later, McKechnie helped basketball star Shaquille O'Neal recover from a muscle tear in his stomach. By the time O'Neal had healed, McKechnie was convinced that his Core Board could be a fitness breakthrough.

'I could have gone the infomercial route,' said McKechnie, who instead partnered with Reebok because 'they could give it research, credibility, and marketing support that I couldn't.'

Once Reebok was convinced that a program for rehabbing pro athletes could be modified into a safe, fun, and easy-to-understand fitness routine for the average person, it decided to put its Web marketing muscle behind Core Board.

That's quite a change from a few years ago. In the early 1990s, sneaker makers signed hundreds of athletes to endorsement contracts in the belief that jocks could move their product.

But when sales later slumped, many companies, including Reebok, cut back on athlete endorsements and looked for more cost-effective ways to get out their marketing messages.

With Core Board, much of the offline marketing focus will be on fitness trainers at health clubs.

At WellBridge Health and Fitness Center, a 50-club chain with four clubs locally, the Core Board meshes neatly with the chain's marketing goals, said East Coast manager Bill Patjane.

More and more, clubs rely on revenues from consumers hiring personal trainers or signing up for group exercise classes.

As with fashion or toys, newness counts for a lot in fitness, and Core Board training is something new that fitness instructors can use to induce members to sign up for more group and one-on-one exercise sessions and boost club revenues.

As its Web sites strive to educate consumers about the Core Board, Reebok hopes to convey a larger message.

Said Martinez, 'It is integral to Reebok that we be defined for people as the world of fitness.'

To see more of The Boston Globe, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.boston.com/globe

(c) 2001, The Boston Globe. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

REEBOK'S NEW SEARCH FOR FISCAL FITNESS FIRM HOPES EXERCISE BOARD WILL SPUR MORE PRODUCT LINES - The Boston Globe (Boston, MA)

CANTON - Step aerobics sold a lot of shoes for ReebokInternational Ltd., and the company is hoping that a new exerciseproduct called the Core Board will do the same.

'We think there's an opportunity to define a look around thisprogram,' said chief marketing officer Angel R. Martinez.

Translation: Expect to see Core Board-inspired shoe and apparellines late in the year.

While Core Board won't generate anywhere near the revenue ofimportant shoe lines, it offers intriguing insights into Reebok'splans to use the online medium and 'viral marketing' as a more cost-effective way for promoting its products than signing up largenumbers of sports stars with expensive endorsement contracts.

Just what is a Core Board? It's an unstable oval platform. Imagineindoor snowboarding movements performed while standing in one place,and that's part of the idea.

Training with a Core Board improves balance, Reebok says, and itstrengthens muscles in the body's midsection that are underworked inmany exercise routines.

With a suggested price of $190, the Core Board recently debuted inhealth clubs as part of group exercise classes. It can be purchasedat a Reebok Web site, www.reebokcore gear.com, and it should reachstores later this year.

As Martinez sees it, the Core Board offers opportunities beyondselling new shoe and apparel lines. At a time when the company isrebounding from several subpar years, Core Board is part of largerstrategy to help reposition the Reebok brand.

'Our goal is to be known as a fitness company,' Martinez said.'Our goal is for consumers to think of us as their resource forfitness.'

The Core Board isn't the only thing Reebok is counting on toaccelerate momentum. It recently signed tennis star Venus Williams toa big endorsement deal. It launched its new 'Defy convention' adcampaign. It also obtained the apparel licensing rights for theNational Football League.

The company's financial performance reflects Reebok's improvingfortunes. The stock has tripled since bottoming out below $10 a sharea year ago, and net income in 2000 was the highest in three years. Onthe New York Stock Exchange yesterday, shares dropped $1.36 to closeat $26.18.

As for the Core Board, outside observers are taking a wait-and-see attitude. A similar product called the wobble board has beenaround for a while, and its sales have been too small to turn up insurveys of the $3.3 billion market for exercise equipment, accordingto the National Sporting Goods Association.

Undaunted, Reebok is out to promote the Core Board with missionaryzeal. At core.reebok.com, people can get an online tutorial on CoreBoard training and learn why its tilting, torqueing, and twistingmovements are beneficial.

Parts of Reebok's Web sites are aimed at health club owners andprofessional trainers. Get those folks excited about Core Board, thereasoning goes, and the buzz should spread to the consumers who takegroup fitness classes at these clubs.

At Reebok's Web site, meanwhile, soccer star Julie Foudy and ChrisSlade of the New England Patriots promote the Core Board in Webversions of TV commercials. The theme? 'Enter the power zone.'

Reebok wants consumers to view its Web site, particularly pagesdesignated as part of 'Reebok University,' as a huge repository ofinformation about fitness.

If Reebok can gain the trust of its customers by providingtutorials about such products as the Core Board, perhaps thesecustomers will be willing to share information about themselves;that, in turn, could help Reebok both in designing new products andin marketing them more efficiently.

With the Core Board, Reebok is hoping history repeats itself. Thefirst company to recognize aerobics as more than a fad, Reebok rodethe women's fitness movement for much of the 1980s.

'There was a parade, and we jumped out in front of it,' Martinezsaid of the aerobics phenomenon.

Ever since, Reebok has been trying to orchestrate new fitnessphenomena. One success came in the mid-1980s, when a trainer namedGin Miller devised Step Reebok, a series of aerobic exercise anddance movements originally based on stepping up and down on a milkcrate.

Reebok refined Miller's idea and sustained it with a series ofvideos, each adding a new wrinkle to the basic routine. To promoteit, the company tapped into a network of club trainers it oftenprovides with discounted sneakers and apparel, and Step Reebok soonbecame a popular group class at many health clubs.

An investor who decided against backing Miller later told her, 'Imissed out on a $750 million business.'

Reebok sees a similar opportunity with Core Board. Plans call for$25 videos with Core Board exercises designed to help golfers.Another Core Board video might be aimed at yoga practitioners.

According to inventor Alex McKechnie, the Core Board is partly theoutgrowth of physical therapy sessions with Paul Kariya, a hockeystar with the Anaheim Mighty Ducks and, previously, with theUniversity of Maine.

By 1996, Kariya's regular exercise routines were causingrepetitive stress injuries, weakening muscles around the pelvis tothe point where he could barely play.

Using a prototype of the Core Board, McKechnie devised exercisesthat worked the body's central muscles in an unpredictable sequencethat avoided repetitive stress.

Two years later, McKechnie helped basketball star Shaquille O'Nealrecover from a muscle tear in his stomach. By the time O'Neal hadhealed, McKechnie was convinced that his Core Board could be afitness breakthrough.

'I could have gone the infomercial route,' said McKechnie, whoinstead partnered with Reebok because 'they could give it research,credibility, and marketing support that I couldn't.'

Once Reebok was convinced that a program for rehabbing proathletes could be modified into a safe, fun, and easy-to-understandfitness routine for the average person, it decided to put its Webmarketing muscle behind Core Board.

That's quite a change from a few years ago. In the early 1990s,sneaker makers signed hundreds of athletes to endorsement contractsin the belief that jocks could move their product.

But when sales later slumped, many companies, including Reebok,cut back on athlete endorsements and looked for more cost-effectiveways to get out their marketing messages.

With Core Board, much of the offline marketing focus will be onfitness trainers at health clubs.

At WellBridge Health and Fitness Center, a 50-club chain with fourclubs locally, the Core Board meshes neatly with the chain'smarketing goals, said East Coast manager Bill Patjane.

More and more, clubs rely on revenues from consumers hiringpersonal trainers or signing up for group exercise classes.

As with fashion or toys, newness counts for a lot in fitness, andCore Board training is something new that fitness instructors can useto induce members to sign up for more group and one-on-one exercisesessions and boost club revenues.

As its Web sites strive to educate consumers about the Core Board,Reebok hopes to convey a larger message.

Said Martinez, 'It is integral to Reebok that we be defined forpeople as the world of fitness.'

SIDEBAR: THE REEBOK CORE BOARD PLEASE REFER TO MICROFILM FOR CHARTDATA

Senior should consider AARP's growth funds for grandson trust - The Boston Globe (Boston, MA)

Q. Iam a senior citizen, and I have two CDs which come due thismonth. One is in trust for my granddaughter and while the other isnow in my name, I would like to put it in trust for my grandson.Should I renew these CDs or put them in mutual funds? I have twoaccounts with the AARP fund family, both invested in the AARP GNMAand US Treasury fund. Would you advise putting the CD money in thisfund?M.F., Canton

A. The AARP GNMA and US Treasury fund, which sports a generousyield and usually produces above-average total returns, is anexcellent holding for a senior citizen such as yourself. But intruth it's a pretty stodgy vehicle for young people, who probably areseeking growth of capital more than yield, and whose investment timeframe will probably be fairly long-term -- saving for college, a homedown payment, or even retirement. So why not consider the twogrowth-oriented funds within the AARP fund family.

The first of these two if AARP Capital Growth, a fund which isdubbed 'aggressive' by Morningstar Mutual Funds, and which hasdemonstrated its aggression by losing 10.89 percent of its valuebetween Jan. 1 and July 7. The fund, heavily committed to media andfinancial investments, is far from tame, and despite its risk-takingways has produced only an average long-term record. So if the giftmust please the giver, let's forget about that one.

But the AARP Growth and Income fund is another story, whichmight please both you and your grandchildren. Morningstar MutualFunds dubs this one 'an all-weather vehicle,' and it has demonstratedthis by producing a year-to-date gain of .76 percent through July 7-- a figure which looks terrific when you bear in mind that theaverage growth and income fund in Lipper's universe lost 2.72 percentin that period. Over the last five years, AARP Growth and Income hasproduced average annual gains of 11.43 percent.

Q. At ages 86 and 83, we are faced with investing the proceeds ofa $94,000 CD which matures in September. We would like the funds tobe easily available in case of illness, etc. Money market funds soundideal, but they are not paying as much as CDs. What can you sayabout money market funds and their advisability? Why do they pay somuch less than CDs? Do they pay dividends or capital gains likeother funds?G.M., Escondido, Calif.

A. Yes, with both the stock and bond markets going to hellhand-in-hand over the past four months, those humble money marketfunds are certainly beginning to look pretty attractive again. Withthe majority of money market funds now offering a seven-day yieldbetween 3.5 percent and 4 percent -- with quite a few higher -- theylook very good to investors who have been battered by the sour bondmarkets of this spring.

Basically, the reason that money market funds produce a loweryield than CDs is that they are shorter-term holdings. These funds'portfolios are typically invested in obligations such as commercialpaper (high-quality corporate IOUs) with an average maturity of about40 days. Most people view money market funds in one of threeways. They are frequently used as short-term repositories for fundsin transit, where they will rest for days or weeks and earn a modestreturn relative to the current market -- not much, but better thanrotting in a noninterest bearing bank account. Others use themdefensively -- as a haven for cash in times of market uncertainty,where the money can ride out the market storms in absolute safety.Finally, some investors -- and particularly retirees -- make it apractice to hold a percentage of their portfolio in cash as a hedgeagainst sour markets. Like mutual fund managers, they might fromtime to time alter the cash allocation, heavying up in uncertainmarkets and reducing the amount when they're bullish, but the accountalways has some percentage of their funds.

CANISIUS ANNOUNCES HALL OF FAME CLASS - The Buffalo News (Buffalo, NY)

Six former athletes and a former coach were named for inductioninto the Canisius College Sports Hall of Fame.

The former athletes include Golden Griffins men's lacrosse coachRandy Mearns, who played 11 seasons of professional indoor lacrossewith the Buffalo Bandits and Rochester Knighthawks. Mearns (Class of1992) was a three-year letter winner in lacrosse, setting Canisiussingle-season records for points (94) and assists (49) in 1990.

The former coach is Tom Hersey, who served as head coach forCanisius football for nine seasons and finished with a 49-42-2record. Hershey is director of student retention at Canisius. Hiscoaching career was highlighted by a 17-7 victory at Dayton in 1983.

Others named to the Hall are:

Michelle Corrigan ('94), a four-year letter winner in softballand holder of several Canisius records as a pitcher.

Daniel Mullins ('88), a four-year letter winner in cross countryand track and a member of the distance medley relay team that set aschool record of 10:19.20 in 1985-86.

Jason Rausch ('91), a four-year letter winner in baseball whoholds the Canisius record for career home runs (27) and is the onlythree-time CoSIDA Academic All-American in school history.

Cindy Ulreich Reinhard, a four-year letter winner in basketballand two-year letter winner in softball. She ranks first in Canisiushistory in career field-goal percentage (.530), including a 7 for 7game against Siena in 1988.

Amy Vredenburgh, a four-year letter winner as a catcher insoftball. She caught 10 no-hitters, including five by Corrigan. In1994 she was an All-Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference selection andhelped Canisius to its first NCAA Tournament appearance.

The ceremony will be Feb. 5 during halftime of the Canisius-Siena men's basketball game, which tips off at 2 p.m. in theKoessler Center. A pregame reception will be held in the Patrick LeeCenter. Contact the Alumni Office at 888-2700.

MEN'S BASKETBALL: Canisius announced that Bret Wackerly (Canton,Ohio) and Joe Young (Battle Creek, Mich.) have signed nationalletters of intent.

A 5-foot-11 guard, Wackerly led Stark County in scoring as ajunior, averaging 21 points a contest, and was named the RepositoryStark County Player of the Year.

Young is rated the 11th-best prospect in Michigan byPrepSpotlight.com. He averaged 16.2 points and seven rebounds as ajunior, earning all-city honors.

Elsewhere, Daemen, which defeated Tiffin (Ohio), 87-72, for itsfourth victory in five games, is ranked 12th in the nation amongNAIA schools. Darnell Jackson's 21 points led the Wildcats' victoryover Tiffin.

WOMEN'S HOCKEY: Buffalo State freshman goaltender ShannonAnesetti was named to the ECAC West Women's Hockey Weekly HonorRoll. She posted 55 saves in the Bengals' 1-1 tie with RIT andstopped 44 shots against Plattsburgh in the conference opener, a 4-0 loss. . . . College Hockey America has named Niagara junior AmyJack Offensive Player of the Week and freshman Ashley Riggs Rookieof the Week.

WOMEN'S SOCCER: University at Buffalo goalie Anna-Lesa Calvertwas named to the Mid-American Conference All-Academic Team. Shecarries a 3.67 grade-point average as a psychology major.

New spin on life ; Division III athletics finds room -; finally - for Whitworth's Joel Werdell - The Spokesman-Review (Spokane, WA)

Here is the conversation, more or less, as Joel Werdell remembersit:

Friend: Let's do track.

Joel: Yeah. I thought I wanted to do track. But what event are wegoing to do?

Friend: I don't know.

Joel: Me neither. The hammer?

Friend: OK, we're throwing the hammer.

Joel: OK, let's go.

At Whitworth College, it is almost that easy to be a part ofsomething fun, fulfilling and uplifting - which, of course, is theway it absolutely should be.

Among the blessings we forget to count about college athletics isthat the big, bad, monolithic NCAA gets it about 40 percent right,at least.

That's the portion of its membership that is Division III, likeWhitworth. There are no athletic scholarships in Division III, nocodicils prescribing minimum attendance or arena size, no self-important million-dollar coaches and, often as not, no spectators.Just sport for sport's sake, and no other.

You know. Let's do track.

But at Whitworth, and in Joel Werdell's case, it's even betterthan that. At Whitworth, in addition to his formal education, he'sbeen set loose to discover some latent talents in a manner that'sthoroughly - to borrow one of his favorite words - random.

For instance, the hammer.

This weekend, Werdell throws it in the Northwest Conferencechampionships in Tacoma with a better-than-fair shot at winning. Hisseason best of 166 feet is about 7 behind the NWC leader, PacificLutheran's Dan Haakenson. It's also good enough to put him on thelist of provisional qualifiers for the NCAA Division IIIchampionships next month in Canton, N.Y.

If the distance doesn't seem remarkable, consider that Werdellpicked up his first hammer 14 months ago.

'I'd never seen it before,' said the senior from Edmonds. 'Ididn't even go out for track until last year.'

And what took him so long?

Here's where it gets good. Here's where it gets, well, Whitworth.

'I thought I was going to do football and baseball here, but thatkind of fell through,' he said. 'In fact, I got cut twice inbaseball.'

His football ambitions, he said, were ended by concussions. Hisbaseball ambitions, apparently, were cut short by limited ability,though like any true competitor he respectfully disputed the finaljudgment.

Over at Boppell Track, however, coach Toby Schwarz has theultimate open-door policy - though he allowed that even he was waryin this case. Werdell had no previous track experience and didn'tturn out until February last year, because of a January trip toHawaii. Schwarz wondered just how serious his new thrower was - and,of course, no coach fancies his program as a repository for culls.

'But he's a great kid and he works hard,' Schwarz said. 'Do youreally need anything more than that?'

It doesn't hurt to have a tutor like Matt Shaffer, the formerWashington State All-American who can still crank the ball and chainout to 195 feet himself. Still, Werdell couldn't help but wonder,'How do you teach somebody who's never done anything before?

'When you start, the ball just pulls you all over the place. Youfall down and it's embarrassing. You feel like such a klutz.'

But Shaffer's expert help and Werdell's own initiative - heworked out on his own all summer - resulted in a 30-foot improvementthis spring.

'I guess I was bound and determined to do something athletic incollege,' he said. 'I love to compete and I love being part of thisteam. Just being around these people is a cool opportunity.

'And what I like about track is that you can put as much into itas you want and a coach can't hold you back. What you can do isreally all up to you.'

Which is a segue as good as any to the flip side of Werdell'sWhitworth experience.

Somewhere between getting cut from baseball and taking a flyer onthe hammer, Werdell wound up in a band. He and Travis Stolcis - thefriend who talked him into track - lived in Warren Hall freshman andsophomore year. Stolcis and Tyler Kumakura began playing guitartogether informally that second year, and with Werdell drumming onthe djimbe, they performed at a fall barbecue. Soon, drummer KyleGilliam (who also throws the discus) and bassist Charlie Shepherdjoined, and the band which has come to be known as Sittser was born.

In the two years since, the group has recorded two CDs - financedby what you might call on-faith presales around campus. Once asolely acoustic group, they've added electric guitar, violin andsax, and Werdell himself has branched out on keyboards, for a soundthat doesn't defy categorization as much as make it irrelevant.They're a Christian band, yes, but no one gets clubbed over the headwith the word.

'I guess if anything,' Werdell said, 'we'd just like our music togive people a hope.'

Themselves, too. They've recently acquired some management andlater this month will open for the popular Christian band Deliriousat shows in Pullman and the Tri-Cities. They'd like to do someserious booking, but one band member is just a junior and Werdell -who will graduate next month in physics and computer science but hasathletic eligibility remaining - wants to return to pursue hishammer muse.

Sittser? Well, that's a good Whitworth story, too. Seems thegroup had a naming party at their dorm when someone came up with the'Jerry Sittser Orchestra' - double wordplay on the noted swing bandThe Brian Setzer Orchestra and popular Whitworth professor JerrySittser. It was a joke until Shepherd blurted it out at their nextgig when the emcee demanded a name.

The professor is cool with the tribute. He's had the band over tohis house for dinner and, said Werdell, has helped settle a fewintraband issues. But he gets no royalties or merchandising rights.

It might be ... it could be ... it is! No. 62 an American milestone - AP Online

TED ANTHONY AP National Writer
AP Online
09-09-1998
ST. LOUIS (AP) _ The man with the red goatee and the Popeye biceps made athletic and American history Tuesday with one swing of a wooden club, hitting an 88-mph baseball 341 feet into the Midwestern night and breaking a revered record a generation old.

In a nation that forever demands bigger, more, better, faster, Mark David McGwire is now a name _ and an event _ to be remembered.

With his 62nd home run of 1998, a stinging line drive that broke Roger Maris' 37-year record (which broke Babe Ruth's mark), the 34-year-old McGwire became the 6-4, 250-pound engine that could. The flashbulbs of a thousand cameras twinkled from the Busch Stadium stands, forming a hometown light show as he circled the bases triumphantly for his shortest home run of the year.

``A shot into the corner! It might make it! There it is - 62, folks!'' Mike Shannon, Maris' friend, said on KMOX-AM. ``And we have a new home run champion - a new Sultan of Swat!''

McGwire's 449th career homer came in his second at-bat of the night at 8:18 p.m. CDT, on a clear evening Chicago Cubs pitcher Steve Trachsel, who threw the pitch, stood still on the mound and watched as a grinning McGwire high-fived all his teammates. Then the slugger climbed into the stands to hug Maris' children, who eyed him as if he had lifted a Chevrolet with one hand.

The historic ball landed in an area where no fan could get it just over the left-field wall. It was picked up by grounds crew worker Tim Forneris, who said he will give it to McGwire.

``The legend of Mark McGwire continues,'' the scoreboard flashed. Security guards high-fived each other as they chased down the smattering of jubilant fans who rushed the field. Applause and celebration held up the suddenly irrelevant game for 11 full minutes.

Across the stadium, from the most expensive boxes to the hot-dog vendors in the outfield, they all said it: The national pastime, an odd game in which the object is to get back to where you started, is a contender once again.

``Now there's a reason to come back to baseball,'' said Sherry Irby, a pharmacist from Florence, Ala., who drove all night with her husband and two young sons to see a McGwire at-bat. They set up shop on cardboard mats in the outfield standing-room-only section.

``Good role models are few and far between for kids,'' said her husband, Ken. ``The country's been kind of in the doldrums with the Lewinsky thing. We needed something to cheer.''

And cheer they did, for days: St. Louis fans, opposing teams' fans, people who aren't fans at all, entranced with the excitement of the record. They cheered from the bars of St. Louis to the McGwire-mad left-field stands of Busch Stadium and beyond.

The home-run race being run by McGwire and the Cubs' Sammy Sosa, who has a healthy 58, has heralded a resurgence of the nation's pastime, scorned by many since its players went on strike in 1994. Attendance is up 3.3 percent this year and on a steady rise.

``Baseball sort of lost its way. Mark McGwire is doing a great job for the game,'' said Bob Edmiston, 87, who has been attending Cardinals games since 1920. He came to the stadium in a McGwire jersey and scarlet shorts.

But what is it about the home run in particular that has captured the American imagination across the generations? It is dramatic, violent, visual, an expression of power - a high-ticket item in a sport that many insist is far too unplugged.

``We're in an age of instant gratification. And a home run is instant gratification,'' says Melvin Philip Lucas of Cornell College in Iowa, who teaches a course on baseball's role in American history.

Milestones are especially crucial in baseball, a game of statistics with fans who care that so-and-so bats .306 against left-handed pitchers named Frank on partly cloudy Tuesdays in May.

``There's something in the pursuit of records that only baseball can deliver,'' said Bud Selig, the game's commissioner.

Behind it all has been McGwire, the aw-shucks Californian giant who makes $9.5 million a year and has consistently tried to deflect the attention toward baseball itself. He can't, of course; in a world of 64-ounce Big Gulps, Wal-Mart Supercenters and McDonald's super-size fries, McGwire is bigger-more-faster incarnate.

``He's really the home-run hitter of our era,'' said Roger Maris Jr., who should know.

Other famous home runs have transcended baseball: Bobby Thomson's, off Ralph Branca, that won the Giants the 1951 pennant; Bill Mazeroski's World Series-winner in 1960; and, of course, Ruth's called shot in the 1932 World Series, in which it's said he pointed his bat into the stands and put the ball right there.

Beyond being the national pastime, baseball - deservedly or not - crosses over into the fabric of American culture more than most sports, becoming the repository of many an American's metaphors of innocence and timelessness. You don't hear football players talking about ``Canton'' with the reverence of Cooperstown. And where's the Hockey Hall of Fame, anyway?

``Baseball is associated with legend - both sport and American culture,'' says Bill McGill, co-editor of Spitball, a literary baseball magazine.

It has been a memorable few days in St. Louis, one of the oldest of baseball towns. Fans have dissected each pitch. Words like ``prodigious'' and ``prowess'' are weary after weeks of hard work.

Thousands draw breath en masse each time he connects. Batting practice turns into a fireworks show. Random fans catch home-run balls and hold news conferences for the national media minutes later. Opposing pitchers hint they wouldn't mind giving up No. 62.

``This is something phenomenal in our lifetime,'' said Tony La Russa, McGwire's manager.

But while everyone around town is wearing No. 25 on their backs, in many ways it has been the loneliest number. McGwire has done his best to concentrate at the eye of the scrutiny storm. It hasn't been easy.

``You try to tell yourself to sit back and relax, but it's hard to,'' he said before No. 62. ``I'm a human being. I have emotions like everybody else.''


Copyright 1998 The Associated Press All Rights Reserved.