First G-E-T graduating class looks back at successful merger 50 years later

The streak was almost over. 

The Redmen of Gale-Ettrick had won 26 straight games, with the addition of students from Trempealeau for the 1971 season that streak grew to 31. That’s where it would’ve otherwise ended, but because the two schools merged, it was kept alive.

Onalaska had a 12-6 lead with fewer than 10 seconds remaining in the game. It was enough that, legend has it, Trempealeau County Judge A.L. Twesme had determined the outcome was no longer in doubt. As the story goes, Twesme left the game and went to Wason’s Supper Club to tell the crowd that the streak was over. 

Only, it wasn’t.

Backed up near its own goal line, Onalaska decided to take a safety, making the score 12-8. That would surely be the final as the clock would wind out on the ensuing free kick. 

The clock did wind out, but that wasn’t the score because players from Gale-Ettrick and Trempealeau made magic happen. 

Steve Schaller fielded the kick and handed the ball off to Dan Brueggen on a reverse. Brueggen surely would’ve been tackled, Kevin Hunter — member of the G-E-T class of 1972 — remembered, if not for Glenn Brommerich, one of the Trempealeau newcomers. Hunter said the Trempealeau kid took out three Onalaska defenders with one huge block. Brueggen was able to scamper into the open field and score the winning touchdown, extending the streak to 32 games.

That game was one several people who were a part of the first-ever G-E-T graduating class remembered. It’s a memory that surely came up again last Saturday as the group got together for its 50th class anniversary. But this wasn’t a graduating class that grew up together, it was one that was thrown together through adversity and had to make the best out of it. 

The vote to have Trempealeau join Gale-Ettrick came in early 1971. After one referendum for the merger failed, the second try passed 927-602. 

Hunter remembered the hard feelings. 

“(There were) a lot negative Trempealeau people, parents particularly,” Hunter remembered. “They lost their school.”

Village of Trempealeau residents voted against the merger, 155-99. So did Ettrick village residents, 86-64. The rest of the municipalities, however, supported it. 

Trempealeau residents suddenly had to bus or drive to Galesville. They had a new school building to learn, new teachers and went from being Bears to Redmen. 

Hunter was among several from the Gale-Ettrick district who said the merger didn’t impact them as much. Part of the reason is because they had already gone through a merger with the Gale and Ettrick districts joining in a new junior high building. 

Brommerich said that he wishes he could’ve graduated from Trempealeau, words his wife, Betsy, didn’t like hearing.

For Brommerich, the merger wasn’t just about one block that won a football game. It also helped him meet Betsy, who was a junior at G-E-T when they met. 

“It’s funny because I’m the one that always has the negative comment about the consolidation,” Brommerich said. “I really don’t mind it, but I’ve got to live up to what I’ve been saying for 50 years.”

Glenn and Betsy started dating after football season and were married three days after she graduated high school in 1973.

Several of the graduates agreed that football was a large part of the reason it went well inside the G-E-T hallways.

Brommerich remembered that Trempealeau, which finished behind only G-E in the 1970 football season, only had about 13 players out for football. When they arrived for practice, they met 80 G-E kids. While he said the Trempealeau players all had their “Trempealeau Bears” shirts under their jerseys, the team came together well. 

Part of the reason it worked, Ed Przytarski said, is coach Russ “Pug” Lund convinced the players even before the school year started that they had to work together. 

“I do know we were very fortunate at the time that we had Pug Lund as our head coach,” Przytarski said. “He really melded that team together and made us want to succeed as one, even though we went from basically being competitors to being teammates.”

Athletic success wasn’t just limited to football, the school tied for the conference championship in basketball and went to the state baseball tournament. That was something Gale-Ettrick had never accomplished, but Trempealeau did in 1968. Together, they have combined for nine appearances in the state baseball tournament. 

“Sports has a tendency to meld people together, it really did help to have them with us,” Przytarski said. 

Class president John Byom agreed that sports played a role in easing the anxiety about the merger.

“There would’ve been some anxiety about it, but that quickly transitioned because I played sports,” Byom said. “(Trempealeau) had some really good athletes who came over, so we worked through any anxiety or issues.” 

Like Brommerich, Przytarski married his high school sweetheart, Eileen, though both were from G-E. Unlike her eventual husband, Eileen Przytarski didn’t have sports to help merge her classmates together. Title IX wasn’t passed until after the 1972 school year. She said, for the most part, the girls stayed within their previous social groups. 

“It wasn’t any animosity, it was more familiarity,” she said. “(It was) who you knew who and had spent many years with.”

Classmate Anita (Bishop) Scheller said the girls, for the most part, got along.

“There were people who were a little negative, but I was so impressed with the way it started right off the bat,” Scheller said. “Everyone was really friendly for the most part and sometimes with girls that isn’t always easy.”

Donna (Adams) Newman, previously a Trempealeau student, said she was familiar with many of the girls in the G-E district because she had worked at the root beer stand in Centerville. After the schools merged, she tried out for the cheerleading squad and, not only was the only senior from Trempealeau to make the team, but she was voted captain.

“I really respected those Galesville kids voting me captain,” Newman said. “They didn’t have to, I appreciated that.”

Newman saw the merger as a major positive entering the school year. 

“I saw it as a way of having many more friends and also as preparation for college,” she said, saying they’d be put into a similar social dynamic in a year anyway. “That’s not to say I wasn’t sad about losing the Trempealeau Bears.” 

Newman’s biggest issue with the merger was, well, the name. 

“I can’t believe in the 1970s they couldn’t have thought of a better name than GET High,” Newman said. “I can’t believe that ever happened. They could’ve named it the Southern Trempealeau County High School… Anything but GET High.”

The changing of the school nickname from Redmen to Red Hawks in 2011 brought up some hard feelings in Trempealeau with many wanting the school to take the Bears nickname. Brommerich, though, thinks Red Hawks was a wise choice.

“They got our school, they don’t need our nickname too,” he said. “Red Hawks is great.” 

Members of the district’s first graduating class look at the current state of the district and see a success.

“I am very proud of the G-E-T School District,” Ed Przytarski said. “One of the things that I believe is that the merger made a very, very strong school district.”

Several of the classmates mentioned the facilities that the district has built, specifically the athletic complex and Performing Arts Center. 

They also noted personal growth that came from the merger.  

Byom — who also went through the Gale-Ettrick merger — thought going through change helped him adapt to change. “You don’t realize it probably when you’re 15, 16, 17, but I’m quite sure it would’ve.” 

“It opened our eyes to opportunity and also that the world changes,” Ed Przytarski said. “Nothing stays the same. Even though you want it to when you’re 17 and 18 years old and you’ve already felt you’re on top of the world.”

His wife agreed. 

“It helps make you realize you have to make the best of every situation,” Eileen Przytarski said. “A lot of things in life, in general, are out of your control.”

Though most acknowledged there are still hard feelings amongst some.

While the G-E-T class reunion was held Saturday night, a separate reunion for the students from Trempealeau was held on Friday. Brommerich wasn’t able to attend the G-E-T reunion because he serves as the president of the Trempealeau Lions Club and the reunion was held during Catfish Days, but he said he would attend the Trempealeau reunion. He said he knows all of his Trempealeau classmates by name and there are some from G-E, he doesn’t know at all. 

While he said the advantages of switching schools at that time may have been minimal, Brommerich admits the merger had a positive impact on his life.

While out in Las Vegas for a Wisconsin Badgers football game, he was stopped by someone from Ettrick who told him it was a “hell of a block” he made. It’s a story his son is sick of hearing, but follows him to this day. 

More importantly, Brommerich met his life partner because of the merger. He and Betsy celebrated their 49th wedding anniversary earlier this year and will mark 50 years next year. 

“This wouldn’t have happened (without the merger),” he said.