Working on a chain gang
From left, Jim Kirkbride, Mike Plett and Craig Dinkel work the sidelines of the Ellsworth home football game Oct. 10.
Mike Plett jogs down the field to move the chains during the Oct. 10 Ellsworth football game. Plett is a longtime volunteers from the Ellsworth Kiwanis Club who helps at home football games.
The thought of working on a chain gang in modern times sounds horrifying. People, all connected by a chain, are forced to do a job. However, volunteering to work on a chain gang today might score you the best seats in the house for a Friday night lights Ellsworth football game.
Ron Svaty and Mike Plett would know. For years, as members of the local Kiwanis Club, they’ve spent many nights volunteering to move those well-known 10-yard marker chains up and down the sidelines for local high school football games. That team of volunteers hauling those chains is called the chain gang. Plett has volunteered every game this season.
Svaty was not just there for the beginning of the Kiwanis chain gang project, he suggested it.
“I’m the only original Kiwanis member left,” he said. “We celebrated our 50th anniversary I think four years ago. We’ve been doing this for over 50 years. I’m not sure exactly when we started, but it was one of our first projects.”
At that time, Svaty was announcing football for the high school games. He saw the school struggling to have enough people to man the four-person chain team.
“I was announcing, and I would hear them sometimes say they couldn’t find enough people to run the chain gang,” he said. “I think at that time, they were depending on teachers to volunteer, and I thought, ‘Well, let’s see what we could do with Kiwanis.’ Now, we were all a lot younger then, like me and Dr. Ptacek, but we were all in on the chain gang.”
Svaty’s idea wouldn’t just benefit the school, but it also would benefit the then fledgling Ellsworth Kiwanis Club as well.
“I thought that was an opportunity for Kiwanis to gain publicity,” Svaty said. “When I was announcing the football games, I would always announce that it was a Kiwanis chain gang and who they were. I used it as a recruiting tool for Kiwanis. We did get Kiwanis members because people like to do the chain gang. You get to see the ball game from very close.”
Sometimes too close. When Svaty retired from announcing games, he also joined the chain gang crew, and finally retired from that after he took a hit from a player while working on the sidelines.
“When we first started out, the chains were right on the edge of the field. Well, back then, people were getting hurt,” Svaty said. “There is a marker and you do mark right on it, but then you step back behind the marker. Now, it is 3 feet back. That’s to give the chain gang some protection and to protect players who go out of bounds as it’s dangerous for them to run in and trip on that chain.”
Svaty retired from volunteering on the chain in 2015.
“There is a concrete ridge around the track and I got hit hard enough that I got knocked back in and my head hit the concrete,” he said.” I don’t even remember that. All I remember is I saw the guy coming, I dropped the thing and started backing up, but it happened so fast.”
Svaty was knocked out. “I was out. I woke up in the hospital. My wife was listening to the game. She knew I was on the chain gang and she could hear them announcing,” Svaty said. “She said suddenly there was no noise. It took about 15 minutes before they got me in the ambulance because they were checking me out. She said there was quite a long time and then she got a call that I was in the hospital.”
“That’s the worst one I’ve ever seen on a chain gang,” Plett said.
The chain gang works on the opposing team’s side of the field. Sometimes the gang can get hemmed in by players on the sidelines, Plett said.
“I’ve seen us knocked down. I’ve been knocked down,” Plett said. “Because sometimes you just can’t get back fast enough.”
“That’s the most dangerous time, if you’re in front of the players,” Svaty said. “That’s kind of a little bit where I was. It’s a fast game.”
“And you don’t always know where they are coming from,” Plett said.
Despite the risk, the chain gang has benefits that keep drawing in the volunteers.
“People want to get on the sidelines. You’re there. You hear them calling the plays,” Svaty said. “You’re right out there and see everything.”
“You listen to them arguing with the referees,” Plett said.
“It’s a lot of fun,” Svaty said. “It’s a great way to spend your Friday night, unless it is raining.
“It is fun, that’s why I’ve been doing it all year,” Plett agreed. “It is fun to just listen to the camaraderie. Sometimes there is a lot of cussing.”
And Plett has even worked the chain gang in a snowstorm.
The chain gang is popular enough there is rarely a problem finding volunteers among Kiwanis members. Usually, it only comes up if someone has a last-minute cancellation, Plett said.
A chain gang works with four people, but in a pinch, it can be done with three.
“I think I’ve been in one where we’ve only had three people,” Plett said. “It works, but it isn’t great. If you don’t have three, you’re in trouble. We have to find somebody.”
“I can remember when I was announcing, there would be some times we would need that fourth person and I would just announce we need someone on the chain gang and we’d get someone out of the stands,” Svaty said.
“Normally, it takes four people. One at each end of the chain, which is 10 yards. You have one at each end, and then you have the down marker person,” Svaty said. “And then there is a person that marks a clip. The referees tell you where to put the clip on the chain.”
Even in an era of seeing so many computerized images on television, college football and the NFL still have chain gangs. However, the NFL is looking into more hightech alternatives. But for now, the chain gang is here to stay in high school football. And while many schools offer payment, the Kiwanis volunteers man the chain gang for free.
“We’ve never taken a penny,” Plett said.
“Well, we did get a hamburger and a pop at half time,” Svaty laughed.
Since Svaty’s idea for the Kiwanis Club about 50 years ago, the Ellsworth Kiwanis have manned the chain gang for Ellsworth home games ever since. The chain gang helps to raise awareness of the service organization.
The local Kiwanis Club is a member of Kiwanis International, a global organization of members of every age who are dedicated to improving the world, one child and one community at a time, Plett said. The organization helps children both locally and internationally.
Plett mentioned helping a vision-impaired student attend college at Fort Hays State University. Svaty said Kiwanis also offers scholarships to area youth, but it isn’t always about those big gestures.
“We’ve done things where if there are kids in town who need new shoes and they don’t have any, maybe we can go buy them some,” Plett said.
“We raised the money to build the splash pad in the park. That was a monster project,” Svaty said.
The group also has worldwide projects like funding tetanus shots.
“We don’t just raise money for local children, it’s worldwide,” Svaty said. “It’s all about kids. Every service Club has some kind of a main aim, but Kiwanis is all for the kids.”
For anyone interested in learning more about the Ellsworth Kiwanis Club, they can contact Svaty at (785) 531-1250 or Plett at (316) 2587214 or visit the local website at www.ellsworthkiwanis. org.
Photos by KAREN BONAR/Ellsworth County Independent-Reporter