West Branch Soccer Club Marks 30th Anniversary
by Abe Stauffer
(Editor’s Note: As the 2014 soccer season is about to get underway, the West Branch Soccer Club marks its 30th anniversary. From its inception, the club has been instrumental in the development and growth of soccer at the youth level in southern Clinton County, the efforts of its many volunteers helping to foster solid high school soccer programs at Lock Haven and Bald Eagle-Nittany High Schools and following consolidation, Central Mountain High School. Local soccer pioneer Abe Stauffer was kind enough to provide The Record with this anniversary look back at the West Branch club and the “early days” of soccer in the area):
Local youth soccer began in 1975 when Karl Herrmann, the Lock Haven State College Soccer Coach, had local children, including his son, playing informal pick-up soccer games on the LHSC field on Sunday afternoons. As the numbers increased and these boys got to high school, Hermann and the other soccer parents approached Keystone Central School District to sponsor a boys’ soccer team at Lock Haven High School. Through his hard work, the boys had their first season of interscholastic soccer in 1981. Mike Kling was the first coach. Abe Stauffer, a graduate of Ephrata High School and Lock Haven State College, was hired to teach Social Studies and coach the soccer team in 1982.
Realizing a more formal approach to soccer in the community was needed, Stauffer held a meeting in Room 108 of the Lock Haven Senior High on February 9, 1984 to continue and improve upon what Herman had begun. The purpose of the meeting was to form a local soccer club, which would organize and support youth soccer in the area. All area soccer enthusiasts were encouraged to attend.
Stauffer chaired the meeting. It was here on that night that the West Branch Soccer Club was formed. Elections of officers were held that same evening. The officers of this new soccer club were President: John Covell (a local doctor), Vice-president: Tom Ellis (a former player of Coach Herrmann), Secretary: Judy Orndorf Yost (a parent of two high school players), Treasurer: John Buchan (Lock Haven Postmaster and a high school soccer parent).
It was at this meeting that it was decided to sponsor teams in the American Youth Soccer Organization (AYSO) for the spring 1984 season. Teams were organized in the Boys U19 and Boys U16 age groups. These teams were affiliated with the Williamsport AYSO Region.
Plans were then made to expand the youth soccer organization for the fall of 1984 with a group from Woolrich expressing an interest in becoming involved. It was decided that the newly formed West Branch Soccer Club would affiliate with AYSO for the fall 1984 season. Lock Haven now had its own AYSO Region, Region 445. So the youth soccer program started by Karl Herrmann in the 70’s was now affiliated with a national soccer organization. It was at this time that the number of participants in youth soccer in Lock Haven grew to proportions greater than Herman or Stauffer could ever have imagined. In the following years communities like Mill Hall, Beech Creek, and Loganton also joined AYSO.
The Boys U19 and U16 teams formed that first spring season played their games on Lock Haven University’s McCollum Field. Youth games in the fall of 1984 were played at Lock Haven High School’s small practice field next to the McGhee School tennis courts and also at the Lock Haven Catholic School.
Knowing the WBSC needed more field space for their burgeoning AYSO program, Herman and Stauffer began looking for field space. In the spring of 1985 WBSC members laid out two full sized fields and one small field at the Piper Memorial Airport. The grass fields between the airport runway and River Road became the new home of the West Branch Soccer Club and Lock Haven AYSO. These fields served as their home fields for several years.
In the spring of 1989 it was learned that archeological digs would begin on the soccer fields in advance of construction of the dike/levee system. As Stauffer said, “We were going to lose the use of the fields at the airport!” The West Branch SC leaders began looking for land to purchase to build a soccer complex. Stauffer noticed farm land for sale on the Great Island owned by Earl Stern. Herman pursued this with the realtor and discovered that Mr. Stern did not want to subdivide his land. However, it was learned that Earl Stern’s son Mark had land for sale on the north side of the West Branch of the Susquehanna River just off the Farrandsville Road.
The West Branch Soccer Club bought 10 acres from Mark Stern in 1989. The land was worked and grass seed planted in the fall of that year. After giving the grass a year to mature and thicken the first games were played there in the spring of 1991. Seeing a need for more field space West Branch bought two more acres with most of it converted into a parking lot. West Branch now had enough land for four full-sized (70×120 yards) soccer fields or any combination of smaller youth fields and a large parking area. In 1993 the Keystone Central School District vocational students, led by Mark Chappel, provided the labor and skills to build a nice sized pavilion. A few years later, West Branch bought an additional 3.8 acres from Mark Stern to provide an area for overflow parking and for future expansion. The total size of the West Branch Soccer Club complex is now 15.8 acres.
Backers proudly note the West Branch Soccer Club is proud of the soccer complex they have built and improved upon over the years. The club is the only youth sports organization to own and manage its own facility in Clinton County. Money to purchase this land and make it into a top notch soccer facility was raised in part by camps and tournaments. Karl Herrmann and Abe Stauffer have run the annual soccer camp for kids now in its 33rd year. Over the years many tournaments have been held here including youth tournaments, Over 30 and Over 40 tournaments, 4v4 tournaments, and the annual high school Labor Day tournament now called the Clinton County Commissioners’ Cup. Even Lock Haven University would move their men’s soccer games to West Branch when their field on campus was unplayable. The University Men’s program used WBSC for additional field space when needed for their summer team camps. Proceeds are also raised by volunteers running the concession stand.
Stauffer said the West Branch Soccer Club would not be where it is today without a large number of volunteer soccer enthusiasts. Early leaders involved with the building of the soccer complex besides Herrmann and Stauffer were Charlie Rosamilia, WBSC president at the time, Don Harger, and Tom Shortledge. In an effort to list names of involved West Branch leaders and workers, there is always to possibility of forgetting someone but Stauffer said the club has compiled a list of WBSC Presidents. Besides John Covell and Charlie Rosamilia (the second president), presidents in order of their service are, Robbie Gould, Calvin Winner, Lenny Long,
Dan Corbett, Abe Stauffer, and Jeff Brinker, the present (2014) president.
The West Branch SC seal was designed by Kurt Herrmann, son of Karl. It depicts a rising sun/soccer ball over the mountains of Clinton County out of which flows the West Branch of the Susquehanna River.
