A National Wrestling Hall of Famer, Dick Beattie of Locust Grove, was a cadet at Ponca Military Academy (PMA) during the school year 1944-45.
Beattie recalls that this was during World War II and there were a lot of movies filled with the war time theme. He remembers that Major Cox conducted some war games in which everyone had to participate. At that time Dick was a Fourth Grader and had a ball.
Remembering the PMA campus, Dick said that the west side of the west building was a theater, with no seats, so the cadets sat on a smooth concrete floor that slanted down hill from the back of the stage.
He was in a group of cadets that put a board on a roller skate and raced from the top to the bottom, where they crashed into the stage.
The escapades of this bunch of boys sounds like the Little Rascals TV and movie series.
The cadets hooked up a steel cable and tied to a tree at the bottom of the hill so they could hang onto a wheel on the cable at the top of the hill and ride it to the bottom. Dick recalls that a few of the boys did not hang on all the way to the bottom and did not ask for a second try.
"Of course when we were caught doing things like that we were rewarded by getting to guard the flag pole," Dick said.
OSU Champ
After graduation from Ponca City High School, where he was a state champion wrestler, Dick went on to Oklahoma State University, where he won two Big Eight and two NCAA Championships. He was on the Oklahoma State University wrestling team in the years 1958 and 1959 under Coach Myron Roderick. During these two years, he was the NCAA champion both years at 157 pounds.
Beattie was wooed by both OU and OSU. He said he chose the OSU scholarship because all he had to wear was jeans and it was closer to Ponca City.
Beattie also won a spot on the Pan-American and U.S. Olympic team but was not able to wrestle when he arrived there. This was because he had an emergency appendectomy in Los Angeles, before he was to make the trip to Melbourne, Australia, to participate.
There were not enough experienced officials in Melbourne that knew how to referee and judge the wrestling matches so the Olympic committee asked Dick to help out since he knew the rules.
He said, "I am very proud to say that after the competition was over an Olympic official told me that my refereeing and judging were perfect and I was now qualified to officiate in any future games."
In 1968, Beattie was inducted into the Helms National Wrestling Hall of Fame. In 2001 he was inducted into the Ponca City Wrestling Hall of Fame, by Myron Roderick.
Letter to Cadets
Beattie shared with The News a letter to incoming cadets from Major William V. Cox, Superintendent of Cadets, which set the tone for the academy. The letter reads: "You are about to enter a great experience, which will take you from the threshold of life along a pathway in which you will develop self-reliance and a strong character. Your experience will be rich in interesting details, which will contribute to your happiness and success.
"You will become a member of a strong organization with clearly defined objectives and responsibilities; an organization whose principal aim is to keep with you a close personal touch, so that your individual needs will be its first consideration. The patience and understanding of the faculty will be a source of great inspiration, and I hope will enable you to become one of the leaders in the school, which stands for the development and care of manly boys."
Ferguson from PMA
A memory concerning the PMA and wrestling, Dick recalled that after winning a tournament in Iowa in 1956, an OU buddy became ill and asked him to drive him home to Oklahoma.
On the way Beattie passed a Highway Patrol, who had nothing better to do at 3 a.m., than to stop me. My buddy was asleep so I went back to the patrol car to see what he wanted. He asked for my driver's license. He looked at it and said "Well Beattie how have you been? I am Ferguson from PMA."
His wife died after 40 years of marriage. The couple had three daughters. Dick retired from the Real Estate and insurance 12 years ago and resides in Locust Grove.