Packers training camp memory: The start of the bike tradition

[Cheesehead]

The above picture is proof that the bike tradition, one of the Packers' oldest and most uplifting, dates to at least the first year training camp was held at St. Norbert College and practices were conducted across the street from what is now Lambeau Field.


This 1958 photo is the oldest that I've found of Packers riding bikes from their locker room outside of what was then 2-year-old Green Bay City Stadium, through the east parking lot to the practice field along Oneida Street, just a short distance away.


The players are safety Bobby Dillon (in front or to the right) and halfback Don McIlhenny (in the back). The picture ran in the Green Bay Press-Gazette on Sept. 10, 1958, and the caption stated the photographer who took it was working on a feature for a national advertisement.


Now, does anyone know who the two boys are? If so, please let us know via email, history@packers.com, or in the comment section for this post, although we have two likely candidates.


"Before school started, young Packer fans used to wait outside the Packer dressing rooms to offer players a bike ride to the practice field," the Press-Gazette stated in its caption. It also noted, "The ride to practice is mostly downhill."


Between the photo and caption, we can determine the following:


One, the bike tradition pre-dates the Vince Lombardi era. Scooter McLean was coach in 1958. Two, this was the first training camp in Green Bay, at least, where some of the Packers rode kids' bikes to the practice field.


New Green Bay City Stadium – renamed Lambeau Field in 1965 – was dedicated Sept. 29, 1957. Twelve days earlier, on the afternoon of Sept. 17, the Packers practiced on their Oneida Street field for the first time. In fact, the Press-Gazette's Art Daley wrote the next day that it was the first time the Packers ever practiced on the West Side of Green Bay's Fox River.


With training camp being held that summer in Stevens Point, Wis., and basically all schools in the Green Bay area opening between Sept. 3, the day after Labor Day, and Sept. 5, there were only three days of practice before the Packers' final preseason game in Minneapolis against Pittsburgh and kids were in classes those days.


Here's one other note about the photo at the top of this post. It appears to have been shot at the south end of the stadium, where both the Packers' and visitors' locker rooms were located at the time in a small building that was later converted into a restroom. It wasn't until 1963 that the Packers built an office building at the stadium with a larger, plusher locker room.


In July 2014, I first wrote about the bike tradition for packers.com and asked fans to respond with evidence or memories of when it might have started. Keegan Wright of Greensboro, N.C., and grandson of former Packers safety John Symank, offered visual proof that the tradition dated to at least 1961. He submitted a photo of defensive halfback Hank Gremminger riding a bike in the parking lot with a young boy on the back, while defenders Jim Temp and Dan Currie scurried in front of the bike.