Raymond Sports Trivia

The Raymond High School track team of 1906 was the Montgomery County Champions, winning the county meet held at Hillsboro. Team members included Harold Henderson, Roy Reineke, Joe Egelhoff, Joe Beatty, Otto Wiegreff, Henry Munstedt, and Percy McGown. 

Harold Henderson was responsible for organizing the first basketball team at Raymond High School in 1905. The team played its games in Doc Heren 's Opera House and then in the Creamery. Harold gradua ted with the Class of 1907 (there were seven in the class) and then attended Northern Illinois College of Ophthalmology and Otology graduating in 1913 with a degree of  Doctor of Optics. He served in World War I in France and was president and adjutant of the American Legion Post in Raymond after the war. He moved to Lit chfield in 1937 to practice optometry there continuing until his retirement in 1968. In those days, athletic teams traveled by train, buggy or surrey to get to competitions. Often when traveling out of town by train, they stayed all night at the homes of rival players returning to Raymond the next day. 

Following the 1907 county track meet, held at Nokomis, rain and muddy roads forced the team to stay overnight. The team members slept in a livery stable and the girls who attended the meet stayed in the home of the owner of the livery stable. Other track standouts from Raymond High School were Henry Bitterberg who held the state record at one time in the shot put and Robert Seward who won second at the state track meet in the 440. Henderson also held a second place

finish at the state track meet in the 220. 

      Football as a sport was briefly offered at Raymond High School beginning about 1915. Games were played in Luking's  pasture. Some of the outstanding football players were Herman Higginson , Toke Herman, and Fred Bowsher . The sport died out in a few years and was never resumed.