Todd Saylor to host town hall gathering for Hudson football

HUDSON — Todd Saylor will never forget watching the Hudson Tigers football team practice when he was 8 years old.

“Almost every day I’d run from elementary school to the high school practice field, hand out salt tablets and water and pump the machines, do all the things I could do.

“This one day, they were out there with no football helmets, no pads. They were in three sections. In one section, they were carrying men over their shoulders. I looked over there and there was one guy that could not get there. He struggled and struggled to get the guy on his shoulders. As he finally picked him and crossed the finish line, everyone started cheering.”

Saylor went to his dad, the legendary football coach at Hudson, and scowled because the players weren’t wearing helmets or pads.

“I said, ‘Dad I thought you were a football coach?’”

The elder Saylor’s response impacted Todd every day for the rest of his life.

“He said to me, ‘Todd, I’m not a football coach. These boys aren’t going to the farm after high school. These men aren’t going to college and some probably won’t be going down to the factory. I’m not a football coach, I’m a builder of men. These boys are going to Vietnam.’

“And, so, that changed my life. I really remember being as a young boy that I wanted to be my dad so much.”

Saylor has spent a lifetime telling the story of Tom Saylor and his Hudson Tiger football team that won a national record 72 games from 1968 to 1975 and captured the imagination across the county, state and nation. Next weekend, he hopes to hear more of that story when he returns to Hudson and hosts a town hall meeting from 2 to 6 p.m. Sunday March 3 at the Hannan-Colvin Post 180 American Legion hall.

The idea is to tell stories, reminisce and gather material for a book and, hopefully, movie project he wants to create reliving the Hudson streak and securing its place in history.

“I have so many stories of the win streak, but I know there are more out there,” Saylor said. “There are still quite a few people alive from that era. Hopefully people will come and tell me their stories.”

Todd, who graduated from Angola High School in Indiana, where his father coached after Hudson, is a motivational speaker and entrepreneur. He is writing a book called “The Tiger in Us.” He pitched the movie idea to a group of potential investors at the Super Bowl last year and he sees he has a lot of momentum for the project if he can get it off the ground.

There has been talk of other documentaries or films in the past that haven’t come to fruition. Well known producer Steve Gebhardt – who produced documentaries for people like John Lennon and the Rolling Stones – came to Hudson in 1975 and stayed for much of the season, living with the Saylors and filming everything from practices to games to things going on in the community.

Saylor has some of that film, but he fears much of it has been lost or it will never be made available to him.

“They filmed everything,” he said. “It’s a great story. They financed it all on their own. Dad gave him permission. My dad was so superstitious. I can’t believe he allowed that, but he did.”

What Saylor has access to he wants to combine with fresh stories about his dad, his coaching tactics, the win streak and more.

“I know there are countless stories,” he said. “Some people have written him letters over the year.”

Tom Saylor is 81 and his health has declined in recent years, but his son hopes to bring him to Hudson for the event. The hall of fame coach went to Angola after Hudson and coached his last team in 2010 at Morenci. In addition to coaching football, he made a name for himself in the donut industry.

“The Hudson event is to create some hype, create new energy, get me some stories,” Saylor said. “My father’s memory is really good until about 1990, but we are running out of time. It’s a story that needs to be told.”

This article originally appeared on The Daily Telegram: Hudson football town hall set for Sunday