A minute and a half remaining in the last quarter of Syracuse’s home game against Virginia Tech – the winner was going to the Sugar Bowl. Harris Elliott, tight end for Syracuse, catches a pass. He doesn’t know he’s caught the pass in the end zone till he hears the roar of the crowd that is surging on to the field. Syracuse is going to the Sugar Bowl.

That was 1964; Harris – Alwiyn Harrison Elliott – was a junior at Syracuse, on full scholarship. Going to the 1959 NCAA championship university was “…a big jump from Rumford, Maine. I worked my tail off.” Harris didn’t know how he came to be recruited out of Stephens High till after that game.

Stuart Martin, Burt deFrees and Jack Zollo were sponsors of the testimonial dinner for the football hero at the Rumford Point Congregational Church (where his mother, Louise Elliott was organist). There, months after The Game, Harris met Bill Rogers, a Syracuse alum from Lewiston, who was a friend of then-Stephens coach Mike Puiia: That was the connection that started Harris Elliott on his way to play for Syracuse in Yankee Stadium and to play for the Los Angeles Rams. Briefly.

Harris’ draft notice followed him across the country before the Rams’ summer training camp was over. Quantico. Fort Sill. Vietnam.

After he was discharged from the Marines, Harris did some coaching at Wake Forest in North Carolina, where he met and married Emily, and for a time back in Rumford, where he also taught.

He and Emily built a house in Erroll, N.H., on land his father spotted for him, and Harris began a new career as purchasing manager for a principal and chef of The Balsams Phill Learned of Andover. He retired last spring after 29 years.

Heroes and heroes’ heroes

I can’t believe I’m writing about a sports hero. I’m not a fan. Didn’t even know that the Rams moved to St. Louis. I hadn’t noticed much about professional sports since the Dodgers left Brooklyn.

But Jack Zollo called some weeks ago to urge me to talk with Harris, and if Jack Zollo says to do it, well. … He was right, of course; Harris and his family would make a great and heartening book.

Terry Flynn was at our house last week when Harris Elliott visited – back in Christian Valley where he grew up with the Roys, Jim Knight, Bob Colby. Everybody worshipped him when he was coaching, Terry told my husband.

Harris has some heroes, too. One of them is Walter Abbott: “He’s an icon.” Others include his late brother Jim (Class A ski jumper) his brother Bob (“the thespian in the family”), and his dad. I’ll return to the Elliotts and the Broomhalls – two more hall of famers – and others come ski season and then baseball season: The stories never stop.

More than 40 years after that testimonial dinner in Rumford Point, Harris found himself riding to a Maine Sports Hall of Fame event in Bangor with Jack Zollo and Dick Austin. “It was great swapping stories … so much fun” and full circle.

Linda Farr Macgregor lives with her husband, Jim, in Rumford. She is a freelance writer and author of “Rumford Stories.” Contact her at [email protected]