Mountain Valley High School plans to create an Athletics Hall of Fame honoring outstanding athletes there and from the former Mexico, Rumford and Stephens high schools. Nomination forms are available at the main office of the school at 799 Hancock St. Submitted photo

RUMFORD — Mountain Valley High School plans to create an Athletics Hall of Fame this year and include athletes from the former Mexico, Rumford and Stephens high schools.

“As much focus as we put into building towards the future success of our programs, it is equally important for us to celebrate the rich history of athletics in our community,” school Athletic Director Jeff Pelletier said.

Pelletier, a 2006 graduate of Mountain Valley High School, said he began the effort after conversations with Assistant Superintendent Matt Gilbert, who was the high school principal when the idea was pushed in 2010.

The effort also gained support from current Principal Tom Danylik and Assistant Principal Craig Milledge.

“We definitely have a rich history, with all the success that those schools had, and continued on to Mountain Valley,” Pelletier said. “Finding a way to celebrate that, I want to bridge the gap between the Rumford and Mexico alum and Mountain Valley. There’s a lot of people in our hallways that couldn’t tell you who Andy Bedard was, let alone some of the other greats here.”

Bedard, a Rumford native, played basketball for the University of Maine, graduating in 2000. He was a two-year letter winner and captain at Maine after transferring from Boston College. He led the Black Bears to a school record 24 victories in 1999-2000 and was a First Team America East selection. He was Second Team All-New England in 1998-99 and 1999-2000. He led the America East in assists both seasons and ranked among the nation’s top 15 both years. At the time of his induction into the University of Maine Sports Hall of Fame in 2007, he held the record for both career and single season assists. Bedard served as an assistant coach at Maine for two years following graduation.

Pelletier said it has been fun “thinking ‘who would my first class (of inductees) be’ if I was the one choosing? If you like athletics, it’s fun to think about that stuff.”

He is working on a two-step process to get the effort started.

First, there will be a Hall of Fame Committee to help with the selection process, followed by the public submitting nominations. The committee will vote on an inaugural class of inductees.

Applications to serve on the committee and to nominate athletes are available online via tinyurl.com/MVHOF. Paper versions may be picked up in the main office at the high school at 799 Hancock St. The deadline for returning both is March 31.

Pelletier said bylaws have been developed indicating the school principal, assistant principal and athletic director will be standing members of a board to select candidates for the committee.

“Once we do that, we’ll sit down and look at the bylaws as a committee, and start to look at nominations from the public and who should be the inaugural class of inductees,” he said.

Pelletier said having an Athletics Hall of Fame is “something I’ve thought about since I’ve been athletic director, but it’s also something that’s been talked about for a long time. I’ve been in conversation here as a coach here, as a teacher here, as a student and an athlete here.”

He said, “I hope I can encourage people that graduated from Rumford and Mexico to take pride in being part of Mountain Valley history. And I hope this drums up some support for our current athletes from those (alums). But I want our current students to learn the history that we have because there’s a lot of it.”

Pelletier said plans are to have a wall of fame along wall from the backside school entrance near Puiia Gymnasium.

“Ultimately, if everything happens the way that I like it to, I’d like to inform the inductees at the beginning of summer and to be able to have an actual banquet in the fall,” he said. “We’d like to make it an annual thing.”

For more information or to make suggestions, contact Pelletier at jpelletier@rsu10.org.