Thursday, January 17, 2019


Honorably building sound minds and sound bodies


It’s refreshing to see the non-profit Tri-Municipal Park Inc. readying multi-playfields, sand volleyball courts, disc golf, an orchard, walking trails, a pavilion and more on a 165 acre Centre Hall parcel. The board is asking the community for fund-raising suggestions regarding additional ideas that we envision for the park. Some ideas submitted so far are lit baseball fields, a walking path from town to the park, a butterfly garden and a tethered bike repair kit with an air compressor for pumping up deflated tires and sports balls.

When sportspersons start utilizing these playfields soon, a hope of mine is that most sportspersons will hold playing fair as a prime principle during their healthy competitions. Many psychologists talk about how playing fair in sports is more important than winning. Some overly obsessive winners want to crush their enemies and will do whatever it takes to win, even if that means being cruel or cheating. And as second-grader Eagle’s fan Abigail points out, “You don’t always have to win.”
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I agree with young Abigail. Perhaps we should see that “failure” is honorable and constructive rather than humiliating. Strong lessons from youngster’s clean-living days in sports carry over to real life. If parents help their children to be fair and fun to play with, then others will want to line up to play with them. We should be teaching our children ways to develop their characters and do well at winning at life. Strategy is an outgrowth of character and star players are those who can help their teammate’s blossom into becoming better players and people. 
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For the love of the game, when the park officially opens soon it would be nice to see respectful community members christen a persuasive entrance sign that reminds players about how integral fair sportsmanship is. Perhaps some of our thoughtful community members can submit their own motto and slogan suggestions to the Tri-Municipal Park board for such an inspiration park entrance designed sign. Alongside the slogans we could add a weather resistant monitor that plays a video loop of prime sportsmanship moments in sports; inviting the community to submit some of the same style films, shot from their new fields.
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For maps of the park and for submitting suggestions you can find the Tri-Municipal Park Facebook page at:

In addition, the park board meets the 3rd Tuesday of each month at 7 p.m. at the Centre Hall Borough Building.

You can make park donations at: www.centre-foundation.org

Here is a link to some featured Sportsmanship moments:  https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=sportsmanship+moments+in+sports

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