I just want to verify if I am understanding this correctly,,CVH did not come via the CCH feeder schools, but by way of Villa. I thought from previous posts that all the players , except Ruth, were out of the feeder schools..

 

I don't know how long CVH was at Villa. Perhaps he just attended his 8th grade year?

I don't know how long CVH was at Villa. Perhaps he just attended his 8th grade year?

 

My understanding is that he was at Blessed Sacrament his 8th grade year (a CCH "feeder school") and was allowed to play varsity for Villa. I do not believe he attended classes at Villa. I cannot confirm this as absolute... but this is/was my understanding

 

Helluva player either way.

My understanding is that he was at Blessed Sacrament his 8th grade year (a CCH "feeder school") and was allowed to play varsity for Villa. I do not believe he attended classes at Villa. I cannot confirm this as absolute... but this is/was my understanding

 

Helluva player either way.

 

Hmmm ... interesting.

My understanding is that he was at Blessed Sacrament his 8th grade year (a CCH "feeder school") and was allowed to play varsity for Villa. I do not believe he attended classes at Villa. I cannot confirm this as absolute... but this is/was my understanding

 

Helluva player either way.

 

I know a girl who attended an NDA "feeder school" in 8th grade but played Varsity soccer for Villa. When it came time to go to high school, she went to NDA.

 

CVH probably did the same thing.

My understanding is that he was at Blessed Sacrament his 8th grade year (a CCH "feeder school") and was allowed to play varsity for Villa. I do not believe he attended classes at Villa. I cannot confirm this as absolute... but this is/was my understanding

 

Helluva player either way.

 

Your understanding is correct. Villa allows it.

Not sure if this has been asked but how many kids on CovCath's roster are actually from Covington?

 

When Covington Catholic first relocated to Park Hills from the city of Covington back in the 50's, tons of kids from Covington and Ludlow attended CovCath for there were still a significant amount of Catholic grades schools still very active within the inner-city.

 

Then you had St. John, St. Aloysius, St. Benedict, St. Ann (Of West Covington), St. Augustine, St. Patrick.

 

Mother of God Parish w/ no grade school for the old CovCath was located directly across from the church on 6th St. in Covington which was torn down in the early 80's to become a parking lot for the church as well as for Tickets Sports Bar.

 

As a graduation gift, 1982 CCH grad Josh Deters was helped by his dad to open Tickets Sports Bar where he obtained the goal post from the Cincinnati Bengals from the 1981 Kenny Anderson Super Bowl season which he positioned in the back patio of the bar, and to this day it still stands.

 

Before being torn down it used to house one of the coolest Halloween Haunted Houses that I had ever been to.

 

I believe there used to be a St. Joseph around Greenup St. in Covington which I believe turned into Bishop Howard.

 

The Cathedral Basilica of the Assumption which years ago had a school, and the building still exists, and has recently been added on to, to house the central offices of the Diocese of Covington.

 

Church of our Savior Parish, which is a predominantly black Catholic Parish, which never had a school, but most of their kids attended Bishop Howard years ago.

 

If you recall Jeff, Keith, and Phil Stowers, and John and Richard, this is the school that they attended. Keith was an exceptional CovCath football player who sadly died too young when he was murdered by a gunman around the age of 18.

 

Before becoming an all girl high school, La Salette used to be a coed Catholic grade school. The all girl school shut its doors after the last graduating class of 1977, and now is a low income Senior Apartments building.

 

On a side note, Notre Dame Academy used to be located on 5th St. in Covington directly behind Covington Catholic before it relocated to its present location on the Dixie Highway. Presently there is a new Federal Building at the old site which for years was a Toyota Car dealership. I'm not sure of the year of the relocation but venture to say it was in the early 60's perhaps?

 

In Ludlow you had St. James, and St. Boniface

 

Along with these inner-city Catholic schools you also had St. Agnes, Blessed Sacrament, St. Pius, St. Joseph, St. Anthony, & Mary Queen of Heaven.

 

Holy Cross Parish had their own High School, and so did St. Henry.

 

When the 1970's arrived you still had most of these schools still active except for St. Patrick had been torn down along with the whole community of housing in 1966 to make way for the restaurants, hotels, and gas stations to support the I-75 exit into Covington.

 

The present Irish Pub, Kelly's Landing Restaurant in the lobby of the Raddison Hotel (Then Quality Inn) keeps the spirit and memory of St. Patrick alive with a framed picture of the Parish at its entrance way along with a big stained glass type picture of St. Patrick in its dining area.

 

In Ludlow St. James and St. Boniface had merged.

 

In 1979 St. Aloysius in the Mainstrasse area was forced to close its doors for the changing demographic had caused dwindling enrollment numbers with St. Ann of West Covington soon to follow. The schools had merged with St. John and to appease to and unify the three parishes, the school changed its name to "Prince of Peace" while the church remained St. John.

 

In May of 1985 St. Aloysius burned down :cry: on a "Ascension Thursday", the Holy Day of the Ascension of Mary, where depending on who you believe was caused by:

 

1. Lightening striking the steeple (Insurance company called it an "Act of God")

 

2. A welder's accident during massive building restoration.

 

3. The devil worshiper across the street who used to steal communion host for Black Mass desecration who claimed to speak to Satan in the steeple on the day of the burning (Freaky, huh?).

 

The school is now a low income Senior Apartment Building.

 

In 1986 the dome of Mother of God church suffered terrible damage when a tornado in rare fashion swept through the city. The insurance companies claimed it to be considered a "micro blast" and not a tornado to avoid having to pay out to those that had only the word "tornado" in their policy.

 

The following year while workers were fixing the dome, a welder's mishap accidentally started a fire creating a massive fire to the dome. I witnessed the blaze and could not believe what I was seeing, for having just recently witnessed the burning of St. Aloysius. This was all too much and I emotionally cursed the gods and wondered what the hell was happening to all of my childhood churches and memories. :rage: :cry:

 

My childhood revolved around the steeple clocks and bells from both of these churches to remind me that it was dinner time when I was out playing ball in the streets. I could see the St. Aloysius steeple from the 2nd floor of my childhood home.

 

Thankfully the church was saved and the dome repaired after extensive damage.

 

Eventually Bishop Howard too closed its doors, however the "Church of our Savior Parish" is still active to this day.

 

Around 1984, the priest (I forget his name) of the parish took a bullet, but survived after a long tense hospital stay while he exited the church on a Monday morning on his way to the bank with the Sunday donation money.

 

Shortly there after he used to frequent a local pub to invite folks to play backgammon with him for he was a exceptional player. I took my turn at playing him (and lost of course), but will never forget chatting with him outside of the pub around the 4th of July when a firecracker went off nearby freaking him the hell out, where he jumped and said that he had to leave immediately. He said that he was having flashbacks of being shot. I had to fight back tears for the man looked so scared, skittish, and disturbed. I could fully understand. (Does anyone remember the shooting story or his name?)

 

St. Benedict church still very much exists however the school's name has been changed to "Holy Family".

 

In 2009 or 2010, some stupid neighbor on a narrow city street set off bottle rockets on the 4th of July that landed in the steeple doing bad damage to it, but thankfully the fire department did good work to save the church from its demise.

 

Thank God, for this would have been a terrible loss as St. Ben's has a very nice church community, a legendary annual festive which supports perhaps the best version of an old inner city Catholic school reunion as folks with good memories of yesteryear attend to play catchup with old friends and talk about old times, and the church itself is absolutely beautiful, constructed architecturally with a sort of Spanish vibe about it.

 

Not sure where games are played now, but back in the day the girl's volleyball games were held there every Friday night during the volleyball season and the place was an exciting mad house. St. Ben's always had great teams that kicked serious butt. (I'm getting choked up right now thinking about the memories). :cry:

 

By the time I graduated from Covington Catholic in 1982 the number of kids attending CCH from Covington and Ludlow was very small, and I would venture to say by now it's next to nothing.

 

What you now have left in the ways of Catholic grade schools from Covington and Ludlow that perhaps have limited amounts of kids attending CovCath are:

 

Prince of Peace

St. Augustine

St. Benedict

St. James

 

From what I know, the present CovCath basketball team has nary a player from any of these inner city Catholic schools.

 

To the best of my knowledge my information in this post is accurate, however much of it is from either memory or info passed on to me by parents and older siblings. If anyone knows differently about anything that I've mentioned or might've missed, I would love to know to fill in the gaps.

Edited April 3, 201412 yr by B-Ball-fan

I know a girl who attended an NDA "feeder school" in 8th grade but played Varsity soccer for Villa. When it came time to go to high school, she went to NDA.

 

CVH probably did the same thing.

 

Your understanding is correct. Villa allows it.

 

There are many kids that play varsity at Villa while in grade school elsewhere & end up going to CCH. I don't think it happens too often in basketball, but it happens relatively frequently in baseball (and I assume softball).

Another side note about the Sisters of Notre Dame:

 

The Park Hills Animal Hospital that is located on St. Joseph Lane was originally a civil war period structure owned by the Southgate family. The Sisters of Notre Dame obtained this building in the early 1900's along with the land where NDA now sits, and turned it into a grade school for grades 1-4 calling it St. Joseph, hence the name St. Joseph Lane.

 

Along with the building, the Sisters had a chapel that still exists on the property and is owned by the present Vet Dr. Collett.

 

In the late 40's or early 50's the Sisters sold the property to the eccentric Dr. Bernard, Vet of the Cincinnati Zoo who operated his office at the present day Vet location, as well as making his home in the chapel which is much larger than most realize, and has been presently divided into 3 apartments where one of the apartments is and has never been occupied, but is very interesting nonetheless.

 

Dr. Bernard lived well into his 90's and died only a very short time ago, and within the last 10 year perhaps. There is a sign with his name on it still attached to the Chapel building.

 

While living in the chapel he designed it to be abstract and to this day it is still very much the same as it was when he designed it. His bar was the most unusual kidney shaped silver metallic shaped bar with a giant fish aquarium in the center of it.

 

He had a cage in his residence that was home to an ocelot, and the cage is still there.

 

In the late 50's Dr. Bernard gave Nobel Peace Prize Winner Dr. Albert Schweitzer a bunch of milk goats to feed the starving in Africa. As a return gift Dr. Schweitzer gave to Dr. Bernard a female gorilla which is the great grandmother of the present day gorillas at the Cincinnati Zoo. I believe her name was something like Pricilla or Lucy... can't remember exactly, but it's one of those two names.

 

Her mate "King Tut" stayed true to her, but she had her way with any male gorilla that she wanted to.

 

She actually lived with Dr. Bernard who said that she loved to take bubble baths in the horse trough that doubled as a bath tub, which still is in the bathroom to this day. Dr. Bernard used to put girly hats on the gorilla and take her for drives in his convertible, and freak people out at stop lights.

 

I have a good friend that presently lives in the part of the building with the ocelot cage, and the unusual bathroom where his tub and shower still is centered in the middle of the room in the horse trough.

 

The entire walls of the bathroom were decorated with antique magazine covers from the Sunday Evening Post and glazed over, and are still there from when Dr. Bernard put them there.

 

There is an old fashioned British styled toilet where the tank is high up on the wall with a chain that can be pulled to flush, but currently there is a normal flusher attached as well.

 

Next to the toilet is an old fashioned urinal much like you'd find in public restrooms of yesteryear in old buildings.

 

The living room/bedroom is the entire chapel area of the building with stained glass windows and wooden cathedral ceilings with big wooden lofty like rafters, as well as an ornate fancy French style mantel and non-operating fireplace.

 

His kitchen in out of this world huge, and has a glass see through bar that also used to be an aquarium.

Pretty neat information, thanks for posting it.

 

 

Around 1984, the priest (I forget his name) of the parish took a bullet, but survived after a long tense hospital stay while he exited the church on a Monday morning on his way to the bank with the Sunday donation money.

 

Shortly there after he used to frequent a local pub to invite folks to play backgammon with him for he was a exceptional player. I took my turn at playing him (and lost of course), but will never forget chatting with him outside of the pub around the 4th of July when a firecracker went off nearby freaking him the hell out, where he jumped and said that he had to leave immediately. He said that he was having flashbacks of being shot. I had to fight back tears for the man looked so scared, skittish, and disturbed. I could fully understand. (Does anyone remember the shooting story or his name?)

 

 

Father Allan Bradley

 

Rev Allan W Bradley (1944 - 2003) - Find A Grave Memorial

 

He was a great guy. He was a very smart man, who was very well versed on the Gospels, and the study of who the actual authors really were (it's not a simple, straightforward "Matthew, Mark, Luke, John").

 

Anyone who had him as a student will still remember "The Lineage of Abraham".

Father Allan Bradley

 

Rev Allan W Bradley (1944 - 2003) - Find A Grave Memorial

 

He was a great guy. He was a very smart man, who was very well versed on the Gospels, and the study of who the actual authors really were (it's not a simple, straightforward "Matthew, Mark, Luke, John").

 

Anyone who had him as a student will still remember "The Lineage of Abraham".

 

Great info... Thank You. :thumb:

 

Yes he was a brilliant man and an incredibly nice guy.

 

Genius I'd venture to say.

 

Also, I was mistaken and it was bingo money and not Sunday's donations that he was taking from the Cathedral, and not the Church of Our Saviour according to his obituary. Still, it seems like I recall it being from Our Saviour.

 

Also in my list of remaining schools in the inner city I meant to reference St. Benedict as "Holy Family".

Pretty neat information, thanks for posting it.

 

Thank you, my pleasure and I'm glad you enjoyed it. I dig all this kind of stuff.

Congrats to Cov. Cath! How bad was Billy Hicks ripping the officials? I was listening to a little of semis last night and guys doing the game on radio were talking about how he (Hicks) ripped the officials about every single call. Just wondering?

 

Ten years ago, I had the impression that I didn't like Billy Hicks. He visually is not a handsome man and his court side manner is distorted by this. Than one night, I was lucky to scout next to him at Shelby Co. I found him to be a wonderful, Christian man. One of my former players son played for him, and the father could not say enough to me as to what a great leader, teacher, and coach he was. Spoke highly as to how easy it is to misjudge our sideline demeanors. Go Billy Hicks, you are truly a great leader of young men. You did not become the all-time winningest coach in Ky.history by doing things the wrong way..

His antics on the side line were embarrassing. I heard he was that way on the court side but he was way worse than I was told. Maybe he should retire on top now. Someone show him a video how he looks from the stands.

His antics on the side line were embarrassing. I heard he was that way on the court side but he was way worse than I was told. Maybe he should retire on top now. Someone show him a video how he looks from the stands.

 

Embarrassing to who? I am quite sure he would get a laugh out of this.....