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March 5, 1996
Last year at about this time I brought you an update on Ferol Mornhinweg's grandsons, Marty and Shannon Mornhinweg, sons of Larry and Darla Mornhinweg of San Jose, Calif. Shannon had just been signed by a professional team in Cannes, on the French Riviera, and Marty had been hired as an offensive coach by the Green Bay Packers. You may have noticed that the Packers recently climaxed a sensational season by beating the defending world champion San Francisco '49ers and advancing to the National Conference playoff finals against the Dallas Cowboys.
The Cowboys defeated the Packers in a classic contest and then went on to win Super Bowl XXX by downing the American Conference's Pittsburgh Pirates.
Marty and the Packers covered themselves with glory during the regular season and the playoffs by recapturing some of the team's former magic, dating back to the Vince Lombardi era when they ruled the National Football League. After the Super Bowl in January, many of the league's big name players were chosen for the annual Pro Bowl game in Honolulu. Marty coached the National Conference's All Star quarterbacks, Brett Favre of the Packers, Steve Young of the '49ers and Warren Moon of the Minnesota Vikings. The National All Stars defeated the American Conference All Stars in the Pro Bowl.
The Packer coaches, including Marty, were selected to guide the National All Stars after completing their most successful season since 1972. They were Central Division champs and runnersup to the eventual world champion Cowboys in the National Football Conference.
Brett Favre, the Packers' stellar quarterback, was coached by Marty during the regular season and was named the most valuable player in the NFL. Ferol, while visiting Larry, Darla and family in San Jose at Christmas, attended the Packers-'49ers game in San Francisco and saw her grandson's team win, 27-17. It was a major upset; San Francisco had been widely expected to win that game and go on to another showdown with the Cowboys before returning to the Super Bowl. Favre was given much of the credit for engineering the Packers victory. Some of his achievements are due to the excellent coaching he received from Marty.
Just this week it was announced in the newspaper USA Today that Marty has been promoted by the Packers to head the quarterback coaching staff.
Shannon completed a season with the Cannes team last summer then returned to the U.S. and enrolled in a California college to complete the last few hours remaining toward earning his degree. Before signing with the European professional team, he had been a sensational college quarterback in California and was so greatly admired that they asked him to run for mayor. But, that was not what he wanted to do, so Shannon declined. Now he has been hired as a football coach at the Redlands, CA, Junior College.
Neither Marty or Shannon is a Perry product but their parents and grandparents have close ties locally so we're entitled to claim at least a piece of them, and certainly we all share Ferol's pride in what they have achieved in the rough and tumble world of both professional and collegiate football.
While we're discussing things athletic, how about a nice round of applause for the Frontier high school Mustangs up at Red Rock, winners of the state class A boys championship in basketball. Coach Bob Weckstein's team sailed almost unmolested through the state tournament, winning all games by whopping margins. In the finals Saturday, they defeated Ketchum, the No. 1 seed, by 22 points. Three Noble county teams had a shot at state high school sports titles this year, but only the Mustangs were able to capture one. Frontier had just one senior starter, J. W. Buxton, of Marland. That should mean another good season next year. Congratulations on a great record (29-2) this year.