Thanksgiving Game 1991

The Needham-Wellesley football rivalry is one of the oldest in the country. Every year, on Thanksgiving, the teams have their annual face-off. While each game brings its own excitement, no one is quite as memorable as the one that almost didn't happen in 1991. A so-called bomb in the field, national attention, and the postponement of a historical match up? This should be a Needham legend, and yet, thirty years later, nobody knows of it.

It started as all dastardly plans do: with a well-intentioned idea. A few sophomores wanted to boost Needham spirit, and considering Needham’s mascot, what better way to do this than with an actual rocket, right? So they built a rocket and secretly buried it on the fifty yard line of Wellesley’s field, planning on the best half time show in the history of high school sports.

But when the school janitor spotted a dirt mound on the field, they assumed, as any vigilant person would, that it was a bomb. Of course, it wasn’t. Police were called, and the event attracted national media coverage. For obvious reasons, the game was delayed until the next day.

The state bomb squad was called to detonate the device. According to current Wellesley football coach Jesse Davis, who was a Wellesley middle schooler in 1991, “It left a little crater in the field and they had to patch it up.”

A former junior on the football team at the time still remembers, “I think we were still in Needham… because it was at Wellesley. We were in Needham, in the locker room [when we found out]. It was shocking and confusing, as we were all ready to go.”

Another student, who was on vacation with her family for Thanksgiving, heard about the rocket. She recalls reading about it in the newspaper: “I was shocked that this would happen, but I was glad when I found out the truth: that it was meant for school spirit, not as an actual threat.”

There are hundreds of stories about good ideas gone wrong, but this particular one has stayed out of the spotlight. Why hasn’t this become a classic tale of misunderstanding, another legend to fuel the Needham-Wellesley rivalry? Though terrifying at the time, the rocket has become a vivid example of how not to support your school. This year, let’s stick to pom poms.