A home run

Chemical engineering students scored 24 warm beers and a trophy with a typo in the '70s . When Phil Wood talks about two major victories during his time as a Waterloo student in the early 1970s, he tends to remember the prizes much more than some of the other details. Fifty years after the 1973 chemical engineering grad and his classmates* captured first place in the Waterloo Engineering Society softball tournament, Wood can't recall the score of the winning game. He does though fondly think back on the award - a case of beer placed in Laurel Creek first thing in the morning but no longer cold when his victorious team drank it later that afternoon. Wood says the star on that sweltering July 1971 day was pitcher Jim Cockburn (BASc '73, chemical engineering).   "I think we were all about equally athletic except for Jim," explains Wood, who was the team's catcher. "Having a good pitcher really made a difference." - Locally brewed award. Playing four games almost continuously in a treeless area beside the University's Village One residence and Laurel Creek, the 3A chemical engineering students clinched the tournament about 5 p.m. The hot and exhausted team members celebrated by somewhat quenching their thirst with 24 warm Labatt 50s, brewed a few blocks away in Waterloo at the time.