Buffalo in the ’70s: Hubert Humphrey and the Buffalo Braves

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

Vice President Hubert Humphrey was the Democratic nominee for president in 1968 when he lost to Richard Nixon in the general election. In 1971, as he contemplated another run at Nixon the following year, he stopped in Buffalo for a pre-campaign visit and to take in the Buffalo Braves home opener at The Aud.

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Senator Humphrey appears to be having a better time than Mayor Frank Sedita as the former VP gets ready to lob the ball out onto the court.

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Humphrey visits quickly with the Braves cheerleaders. No record of whether an “ooh, ahh… Hubert on the warpath” chant broke out.

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Fans directly behind them in the golds and reds don’t seem too interested in the courtside conversation going on between Braves owner Paul Snyder, Braves Captain Walt Hazzard, Vice President Humphrey, and Mayor Sedita. That night, Hazzard, in his first game with the Braves after being acquired from the Hawks in the offseason, led the Braves with 14 points as they were pounced by the Seattle Supersonics, 123-90.

What it looked like Wednesday: Braves vs. Warriors at the Cow Palace

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

When the Cleveland Cavaliers beat the Golden State Warriors to win the NBA Championship in Oakland’s Oracle Arena a few weeks ago, the scene looked every bit the part that modern sports fans would expect of the multi-billion-dollar NBA of 2016.

Buffalo News archives

Buffalo News archives

When the Buffalo Braves traveled to the Bay Area to play the San Francisco Warriors in 1970, the home court at the Cow Palace—built as an agriculture and livestock pavilion—was lit, in part, by Liberace-looking chandeliers.

The photo shows Mike Silliman of the Braves trying to drive past the Warriors’ Joe Ellis as future Hall of Famers Nate Thurmond and Jerry Lucas look on. The Warriors beat the expansion Braves 123-108 under the light of that candelabra fixture.

Buffalo in the ’70s: Bob McAdoo and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar tangle at the Aud

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

It was an overtime thriller in a battle of two of the NBA’s premier big men as Bob McAdoo and the Braves hosted Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Lakers at Memorial Auditorium.

Buffalo News archives

It was Nov. 9, 1976, and McAdoo was showing the stuff that had won him the NBA MVP Award a season earlier.

Down by 20 heading into the fourth quarter, McAdoo led a comeback — including hitting a basket with two seconds left to tie the game. Randy Smith’s eight points in overtime cemented the Braves’ 121-116 victory.

Abdul-Jabbar led the game with 37 points in the losing effort; McAdoo had 34.

Buffalo fans were getting one of their last looks at McAdoo in a Buffalo uniform. Exactly one month to the day after this photo was taken, McAdoo was traded to the New York Knicks along with Tom McMillen for John Gianelli and cash.

McAdoo and Abdul-Jabbar ended up teammates on two Los Angeles Lakers championship teams where McAdoo was the sixth man on the club that also featured fellow Hall of Famers Magic Johnson and James Worthy.

Buffalo in the ’70s: Cheering on your Buffalo Braves

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

Buffalo News archives

“Oh, ah, Braves on the warpath.”

We can’t be sure exactly what the cheer was at the moment News Photographer Robert L. Smith snapped this photo, but the scorer’s table at Memorial Auditorium didn’t seem too impressed.

Fans in the Gold and Red seats, however, seemed to be paying closer attention.

Worst. Sports Card. Ever.

By Steve Cichon | steve@buffalostories.com | @stevebuffalo

BUFFALO, NY – They just look dumb. The 1970-71 Topps basketball cards look stupid for a few reasons.

DonMayThese cards are “tall boys,” which is good news if you’re talking about Old Milwaukee, but just looks dumb for a sports card. When Topps jumped back into basketball cards in 69-70, they decided that longer cards– to mirror the stretch physiques of basketball players– might make them more interesting.

Also, the outfits are weird. Legend says a clause in the players’ union contract said that players couldn’t profit from images of themselves wearing the team name or logo.

The solution is one of the dumbest things I’ve ever seen. Players wore their jerseys backwards. Or their shoot-around warmup gear (sometimes backwards.) Or they wore plain jerseys. Or they wore white t-shirts.

The team name does not appear on cards, either. Just Boston, no Celtics. Just Baltimore, no Bullets. Just Cincinnati, no Royals.

My interest in these very odd offerings is in the first basketball cards marked Buffalo (but not Braves.) 1970-71 was the year the NHL and the NBA expanded to include Buffalo, and that makes the cards only weirder for Buffalonians.

There is no Braves feel to any of these first Braves cards. The photos are not only of guys wearing backwards jerseys, they are all wearing the backwards jerseys of other teams.

Dick Garrett, coming off a rookie of the performance for the Lakers before being taken by the Braves in the expansion draft, is wearing a crisp white t-shirt.

Worst ever sports card. Nate Bowman 1970-71 Topps Basketball. He only has 1.5 armpits.
Worst ever sports card. Nate Bowman 1970-71 Topps Basketball. He only has 1.5 armpits.

But perhaps the worst sports card of all time has bothered and intrigued me since I bought it for 25¢ almost 30 years ago.

Nate Bowman played one season for the Buffalo Braves. He came here from the 69-70 champion Knicks, but you already knew that, because he’s wearing a backwards Knicks shirt.

While you’re looking at that shirt, look at the armpit on the right side of the card. It might be easier to be judgmental about terrible photo edits in this modern day where Photoshop flawlessly fixes anything, but holy freakin’ cow. Half of dude’s torso is missing.

It looks a lot like the guy who was editing the cards was working on this one right before lunch, and when he came back, he accidentally put it on the done pile.

How could someone only give a guy half an armpit and think that’s ok?

Worst. Sports Card. Ever…. among plenty of bad 1970-71 Buffalo (Braves) Topps cards.

This story originally appeared at TrendingBuffalo.com

WBEN 1973- Clint Buehlman, The Buffalo Braves, and more….

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo


Originally Posted: February, 2008

Just unearthed! Recordings of entire days of WBEN Radio… Unheard since the days they were broadcast over 35 years ago! Names like Clint Buehlman, Van Miller and the NBA Buffalo Braves! Read on!

WBEN AM/FM/TV, 1960

So where did these tapes come from? In 1995, Lin Television performed a massive cleanout of the 2077 Elmwood Avenue building they had just purchased as a part of their buying WIVB-TV.

Among the “treasures” I found dumpster diving, was a box of Reel-to-Rel tapes that appeared to be WBEN Radio Logger tapes from the early 70s. Many of the reels were blank… But even those with the audio intact were nearly useless… The tapes were recorded at 15/32 IPS. That is very slow, and at the time the tapes were rescued, the only way to hear the tapes properly involved about 4 hours of work for an hour of final product. For 13 years, I’ve been trying to figure out how to play these tapes back… And now… thanks to a new reel deck.. and some new digital audio editing programs, viola!

The audio quality is not the best… Its warbly sometimes… And it jumps quite a bit… And These logger tapes were in the Engineering Shop because there were problems with the recording…. But what is really amazing. Imagine your grandparents listening to WBEN all day… That’s what you get here. Things were slow to change at WBEN. Clint Buehlman’s Show in 1973 was not really all that different from the show in 1953. Van Miller is in great voice and cadence calling Buffalo Braves basketball. As far as I know, these are the only complete recordings of Braves basketball in tact.

Below, you’ll find exactly what and who is on these tapes… and some brief cuts from each.

Clint Buehlman

One of the most often asked questions to this website is, “What was the name of Clint Buehlman’s theme song?” The answer is, there were dozens of light airy instrumentals that were used to open each hour of the Buehlman show, after newsman Jack Ogilvie introduced Your AM-MC after each newscast. Listen below for several such opens, along with other snippets from the Buehly.

 

Newsman Jack Ogilvie (right) and AM-MC Clint Buehlman spent mornings together for over a quarter of a century starting in 1951 and ending in 1977.

Buffalo Braves Basketball

As Van Miller’s one time producer in both radio and TV, I can tell you I don’t know that he ever sounded better than behind the mic courtside at the Aud during Braves games, as shown to the left with Dr Jack Ramsey, standing.

Another of those popular questions is Do you have any Braves Games? Apparently, the answer has been yes for quite a long time… only they’ve been stuck on tapes I couldn’t play. But now, I have at least three Braves games in their entirety.

Braves vs Lakers: December 19, 1973
Kareem Abdul Jabbar visits Memorial Auditorium

Braves vs Bucks: February 2, 1973
Wilt Chamberlain visits Memorial Auditorium

 

Van Miller interviews Fred Hilton and Randy Smith in the WBEN studios circa 1972.

 


Some Highlights from WBEN Friday December 28, 1973

WBEN’s Al Fox interviews a cow.
Dick Rifenburg (l) and Clint Buehlman (r) receive an Award for Ski Coverage.
Ward Fenton
Dick Rifenburg
Jack Ogilvie
Ken Philips
Lou Douglas
Lou Douglas in Studio A
Stan Barron showing some kids around the studio.

Some Highlights from WBEN March 15, 1973

 

 


Random Highlights from WBEN 1973

 

Ed Tucholka at the WBEN-FM automation center.
Virgil Booth on the Channel 4 set.
Marty Gleason at the Editors Desk.
Reformatted & Updated pages from staffannouncer.com finding a new home at buffalostories.com
Reformatted & Updated pages from staffannouncer.com finding a new home at buffalostories.com

 

Remembering Memorial Auditorium and the NBA Buffalo Braves… Randy Smith Sings the The Bob McAdoo Song

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

bravespatchIt was the Bicentennial Summer of 1976– And as the nation was celebrating America’s 200th Birthday with all kinds of fife and drum music, here in Buffalo, the NBA Buffalo Braves were being musically celebrated all over the Buffalo radio dial with the McAdoo Song.

It’s a goofy song all about Braves Forward Bob McAdoo, who was 1973 NBA Rookie of the Year and 1975 NBA MVP.

The best part about the song is the singer– it was sung by Big Mac’s Teammate, Buffalo State College Grad Randy Smith.

randysmith bobmcadoo

Reformatted & Updated pages from staffannouncer.com finding a new home at buffalostories.com
Reformatted & Updated pages from staffannouncer.com finding a new home at buffalostories.com