The last time they watched at football game at the University of Florida, the Gators had never played the Seminoles, J. Wayne Reitz was the president, and the only television set they knew of was in the laundry room at the Florida Veterans Village (also known as Flavet). And just like this year\u2019s Gator Growl, that old laundry room was the place to be on a Friday night.<\/p>\n
But this weekend, Vern and Betty Hammond attended a bigger party. The Gator Engineering Tailgate Reunion hosted 500 alums in an orange-and-blue celebration that led up to Saturday\u2019s football game. It was homecoming for everyone, but for the Hammonds, that return trip was 58 years in the making.<\/p>\n
\u201cNext time, don\u2019t wait so long,\u201d joked the dean, Cammy Abernathy, as she introduced the couple to the tailgate crowd.<\/p>\n
Retired from a career at Tennessee Eastman Company, Vern Hammond once helped design the die for a groundbreaking high-speed wire-coating extrusion process. He and his wife of 63 years sat on the North Lawn Saturday afternoon, in a section of tables reserved for mechanical engineers (who tied with the electrical engineers for being the loudest cheering section).\u00a0 From 1951 to 1956, Vern Hammond studied mechanical engineering at UF \u2013 after serving in the U.S. Air Force \u2013 while Betty Hammond worked part time for the athletic association. On game days she would give the stadium ushers their row assignments and paychecks, so she never got to see the first half.<\/p>\n
This past weekend, the Hammond\u2019s youngest son, David, brought them back to Gainesville to cheer for their Gators – from kickoff to the final. At 84 years old, the Hammonds were the life of the party, the undisputed King and Queen.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s so exciting to be part of all this . . . the Gator Engineering Tailgate Reunion,\u201d said Betty Hammond. \u201cI hope we get invited back!\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The last time they watched at football game at the University of Florida, the Gators had never played the Seminoles, J. Wayne Reitz was the president, and the only television set they knew of was in the laundry room at the Florida Veterans Village (also known as Flavet). And just like this year\u2019s Gator Growl, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2592,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"single-templates\/single-sidebar-none.php","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"featured_post":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-stories"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n