RMD TRI-MEET, Three communities stay united through the decades
Front page story commemorating the 2nd longest running tri-meet between three northwest Indiana high schools.
Those who have participated in an RMD Tri-Meet, the long-time track and field competition between Rensselaer, Twin Lakes and Delphi, are understandably proud of its history.
The 96th incarnation of the tri-meet will be run today at Rensselaer Central. It will mark the
100th year since the triangle meet between the schools began, but not the 100th RMD. It hasn’t run concurrently since its inception in 1911, with the meet at least once being canceled on account of a flu epidemic and that little issue of World War II bringing a pause over several years, but it still stands as one of the longest running tri-meets in the nation.
Several have taken a crack at researching the meet’s history, and while it is generally accepted to be the longest running meet in Indiana, organizers have taken care to not get caught claiming a bit too much history. A triangle meet in Texas was begun in 1899, putting the RMD in the running for second.
“We used to advertise in our program that it was the second oldest track meet in the United
States, and somebody said, ‘Well what’s the oldest?’ ” said Gene Edmonds, who coached track at Rensselaer from 1960 to 1991. “Well we don’t know, but we didn’t want to say that we were the oldest, we weren’t sure. So we called it the second oldest.”
Plenty has changed since the RMD meet was first organized. Now used as an early May jump start meet for conference and sectional meets to come, the RMD used to be a competition far and beyond sprints finished, poles vaulted and shots put. It was a competition stretching the breadth and width of the school, meant to draw entire communities to it. Edmonds believed the intersection of the three communities along the railways made the trio an easy selection, and currently all three reside in the Hoosier Conference with plenty of rivalries in other sports.
The member schools still retain memories of these competitions, which included speech contests along with academic competitions and debates to go along with the athletic displays that have outlasted them. While not as all-engrossing as those early competitions, the modern meet has taken on a certain distinction among the three participating programs.
When other tri-meets or relays may be canceled if the original date is rained out and another cannot be readily found, the member schools are adamant to keep the RMD going, Twin Lakes coach and former RMD participant Mike Wright said.
“We try to impress upon the kids that it’s not another triangle meet,” Wright, who attended Twin Lakes from 1964 to 1968, said. “I like to bring up that this was a big meet when I was in school, and some kids get into it, like ‘Wow, that must be an old meet. How long have you been out of school?’
“I’m like hey; they were doing it many years before I was around.”
Wright had a first-hand look at the time when the “M” in RMD became obsolete. In 1963, the shuffling of consolidated schools, among them Idaville, Burnettsville, Yeoman, Adams Township and Monticello, ended with the formation of Twin Lakes. Monticello High School might no longer exist, and with it the end of the true-to- name RMD Tri-Meet, but the conglomeration of athletes made the continued competition at RMDs a change for all involved.
Monticello was on par with Rensselaer and Delphi in attendance before consolidation,
Wright said, with Twin Lakes’ formation putting the school on a path to a larger attendance class that it continues to hold.
“You’re coming from a small school, where you only had a few athletes who were pretty good, and you’re bringing them all together (to see) who’s the real cream of the crop,” Wright, who originally would have attended Idaville before consolidation, said. “I think it’s all for the good athletically, and academically too and financially.”
Generational ties are the cornerstone of the RMD’s appeal. Besides the rivalries between the schools, the continuation of an competition that could have seen a grandparent and grandchild run in the same event and strive for the same record is a quality not seen in many schools. The aspects of a school prior to consolidation may take form in the hanging of the swallowed schools’ banners in the new gym, but the continued presence of Monticello in RMD allows those same races to be run anew each year.
“It’s kind of fun, and when that week comes up for an RMD or a sectional … I put (records) up on the board and kids will say, ‘That’d be hard to do.’ ” Wright said. “It’s kind of neat for the kids to see that, to see it’d be hard for them to do it now, to accomplish some of those things. And some kids rise to the occasion.”
The RMD doesn’t hold the same place in each community as it once did, but the continued push for the traditions in the forms of old photos or clippings to be pulled down from an attic or out of a dusty garage keeps those accomplishments alive. All so that should the RMD hit its actual 100th running and continue on, the athletes of today can do the same.
“A lot don’t know the tradition of it, and if we don’t tell it kids aren’t going to know. There’s a lot of parents and grandparents that have participated in it, and they need to be recognized a little bit I think, to keep promoting the traditions,” Edmonds said.
The 96th RMD Tri-Meet begins at 6 p.m. EST today at Rensselaer.
