Ted Trompeter

Don Cantrell

One of the most valued lessons in sports was once absorbed by Ted

Trompeter when he was a Bee team tackle under the late Les Miller at

Harbor High.

He assumed it was perfectly alright one afternoon to depart from grid

practice and cover an agricultural assignment. He had plans to purchase a

jersey calf, but failed to seek permission from the football coach to

miss practice.

Upon his return, Miller dismissed him from the team.

A sympathetic agricultural instructor, Elgin Hall, admired Trompeter’s

character and chose to ask Miller to review the case. Miller did, and

allowed the athlete to return to the team.

Trompeter said he never missed a practice again after that and came to

respect Miller as a coach.

He subsequently became an All-League choice on the classy ’49 Sailor

grid team, which won eight games and scored 323 points, but his sterling

boost came in college at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, when he won the

Pacific Coast Conference’s light heavyweight boxing championship as a

senior.

Trompeter, 67, and a 1950 graduate of Newport, always considered

himself a “cowboy” and his many friends came to accept that picture of

him. He earned numerous awards competing in popular rodeos.

The college boxing conference included schools such as Stanford,

Washington State and San Jose State, and it was no cakewalk.

It eventually boiled down to an acid test against one of the best, Dan

McGreevy of Washington State. At 178 pounds, Trompeter finally won a

close decision over his chief rival.

Trompeter was interested in continuing on with his football talents,

but hard luck came his way at Cal Poly when he dislocated his shoulder.

He was 5-foot-11 and weighed 170 pounds in high school, but that

changed considerably some years after college when rodeo expanded on his

schedule. He eventually stood 6-3 and weighed 235 pounds.

After Army days, Trompeter became a right-of-way official for the

state before bowing away to enter private business with success in both

directions.

He has also maintained a loyal role to Cal Poly and once assisted

former alum John Madden, ex-Oakland Raiders coach, with one of Madden’s

annual auction drives at the campus to raise funds for Mustang athletics.

He could have passed on the huge Madden event, but Trompeter’s

daughter, Jeannette, a noted TV newcaster based in Ames, Iowa, was

co-emcee of the program. She laughed at the recall as “dad chose to

invite himself along.”

He also has a son, Scott, who resides in San Miguel, near Paso Robles.

Now a resident of Paso Robles with wife Arleen, Trompeter doesn’t

return to Costa Mesa as often as he once did. He dreads venturing through

today’s traffic.

A product of the Harbor Boys Club out of the late ‘40s, he retains a

habit of dodging salutes and directing them on to his old mates in any

sport.

Ted Trompeter, one of the unique individuals from the Long Gray Line,

and a member of the Daily Pilot’s Sports Hall of Fame, celebrating the

millennium.