Mikosz, Matthew
Football playerNo matter how much Shenandoah shrinks - at this point less than 6,000 people - the sports writers of high school football up and down the hard coal fields of Pennsylvania will never forget Matt Mikosz, as fleet a back as ever carried a football for the Blue Devils of Shenandoah High School. He brought state-wide attention to the town 15 miles north of Pottsville. Father Walter Ciszek and Mrs. T's pierogies also came from there. His father, Michael Mikosz, came in 1910 from Rzeszow, the largest city in southeastern Poland, to look for work and found steady employment in the coal mines of Shenandoah. Soon after, he married an 18 year-old girl, Josephine, and Matthew was the last of their five children.
In 1940, when he was a freshman in high school, he decided with a friend to go out for the football team. They were given the worst uniforms in the locker room. His friend didn't like it and quit. Matthew, however, continued to play in baggy pants and had a chance to recover a fumble. He ran with the football. Nobody was more pleased than the coach of the team, Bobby Nork, who turned Matt into a running back. Not to mention changing his uniform. From then on, he led the team in scoring. Nork called Mikosz the best back in his coaching career. The Blue Devils never lost a football game in his four years in high school.
From: Edward Pinkowski (2009)