A Delano High School English teacher recently published a series of poems in the latest edition of the Pennsylvania Literary Journal.
Among the nine poems Rob Luke published in the journal was one about LeRoy Gonsior, an archeologist and well-known Delano resident who died in 2020. It was titled “The Dude of Delano.”
The poem’s title referenced actor Jeff Bridges’ character in the movie, “The Big Lebowski.” Bridges portrayed Jeff “The Dude” Lebowski in the film.

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Firefighter Mike Frach retired earlier this year after more than three decades as a volunteer with the Delano Fire Department.
Frach, who joined the fire department in March 1990, stepped down in March 2023 following a 33-year career there. At the end of this year, he will turn 65, the mandatory retirement age for firefighters.
“[He was] a valuable member of our team, and you never had to worry about him,” said Willie Staunton, assistant chief of the Delano Fire Department. “He always met the requirements of what we asked.”

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The Jaunich family’s passion for amateur baseball began with sneaking under the fence to watch Delano Athletics games and eventually evolved into their active involvement in the sport.
It wasn’t easy for Eldoris and Wallace Jaunich to raise their large family of 11 kids, nine boys, and two girls. Money was always tight, but they always seemed to provide for their family.
In those days, there were no modern distractions like TV, video games, cellphones, or the internet, so the Jaunich kids spent their days playing baseball from sunrise to sundown.
Paul Jaunich, one of the nine boys, said they would wake up in the morning and go down to the park where they had organized baseball. “We played baseball all morning and then went home and had lunch. We would go right back to the field after lunch, and just play more baseball,” he said.

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DELANO – The Delano boys soccer team came into the season with high expectations. They’ve met those expectations early on.

Coming off a pair of ties, the Tigers opened the floodgates as they got the offense going in a 6-1 win over St. Francis Tuesday night on their home field.

“They played a little more loose than we have in the past,” Delano coach Tristen Griffin said. “It was nice to see them score some goals and get after it.”

After a bit of a slow start, Will Strandemo got the Tigers on the board just over midway through the first half on a goal assisted by Sage Mullen.

“Just talking and feeding off our energy was big,” Mullen said about the win. “We moved the ball really well and we were talking so that kept the energy up. We succeeded at doing that.”

Strandemo would add another goal late in the first half to put the Tigers up 2-0. Alex Barta had the assist as Delano took a 2-0 lead into halftime.

“The unselfishness out of them is the key,” Griffin said. “The balance we’ve had has been huge. We just have to keep building off that.”

Up a pair of goals in the second half, Delano wasn’t satisfied. After an assist on the goal late in the first half, Barta recorded a pair of goals himself less than four minutes apart to push the Tigers’ lead to 4-0.
Brock Lucas and Strandemo would add two more goals down the stretch as the Tigers ran away with things in their fourth win of the season.

“We got to keep the energy level high,” Griffin said about adding to their lead late. “If we’re not active after getting a goal, we get flat. We just always want to keep looking for the next one.”

Strandemo finished with three goals and an assist to lead the way for Delano in the win. Barta added two goals and an assist while Isaac Quandt added an assist as well in the win.

“The versatility is amazing for our group,” Mullen said, who made his 50th career start earlier this week. “We got guys coming off the bench that can score three goals in a game. It’s amazing.”

At 4-0-2 on the season, Delano has a big matchup coming up this weekend with Southwest Christian. A team that’s looking to take another step forward this year, a win over the Stars will keep the Tigers on track for what could be a special season.

“The goal is to get to the section finals,” Griffin said. “We’ve never been there. We’ll take it one game at a time and hope we can make it further than we have in the past. We just want to keep building on what we’ve done the past few years. We had 10 wins last year so let’s get more than that this year and make it one step further.”

DELANO – All Delano volleyball coach Becca Rue could do is smile as her team took the floor for their matchup with Rockford. Coming into the matchup with the Rockets, the Tigers had a perfect 8-0 record and have yet to drop a set. That streak continued for Delano as they came out red-hot and never looked back in a 3-0 (25-9, 25-18, 25-12) sweep of the Rockets Tuesday night.

“I really liked our energy,” Rue said about the start. “What I’m really enjoying about this group is that they are a very team-oriented group. I feel other teams don’t know where we’re really going and that’s what is making us successful. Other teams are struggling to block us because we’re mixing up our offense.”

It was all Delano from the start as they jumped out to a 13-1 lead in the opening set and never looked back.

“Our passing was really good and we had a lot of energy going into warmups and the game,” Taylor Tool said. “That helped a lot getting us going. It was one of those games where everyone could just put it away and our blocking was great.”

Rockford showed some life early in set two but the Tigers had the answer. The Rockets had an early 8-4 lead but Delano rallied to tie the game at 11. It was all Delano the rest of the way as they outscored Rockford 14-7 the rest of the way to take a commanding 2-0 lead.

“They play for each other,” Rue said. “I think we did that last year too, but we were successful last year and success produces success. They really want it. Even the underclassmen don’t act like underclassmen. They’ve been on this stage already and you can tell what a year of experience has already done for them. The seniors take the underclassmen as themselves. They’re doing an awesome job too.”

Delano completed the sweep, their ninth in a row to open the season with another strong showing in set three. Despite losing some key pieces from last year’s team that made it to the Section 6AAA title game, the Tigers haven’t missed a beat early on this season.

“Our team this summer was basically our varsity team,” Tool said. “We had a lot of time to work on our chemistry then and it’s translating over to our season now. It’s really exciting to start off the season like that. Our game when we have a ton of energy is so much better. When we work together and have fun, it’s pretty good.”

After starting the season with nine-straight sweeps, the Tigers will get a good test this weekend playing at the Farmington Tournament going up against bigger schools.

“It’s been a really great start,” Rue said. “This weekend we’ll see a lot of Class AAAA schools. We’re going to get tested there. To not drop a set yet this season I would commend their focus and desire. That’s hard to do.”

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