Our View: ‘It’s Apple Week’

Hard as it is to believe — especially for us — Friday evening (weather and field conditions permitting) will mark the 10th time The Winchester Star will present the Barr-Lindon Crimson Apple trophy to a worthy high-school football team.

The distinctive trophy is awarded each autumn to the winner of the season’s series contested among the four Class AA schools in Winchester and Frederick County.

We are pleased and honored that the competition for this trophy — a red glass apple sitting atop a four-sided wooden pedestal featuring school logos, photos of the two men for whom the award is named, and a brass plate inscribed with past winners — has, over the decade, become institutionalized, a treasured goal and, with each passing year, an entrenched tradition.

Local bragging rights, we suppose, still do mean something. But then, legendary coach Walter Barr, who led James Wood to its only state title in football and twice guided Sherando to the very brink of a championship, would tell you that in a heartbeat. And so, too, the late Ron Lindon, who coached Handley to a pair of state titles a decade apart.

Thus, it did our hearts good to hear Millbrook coach Reed Prosser, who played for Mr. Lindon at Handley, tell his charges shortly after they had vanquished the Judges that “It’s Apple Week.”

Yes, it is. On Friday, Mr. Prosser’s Pioneers will entertain the Sherando Warriors, winner-take-Apple. Both teams sport 2-0 records in the Barr-Lindon series. It should be a heckuva contest.

But then, it most always is. After all, it is Apple Week.