Basketball Booster Auction has best run ever, nets $11,600

Immediately following the Lady Bulldogs’ and Bulldogs’ final regular season game on Thursday night, fans, parents and players were working hard on Friday night in order to raise funds for the upcoming year with its annual Bulldog Radio Auction.

This year’s total reached an approximate figure of $11,600 raised for both teams, which is the most in the auction’s history.

“I just can’t say enough about how this community came together this year for the benefit of this Booster Club Auction – it was just fantastic,” Co-host Alan Gibson said.

Patricia Stalcup, parent volunteer, said she couldn’t have been more thrilled about the outcome of this year’s auction.

“When you involve more people, you get more in return,” Stalcup said. “We had all the parents doing their part this weekend. I’ve been delivering items this morning to people who didn’t have a chance to come out and get their items.”

This year’s event began at five p.m. and lasted 30 minutes past the regular sign off time of 10 p.m. due to the number of items donated to the boys’ and girls’ squad.

This year’s event worked in pretty much the same format that has worked since the fund-raiser’s inception in the 1980s.

“All in all, I think this was probably the best overall auction we’ve had in the 30 years that I’ve been co-hosting the program,” Gibson said.

Promptly at five p.m., after the afternoon news update at WANY, co-hosts Gibson and Jackie Flowers begin the program and start the auction right away with three items.

It wasn’t long after Gibson and Flowers took the air that the first call came through.

Working the phone lines, as always, two players answer the phone and take the bids called in by those listening.

Bulldog team members Wendell Maupin and Derek Albertson had the first 30-minute session.

Although the radio auction is mainly for those sitting at home listening to the radio, there is also reason to be on site.

“We had the biggest crowd on hand in the cafeteria we’ve ever had, we had the biggest number of parents and fans helping we’ve ever had, and I’m pretty sure we had the largest number of donated items we’ve ever had,” Gibson said.

In-house bids are over after two and a half minutes, giving callers a 30 second window to place bids over the phone. Up until several years ago, the listener at home had the advantage by being able to call at the last second, but in the age of cell phones, people sitting in the audience have called using their cellular phones while watching the auction live.

With more than five hours of volunteers running around, picking out items to auction and collecting money for items sold, Gibson said the entire night went by without a hitch.

“Still, despite the way this event had grown, we had what I think was the absolute smoothest run last Friday night that we’ve ever had,” Gibson said. “While everyone in the room and those bidding over the phones seemed to be having a lot of fun, the bottom line when all was said and done, was that the kids and the basketball programs were the big winners.”

Although there were more than plenty of the “smaller items” on hand to be auctioned, there were several larger items auctioned off that required a longer time limit.

Several houseboats were donated from local docks, including Sunset Dock in Byrdstown, Tennessee, along with Grider Hill Dock and Wisdom Dock in Albany.

Another big auction item was donated by the Blue Grass Livestock Marketing Group which consisted of a $500 reduction in commission cost at the first sale for the first pen of cattle sold at the very first sale. That item was auctioned for $1,100.

The three houseboats and the $500 commission reduction alone totaled $3,500.

The pace was fast and furious Friday night at Clinton County High School during the annual Basketball Booster Club WANY Radio Auction. In the top photo, Becky Means walked through the cafeteria displaying goods that were being sold during each segment of the program, while Carole Maupin collected money and handed out receipts.

Above, Bulldog team members Wendell Maupin, left, and Derek Albertson talked to bidders who were calling in during the opening segment of the program.

Below, the list of items sold during Friday night’s auction was one of the most wide ranging lineups ever, and included a full-blooded Labrador puppy that had been donated by the Mike and Tina Langford family. Melissa Starns is shown holding the eight-week old puppy as Tonya Thrasher and Barry Douglas Thrasher admired him before he went to his new home with the purchasers, Jack and Phyllis Flowers.

Several parents were on hand early Friday at the Bulldog Booster Club Radio Auction taking down bidder’s names and the items they had purchased. Manning the tally table during this segment were, left to right, Tammy Cook, Amy Davis, Becky Means and Cindy Choate.

Mark Maupin and Jerry Starns controlled the marker board during the first hour of the auction, taking bids from the players who were manning the telephone bank as well as from bidders in the audience.

Bulldog Auction co-hosts Jackie Flowers and Al Gibson run through the first set of items Friday afternoon at the high school during the annual Booster Club Radio Auction. Gibson uses a cowbell to alert bidders to the final 30 seconds of each segment as well as to the end of the bidding time for each group of items being sold.