Our History
The “Ultimate PSU Tailgate” Team begins with our founders “Strong and Great” – Sue & George Henning. Their son, George III, was on the swim team so their tailgate always included Coach Brown, his simmers, and often the opponent’s team. We met at the Burger King on University Drive to “Circle the Wagons” and enter the Beaver Stadium as a group, so we could park together. The Hennings, Millers, Wilsons, Browns and George French would all gather there. We’d pull into the Beaver Stadium and wait for Carl, our favorite parking lot attendant, to “Pull us forward” at the very end of a row near Curtin and Porter. (Very close to where we park now with our Honorary Coach reserved spaces.) This was, as near as we can tell, Around 1982?
We’ve been together for over 20 years, every home game and some away games included. We have our t-shirts and a 16′ Banner to proclaim that “WE ARE…ULTIMATE PSU TAILGATE.com”
In those days, the Millers and Wilsons, with their combined five children, stayed at the “Luxurious” Penn State Stone Valley cabins and would load up our vans dark and early and drive into town to race into the Burger King for coffee and a croissandwich! By the way, the most interesting part of this routine was when George Henning would block traffic with his body so that we could all pull out of the Burger Kin to caravan to the Beaver Stadium. (It’s amazing George survived to become a Trustee!)
These days it is a little less exciting because we now have reserved parking as a group and everyone knows where we are! It is, however, a LOT more expensive, but a 1,000% increase in parking is worth it to park three rows from the Beaver Stadium.
We’ve had some friends join us over the years: the Shores and their rowdy Blue Kazoo Band, the Fentons (Who now must travel from Florida), the Cravens, Who help to anchor the Fenton spot, and we’ve adopted those around us, like the Strumpfs of Long Island, NY.
We can average over 150 tailgaters per game. We’ve hosted the Penn State Icers Hockey Team, lots of football players (Even after they went Pro) or their families, like Darron Perry, Chuck Penzeniki, Brandon Nobel, Dave Joiner, plus Lion Ambassador, Cheerleaders (Carol Phillips) and freshmen from the Cleveland Penn State Chapter. If we’re not scary enough normally, you should see the characters come out in costume at Halloween. it is a sight to behold.
We feature special themes like the Big Blue White Blow Out (where everything is Blue or White) and Big Blue fun on the Bayou (to celebrate our Sugar Bowl National Championship) which was our theme for Louisiana when the Food Network filmed us for “Tailgate Café”.
We have appeared on ESPN Gameday, NBC, CBS, “Sunday Morning”, The Food Network, in the Center Daily Times and Harrisburg Newspapers, as well a on local Radio “98.7 The Bus”, WRSC and the Commission of Tailgating has chowed down with us.
We’ve been together for over 20 years, every home game and some away games included. We have our t-shirts and a 16′ Banner to proclaim that “WE ARE…ULTIMATE PSU TAILGATE.com”
Eduacation/Sports
- Penn State University
- Penn State Sports (goPSUsports.com)
- ESPN Penn State Page
- Funeral Insurance
Shopping
- Penn State Book Store
- The Student Book Store
- McLanahan’s
Nightlife/Bars/Clubs
- The Rathskeller/Spats Cafe & Speakeasy
- The Crowbar
- The Darkhorse Tavern
Restaurants/Cafe’s
- Allen St. Grill
- Baby’s Burgers
- The Diner
- The Deli
- The Gingerbread Man (AKA The G-Man)
- High Way Pizza
- Mario & Luigi’s Italian Restaurant
- The Tavern Resturant & Adams Apple (Home of the Original Sin)
- Champs Sports Bar & Grill
- Spats Cafe & Speakeasy
Would you like to have your link here, or did you have a problem with one posted. Please e-mail coach@ultimatepsutailgate.com and let us know. Thanks and GO PENN STATE!
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View Recipes for:
- Go Big BLUEberry Coffee Cake Desert Keith Miller
- Shrimp Creole with Chipolte Peppers Dinner Keith Miller
- Beer Can Tailgate Chicken Dinner Sue Wilson
- Touchdown Tequila Chicken Dinner Sue Wilson
- Scotch on the Rocks Drink Kerry Miller
- Bloody Mary Balls Drink Keith Miller
- Corona Ritas Drink Sue Wilson
- Ed’s Macho Margueritas Drink Ed Wilson
- Break a Big Run Broccoli Salad Lunch Sue Wilson
- Blue-White Day Bean Bake Lunch Sue Wilson
- JoePa’s Pesto Lunch Sue Wilson
- Touchdown Mango Peachy Paterno Trifle Lunch Sue Wilson
- SW Potato Salad Lunch Sue Wilson
- The Tailgater Sandwich Lunch Keith Miller
- Beat Purdue Stone Soup Lunch Sue Wilson
- Mango Gazpacho Soup Lunch Sue Wilson
- Deep Dish Apple Crunch Lunch Sue Wilson
- Boneless BBQ Pork Chop Sandwiches Lunch Keith Miller
- AHT – Cajun Northwestern Sausage Lunch Keith Miller
- AHT – Not Blue but White Chili Lunch Keith Miller
- Roll Up the Score Tortilla Wraps Lunch Sue Wilson
- Create New Recipe | Create New Meal
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Brief History of the PSU Football Program
Penn State University has a very charming tradition in football and an ethic of striving for excellence that really needs to be viewed first hand to be truly appreciated. As a matter of fact, Penn State University was impressive enough before the rise of Joe Paterno, though Joe’s advent really began a new era in Penn State University football and took it to another level altogether. I might mention that Joe himself was more or less an apprentice coach for fifteen years before taking over the reins himself from Charlie Engle. But we’ll get back to that later.
So just how far back does the Penn State University tradition go? Well, to answer that question we need to go back nearly a hundred and thirty years to a rather unofficial football match played with Lewisburg University. As a point of interest, Penn State University won. But it would take six years for Penn State to actually create an official football team, and that was done in the year 1886. Lewisburg University had changed its name by this time to Bucknell, but the old-time rivalry was still there, and with the establishment of Penn State’s official team the old rivals played another game, and Penn State University won again. As a matter of fact, this rivalry between Penn State and Bucknell would persist for years to come, in game after hotly contested game.
While the team was official, it didn’t really have what one might call an official coach yet, and that would wait till a few years later, when George Hoskins, who would become known as ‘the General’, came aboard as coach of the Penn State University team. Though the tradition of an ‘official’ coach isn’t that intense in Penn State University. Did you know, for example, that only fourteen coaches were taken on in the whole history of their playing the game.
Despite Bucknell’s series of losses against Penn State University early in their history, the two often contested games rather intensely. In the more modern era Penn State University has contested over thirty seven bowl games, starting well back in 1983 and continuing on down through the years.
There have been some pretty amazing coaches at Penn State, like Charles Engle, for example. Now, Charles Engle was rather an innovator, and under him Penn State University experienced a long winning streak. You may say that it was Charles Engle who perhaps began the Paterno era, because it was he who took Joseph Paterno under his wing. Charles Engle coached for Penn State for more than sixteen years, and in all that time Penn State lost not a single season. Ultimately, he stepped down and Joseph Paterno stepped up instead.
Joseph Paterno needs no introduction to anyone who knows Penn State football, and he led the team to perhaps the second greatest focus of wins in its entire existence. There have been many great players on the Penn State team, and one might truly say that Penn State University wins because it has a proud tradition of loyalty that stands behind it.
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Brief outline of the recent Penn State University Scandal
Jerry Sandusky is perhaps one of the best defensive coaches in the history of Penn State University football. However he is infamous in that it is alleged that he regularly molested boys over the course of the fifteen years he was in volved with Penn State University football.
It was easy enough for Jerry Sandusky to gain access to vulnerable youngsters, because he had himself founded a foster home called “The Second Mile”, and it was dedicated to assisting children who came from troubled families or families who could not sufficiently care for them. These children had little support, and perhaps had few people to turn to, to report Sandusky’s actions. Certain more cynical commentators believe that Sandusky set up The Second Mile largely in order to have access to such youngsters, though this remains an unproved allegation. Nevertheless, the coincidence is very disturbing.
As a matter of fact, Sandusky was caught by different people in the act of molesting young boys two or three times over the course of his tenure, and each time the incident was hushed up for various reasons. As a matter of fact, in the case of the 2002 scandal both Penn University’s athletic director and the senior vice president were held accountable by the law for not having reported Sandusky’s crimes.
Jerry Sandusky’s preference for young boys actually came to light as far back as 1998 when he showered with a young boy and the boy told his mother. The mother actually reported this to the University police, but the district attorney at that time, Ray Gricar, ruled against taking any further action against Sandusky. In hind sight it was a serious error, because Jerry Sandusky then went on to molest a great many other boys, nearly all of whom were sourced from his “The Second Mile” charity.
As I said before, Jerry was caught in the act several times while molesting young boys. For example, in the year 2000 a janitor caught Jerry Sandusky having oral sex with a young boy. However, since the janitor (whose name was James Calhoun) was a temporary employee, he choose not to report the incident, perhaps because he was afraid of being fired in an attempt to hush the matter up. As a matter of fact, we don’t know to this day who the young boy in this incident even was.
And this brings up to the 2002 scandal, where Mike McQueary, who was a graduate assistant to Penn State, found Sandusky anally abusing a boy in the showers. He immediately reported this to coach Paterno. Paterno reported this to those in an authority, but only minor action was taken against Sandusky – actions like taking away his locker room keys and reporting his behavior to “The Second Mile”. As a result of this Sandusky went on molesting several more boys before police began taking an interest in his activities. Finally he was arrested in 2011, when his activities were brought to the direct notice of the police. Many are to blame for Sandusky’s streak of crimes, for there were many who saw what was happening over the years and said nothing.