09/03/2026
Tomorrow is Paper Hat Night! We've gotten a lot of questions about the history... So... Here is an article we did in 2021 with the history:
Paper Hat Night has been a tradition in Centerville for many years. The tradition began in the early 1980’s when the acting Athletic Director, Roger Campbell, proposed an idea based on an event he had been a part of in Mt. Pleasant. The premise of Paper Hat Night is to give high school athletes the opportunity to share an event with the younger school kids. Paper Hat Night allows the elementary students to interact with the high school students and it gives those high school students the opportunity to realize that there are young people in the community that consider them their personal role models.
In order to create this event, 1000 sheets of paper garnering the Big Red logo and a list of sponsors are ordered in August. The sheets of paper are then passed on to the Football Parents, who coordinate an evening of folding, to transform the ordinary sheets of paper into paper hats to be worn by the elementary students. But the hats themselves aren’t the most impressive part of this tradition. The interactions that take place between the student athletes and the young students are the heart and soul of the event. Juniors and Seniors that participate in a fall sport, cheerleading, cross country, football, swimming and volleyball visit the elementary buildings as well as the Pre-K buildings during the school day on Football Friday. Upon arrival, the high school athletes distribute the paper hats and remain in the buildings to spend some time with the younger kids and autograph the hats. The event emphasizes to the high school athletes the importance of being a positive role model for all of the young eyes that are watching them. In recent years, the Big Red Football Team stays on the field after the Friday night game to sign more autographs.
For reasons unknown, the tradition stopped in the mid 1990’s. In 2013, a group of football parents decided it was time to bring the tradition back. The tradition has continued every year right up until the fall of 2020 when thanks to the pandemic, Paper Hat Night, along with many other traditions, were put on hold. When the 2021 football season began, the football parents discovered that once again the tradition was in jeopardy. In previous years, the printing of the paper hats was coordinated by the Daily Iowegian. With the closing of that local paper, it became unclear how the hats would be printed in 2021. Enter GoPitchTV and Appanoose Weekly. After some telephone calls and the help of Hy-Vee who not only agreed to sponsor the paper hats, but also suggested contacting their printing company. The paper hats were then designed by GoPitchTV, printed by HyVee and delivered in time for the September 10th event.
This year marks 6 years of us helping with the tradition! We love Paper Hats and look forward to keeping it alive for many more years! We're excited for the kids connection with the athletes tomorrow night after the game! Watch for the feature on the paper hats from Lakeview during the pregame show tomorrow night before the 7:30 kick off against Fairfield sponsored by Iowa State Bank!
