RHS Athletic Hall of Fame
Members of the Ridgewood High School Athletic Hall of Fame are those that have made a lasting impact on the school’s sports program as either student players, coaches, or supporters. Often the student players have continued to influence their chosen sports after high school by ongoing participation in athletics.
Vince Robertiello, 2008 Inductee
Vince Robertiello (Jamie Roberts), a former Sports Editor of The Ridgewood News, is being inducted as a Special Contributor to Ridgewood High School athletics. Robertiello began his sports writing career in 1944 when he was a sophomore at long-defunct Paterson Central High School. He covered their football, baseball and basketball teams as a stringer for the also now defunct Paterson Morning Call.
He graduated high school in 1946 and spent a semester at the Columbia School of Journalism, landing a job with the Paterson Morning Call full time as a general assignment reporter. The late Bob Whiting rescued him from the politics of the city by offering a place on the sports department staff.
Robertiello served in the Korean War for three years as an Army staff sergeant and, in 1954, went to work at The Ridgewood News as a general assignment reporter and later as sports editor.
Robertiello covered Ridgewood High School football for 30 years and also worked for a succession of corporations. He then covered baseball, basketball and track at RHS, as well as coach Otis Grendler’s marvelous 100-match regular season tennis unbeaten streak, the Ridgewood YMCA swim team and the highlight, following Carin Cone Vanderbush’s championship swimming career during his five-year stay as The Ridgewood News sports editor and, subsequently, as a reporter and Sports Editor of the Paterson Evening News and beyond.
Jamie Roberts, his alter ego, was born in 1962 when United Merchants, a New York Textile company, had him under contract as its editor of publications and refused to allow him to write elsewhere under his own name. The “Jamie” was from his son, James, and the “Roberts” a contraction of his last name. He used that pen name covering Ridgewood High School sports from then on.
Robertiello’s prized two sports writing awards highly, both were for columns. He earned first place in the New Jersey Press Association’s sports writing division for a column on Ridgewood High School’s late football coaching legend, Frank Mozeleski, published in The Ridgewood News and repeated in 1972 competition’s in the weekly sports writing category for a column featuring RHS head football coach Roger Sweeney and Paramus High School head football coach John DeGasperis.
Download: 2008 Banquet Book!
Lynne Collazo, Chuck Johnson, Patricia Putnoky Piotrowski, Tyler Roten, Kelci Smesko, Brett Sowers,
2022
Patti Auger, Eric Benedict, Eunae Jo, Peter McGinley, Karla Mixon, Clair Nowakowski, 1983 Softball Team, Joe Pedone, Julia Rappa
2020
Carlos Peay, Louis Edward “Eddie” Peay, Kelly Conheeney, Samantha Cermack, Chris Rae, Chelsea Steinberg, Mark Strittmatter, Andrew Clarke, Jim Dee, Phil Ross Sr.
2018
2016
Maureen Greico, Larry Coyle, Jacob Brown, Richard Bennett, Toshiko D’Elia
2014
John Marshall, Jim Bruni, Mark Romeo, Jean Hughes, Chris Van Note, Nancy Hogan, RHS Football Team 1913, Don Taylor, Rachel Grygiel, John Cerf, Paul Tornatore, Michele Marangi, RHS Boys Lacrosse 1990-92
2012
Craig Halyard, Tom Flatt, Tricia Pappalardo, Mike Henderson, Kandie Latham, Leigh Jester, Tom Dusel, Roger Sweeney, Linda Zabielski, Patty Capasso, Dennis Sullivan, Nick & Dottie Capasso, Track and Field (Bain-Daley-Oliver Era)
2010
Primo “Duke” DeRochi, Debbie Paul, George Monro, Bill Dunne, Amy Lyons, James Sullivan, Michael Culver, Keith O’Connor, Josh Kauke, Patti Mileski, Mary Ellen Mileski
2008
Kitty Batterson, Henry Blauvelt, Frank L. Bradley, Jr., Lucia Cancelmo, Chris DuFlocq, Renee DuFlon, RHS Girls’ Basketball 1922-1923, Harry Grundy, Jim Jones, Joe LeMay, Jen McDermott, Shannon McGarrigle, Tony Napier, Margaret Niemann, Vince Robertiello (Jamie Roberts), Damian Ross, Mike Springer
2006
Mario Ferraro, Paul Ferraro, Don Haldane, Wendy Hartwig, Tom Hopper, Bob Keino, Frank Mozeleski, Tim Mullen, Jenna Rogers, Donna O’Connell, Carin Cone, Charles Yennie
2004
Paul Arrigoni, Pete Campbell, Doug Cook, Becky Deetz, Otis Grendler, Jodi Hartwig, Gene Links, Debbie O’Connell, Aimee McGuire, Walt Perdue, Tom Simos, Kazbek Tambi, Jack Van Yperen, Bob Whitaker, Margaret Scutro