by Erin Hinrichs, MinnPost
Before the kickoff of fall sports, staff at the Eveleth-Gilbert Senior High were busy selling tickets to die-hard Iron Range sports fans. Among them, Tony Tassoni — an Eveleth resident of more than 80 years — stopped by on Monday to purchase his season pass.
Nowadays, he has a grandson to support from the sidelines. But he’s been cheering on football players and other athletes in the Eveleth-Gilbert Public Schools district for as long as he can remember.
The rivalry between Gilbert and Eveleth that he’d initially grown accustomed to was disrupted back in 1993, when the two districts merged. And now his beloved Golden Bears may soon become a relic as well, if current talks between the Eveleth-Gilbert and Virginia Public Schools Districts over merging at the high school level come to fruition.
