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Zirbs
ELKINS -- Current Elkins High School band members and alumni alike are planning to gather Thursday evening to say goodbye to both a legendary fan and an historic playing field.
Both former and current EHS band members will perform Thursday at Wimer Stadium to honor the memory of John Zirbs, who passed away May 12 at the age of 63.
Zirbs, a special needs person, was a 1975 graduate of Elkins High School who became the biggest supporter of EHS sports in the school's history by adopting the alter-ego "Super Fan." For decades, Zirbs would appear at all EHS games in full costume, including a cape, to cheer on the Fighting Tigers.
"Jeff Caplinger, who is the current band director at Tygarts Valley and the former director at Elkins High, had reached out to me and had mentioned the idea of the band playing," EHS Band Director Seth Blake said. "And with his help we kind of took that and we ran with the idea. And after speaking to John's sister it became abundantly clear that the band community had a place to say goodbye to Superfan."
Billed as "A Musical Tribute to Superfan," the current EHS band and alumni will perform the school's Alma Mater and Fight Song in memory of Zirbs, who was also known to many as "Mr. Forest Festival."
"John was a huge supporter of not only athletics, but everything the students at Elkins High School were involved in," Blake said. "He led the band into the park for corn roasts, and at football games he would walk in with the band. I think that a story like that absolutely deserved the attention of the band playing a tribute for him. He meant so much, not just to Elkins High School athletics, but Elkins High School as a whole."
The tribute performance will begin at 8 p.m. Thursday and will mark the final time the EHS band will take the field at Wimer Stadium, officials said.
Last fall the bleachers at Wimer Stadium were deemed unsafe for spectators. The EHS football team played no home games last season, and the bleachers at Wimer have been dismantled. On May 4, the Randolph County Board of Education voted to move forward with a plan to purchase and install bleachers at a field next to Elkins High School, located off the Beverly Pike Five-lane. That field will become the home for EHS football starting this fall.
Officials said t-shirts have been made to honor Zirbs and will be sold at the event. The shirts will feature the image of Super Fan and will be available to the public.
"As sad and upsetting as all of this is, I can't say enough about how important and significant it is to have the opportunity for us to say goodbye and to say goodbye at a place that meant so much to John over his years," Blake said.