The town of Maiden is about as quaint as you can get. There are no major department stores, no giant car dealerships, and the ratio for small businesses to churches is probably close to 1 to 1.

    On any given evening from about April until late September, you can find its residents strolling the sidewalks up and down Main Street, greeting each other as they walk by. Many of the approximate 3,300 residents are life-long ones, and in a small town such as this, everyone knows everyone's business.

    Since the decline of the textile and furniture industries, people haven't relocated to Maiden in recent years for the jobs. While there are some large corporations — Ethan Allen, Delta Apparel, McCreary Modern and Getrag Gears of North America, which specializes in automobile transmissions and drivetrain systems — most people relocate to the town for its quietness and serenity. The people who call Maiden home enjoy the simple things in life. It's the quiet time spent with family and friends in their cozy little homes that make the residents of the small town so unique.

    You'll find them at Maiden High School, underneath the Friday night lights.

    Yes, Maiden loves its football — more specifically, Maiden High football. On any given Friday night during the season, the majority of homes within the town limits will be vacant. As the town celebrates its 125th anniversary this week, people can tell you more about the Blue Devils than they can about anything else — and they're proud of it. Whether the Blue Devils are on the road, or at home, the people of Maiden are there. “Friday nights — you can tell what's going on on Friday nights,” Wilford Parker, the public address announcer for the Blue Devils said. “But other than that, the other six days are just normal days.

    "But when Friday night comes, everybody knows where to go."

THE TOWN

    Maiden has been coined the “biggest little football town in the world,” and it's probably true. The slogan is said to have started with a man named Bill Walton, not the basketball player, but credited as being the biggest Maiden fan ever. He made signs with that slogan for the 1971 state championship game with Mount Pleasant, which was held at Gurley Stadium at Newton-Conover. An over-capacity crowd at Maiden the week before broke the bleachers, deeming the stadium unsafe. After a come-from-behind 6-2 win, the crowd went crazy, and the townspeople and local media picked up the phrase and ran with it.

    People from all over have heard of Maiden, and even more so the football team. Parker told of a story about how he and his wife, Shirley, were on a cruise to the Bahamas for their 25th wedding anniversary, when a man approached him about the hat Parker was wearing — a royal blue cap with an embroidered 'M' on the front. "The man asked me where I was from, and when I told him, he had heard of Maiden and the football program," Parker said. "I have no idea where the man was from, but he had heard about the Blue Devils."

    Parker has been with the program pretty much all his life. Having grown up in Maiden, he played for the Blue Devils until he graduated in 1959, and has served as their public address announcer for 33 years. He spent 32 straight years behind the mic before retiring seven years ago, to spend more time with his grandchildren from Lincoln County, then decided to return last season.

    He remembers when the Blue Devils were just gaining their popularity under then-head coach Bill Barefoot. He said as well as he can remember, the stands have always been full. Back in the 1950s, Parker said the team played on the baseball field in a park beside of the old Carolina Mills warehouse. He said the bleachers would be pushed in for the football games, and pulled out for the baseball games. "I can remember when they were full," he said. "What we had were full."

    And almost 50 years later, the stands are still packed. "It's pretty exciting," Parker said. "We have a lot of people who've come. We have tremendous crowds for the games."

    Though times have changed since Parker played for the Blue Devils, with the rise of the World Wide Web, television and video games, he says the community-wide love for the Blue Devils has remained the same. "They say tradition never dies," he said. "And it doesn't."

    When the team packs up for road games, so does Maiden's residents. No matter where their beloved Blue Devils are playing, the fans will be there. "We really do well traveling," Parker said. "A lot of teams don't (travel well) that have good teams. I think Maiden travels exceptionally well. We filled up the visitors side at (Black Mountain) Owen during the playoffs last year."

    Although the town may "shut down" on Fridays, not everyone will go. Current assistant coach and former player Butch Parker — no relation to Wilford Parker — told of a story about a trip the team made to Bunker Hill during the 1971 season, the same year the Blue Devils won the state championship with Parker as a player. Parker said the team had left for the game, when coach Tom Brown told the driver to stop the bus on St. James Church Road. "Turn this bus around. We will not play these people on their homecoming," Parker recollects Brown saying. "We will dress at our place."

    Parker said no one had scheduled Maiden for homecoming before — those are games you are supposed to win. And Bunker Hill hadn't either, for it was something Brown used to motivate his players. "It must have been an old coach's trick," Parker said.

    Brown got the driver to turn around, and the team went back to the school to get dressed. On their way back, the Blue Devils passed puzzled fans wondering where the team was going, so those fans turned around, too. Once the bus returned to school, the team went into the locker room after explaining to everyone what was going on, and found it had been robbed. "So not everyone was at the games," Parker jested.

    But everyone did take pride in their Blue Devils. "The people that robbed us, didn't totally wipe us out," Parker recalled. "If they took a 20 (dollar bill), they'd leave a 10. If they took a 10, they'd leave a 5. People loved us that much." And the people still do. "Friday nights are special here," Parker said.

    When trying to find the right words to tell just how special Friday nights in Maiden are, Wilford has a hard time finding the words. "It's hard to describe," he said. "With people tailgating on the hill (at the old stadium) — you were so close, you felt like you were in the game.

    "We've got so many volunteers down here at Maiden, to help out with what goes on, not only in football but the athletic department," Wilford said. "It's a tradition that got started back in the 50s, and it just keeps going.

    "Sometimes traditions just get started, and they snowball and continue and continue."

THE KID

    Growing up as a kid in a town like Maiden, you loved your family, respected your elders, and you wanted to play football for the Blue Devils. Kevin Wilson, former Maiden player and current head offensive coordinator for the Sooners at Oklahoma, said being a Blue Devil was his childhood dream. "I was lucky growing up in a football town," Wilson recalled. "Maiden was, what I thought, when you grew up that's what you did. You didn't want to be a fireman or a policeman, you wanted to be a Blue Devil."

    For kids growing up in the small textile and furniture town, their sports heroes weren't the Tiger Woods', Alex Rodriquez's or Peyton Manning's of today. Kids didn't watch much TV, nor did they have the modern conveniences that abound us today. So hearing about the star athletes at the professional level wasn't commonplace. But what was, were the Blue Devils. "(Maiden) was a great little town to grow up in," Wilson said. "My heros and those superstars (as a kid) were those guys who played Maiden football. The high school sports deal was a big, big, big deal back then."

    Wilson said he grew up when Dale Jarrett was a star athlete at Newton-Conover, and the Maiden-Newton-Conover rivalry was just getting started. Fred T. Foard and Bandys had good basketball teams, and Bandys was beginning to excel at football, too. That was what people knew — the high schools and their athletes. "You kinda knew everybody, because they were was such small schools," Wilson said. "Sports were kinda big, that's what you knew."

    Currently on a recruiting trip in Louisiana, Wilson visits small towns, like Maiden, that remind him of home and what it was like growing up, wanting to be a Blue Devil. "You see a few (towns) and it takes me back," he said. "Maiden football did more for me than I did as a football player." Wilson said he can relate to the kids he recruits for the Big 12 powerhouse, because of where he came from. "I didn't grow up here, but I grew up in your hometown," Wilson said he's told several recruits.

    Now with a big-time program, Wilson has helped lead the Sooners to back-to-back national championship appearances (2003-04) and five Big 12 titles games in his seven years with the program. But after all the accomplishments, personal and team, his heart still lies with Maiden and the Blue Devils. "For a Blue Devils fan, it's that old stadium..." Wilson said of his favorite memory. "...It was those Friday nights."

    He still checks in on his team every Friday night, to make sure his Blue Devils are winning, because, after all, he wanted to be a Blue Devil when he grew up. "It was a good time to grow up there," he said. "I was part of a state championship team (1978). I can't say my team was any better than any other team, because it was such a consistent string of 10-, 11-, 12-win seasons.

    "It had a big part of my upbringing and life," he said. "I guess I could be doing this if I (were from) somewhere else, but it would be hard. I was lucky to play with some great players and be with some great teams.

    "That's what our community was."

THE PLAYER

    Once a young boy reached high school, he could finally fulfill his dream as playing for the Blue Devils. Many of those players are still with the program, and will continue to be because, just like the town and the kids, they love the program that much.

    One of those players, coach Butch Parker, was a defensive specialist for the Blue Devils during their 1971 championship season, graduating in 1973. "It was phenomenal," Parker, who has coached the Blue Devils for 20 years, said of playing for them.

    He said the team didn't have a field house back then, so it had to dress in the gym. When the team appeared, there was "a crescendo of noise" as the crowd got louder and louder. "That was the neatest thing," Parker said. "I would just really get fired up to play."

    Parker talked about the old "Creek Gang" that stood in the end zone and cheered for the Blue Devils. "It was just the neatest atmosphere," Parker recalled. "When we had away games, the Creek Gang would be standing there (by the creek next to the field), cheering you on as you left. And when you got back, they were still there, cheering you on."

    Parker said as a child he used to watch the team practice, and, just like Wilson, all he wanted to be was a Blue Devil. "As a high school kid, you played football," He said. "It was the highlight of your weekend. God-forbid if we did lose, it was a sad couple of days."

    Parker recalls the days of pulling up to stadiums for away games, and seeing the visitor's side already full. People, big and small, loved Maiden football. "People who worked together in factories just talked about Maiden football all day long," he said.

    From the kid who grew up idolizing it, to the players who basked in it, to the town that loves it, Maiden High football is the centerpiece of a town that has nothing but stories to tell about its Blue Devils. "Everybody can tell you their stories," Parker said. "There's been 1,000s and 1,000s of them. But I've been a part of most of it. The whole process is a pretty big deal.

    "The fact the town has been so supportive of football as long as I've been alive, and still does — I'm honored to have been a part of it in any imaginable way.

    "I think it's the greatest thing," Parker said. "Maiden High football." And so does the rest of the town.