Dover High School celebrates Dover-Phila week with parade, spirit celebration and bonfire

Andrew Dolph, The Times-Reporter
Updated ·2 min read

DOVER – The calculus of this year's bonfire building outside Crater Stadium had to be measured by the truckload.

Semitrailer after semitrailer arrived at the site fully loaded with shipments of donated palettes for the giant bonfire to be set ablaze after Thursday night's Community Pep Rally.

The pep rally and bonfire are part of the many events happening today as part of Dover-Phila Week, which began Saturday with a Rotary Sportsmanship Banquet and concludes Friday night with the annual rivalry football game between Dover and New Philadelphia at 7 p.m. in Woody Hayes Quaker Stadium.

A semitrailer gets ready to offload shipping pallets and other wood to be used for the bonfire Thursday night at Crater Stadium as part of the annual Dover-Phila Week football rivalry celebration The wood was donated by Deflecto in Dover. Other companies in the area also donated materials.
A semitrailer gets ready to offload shipping pallets and other wood to be used for the bonfire Thursday night at Crater Stadium as part of the annual Dover-Phila Week football rivalry celebration The wood was donated by Deflecto in Dover. Other companies in the area also donated materials.

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The parade began at 6:30 p.m. at Tornado Alley. It ended at Crater Stadium.

Dover High School calculus teacher Brian Miller consults his cellphone while students construct a stack of pallets and other pieces of wood Thursday for an evening bonfire at Crater Stadium. The bonfire is part of the annual Dover-Phila football rivalry week celebration.
Dover High School calculus teacher Brian Miller consults his cellphone while students construct a stack of pallets and other pieces of wood Thursday for an evening bonfire at Crater Stadium. The bonfire is part of the annual Dover-Phila football rivalry week celebration.

Dover High School calculus teacher Brian Miller, who has overseen the bonfire tradition for roughly 15 years, said a "recipe book" dating back to the 1950s sits on his desk detailing the formula for a perfect bonfire. The book details everything: The materials to be used, how the wood pallets should be stacked and the general dimensions of the bonfire. Miller estimates that between 1,500 and 2,000 wood pallets would be used today.

Dover High School students stack pallets and other pieces of wood Thursday as they construct a bonfire outside Crater Stadium in Dover. The bonfire is part of the annual Dover-Phila football rivalry week celebration.
Dover High School students stack pallets and other pieces of wood Thursday as they construct a bonfire outside Crater Stadium in Dover. The bonfire is part of the annual Dover-Phila football rivalry week celebration.

Miller credited the senior students with today's assembly of the bonfire.

"This bonfire is going to be what they make of it," he said, "and they put in all the hard work – from the planning and acquisition of lunch to the construction of the bonfire."

Multiple Dover-area leaders were on hand to help, including forklift operators Jason Hall of the Dover Electric Light Plant and Matt Stevens of Gor-Con Construction as well as Dover City police officers and Assistant Dover High School Principal Scott Ayers.

Matt Stevens of Gor-Con Construction in Dover operates a forklift Thursday to assist in the stacking of shipping pallets onto a giant stack that will be burned for the evening bonfire at Crater Stadium.
Matt Stevens of Gor-Con Construction in Dover operates a forklift Thursday to assist in the stacking of shipping pallets onto a giant stack that will be burned for the evening bonfire at Crater Stadium.

Photo gallery: The building of the bonfire

Photo gallery: Bonfire and festivities

Reach Times-Reporter staff photographer Andrew Dolph at adolph3@gannett.com, or on Twitter: @andrewdolph.

This article originally appeared on The Times-Reporter: Dover High School built bonfire for Dover-Phila football rivalry week