Sal Somma

Sal Somma, a onetime high school dropout and teenage runaway, kicked the extra point that gave NYU a 7-6 upset over Vince Lombardi and Fordham’s legendary “Seven Blocks of Granite,” denying the previously undefeated Rams a trip to the 1937 Rose Bowl.

In a coaching career that spanned parts of five decades at Curtis High School, Mt. St. Joseph Academy in Vermont, and New Dorp High School, Somma’s teams won eight New York City championships and a Vermont state title. His vision led to the creation of the Staten Island Sports Hall of Fame; at the inaugural induction ceremony in 1995, two years after Somma’s death, his was the first name called.

Football

Class of 1995

Did You Know?

Sal Somma is best known for his time at New Dorp High School, where his teams won six city championships. But before serving in the Navy during World War Two, he was the coach at Curtis for four years, guiding the Warriors to back-to-back undefeated seasons in 1939 and 1940.

From Our Collection

Thanksgiving 1959: When One Last Corner of New York City Was Still Part of Small-Town America, and High School Football Was the Last Thing Guys Did for Love (Book Cover)

Thanksgiving 1959, by Staten Island Hall of Famer Jay Price, tells the story of onetime high school dropout Sal Somma and his players – most of them the sons of Italian or Irish immigrants – on their road to New York City’s first schoolboy championship game and the Thanksgiving rivalry that, like the community around it, would never be the same.