Harry Ragsdale walked into the Narrows grade school cafeteria on the evening of December 11, 1954, expecting a faculty dinner. Instead, flashbulbs popped, and a chorus of more than 150 voices erupted in a roar. Coach did not fumble.

It was twenty-five years in the making.

The years since Harry’s return from the war had not been easy ones. After a winless campaign in 1946, Narrows won just once in 1947. Still, the 1948 team showed signs of life, finishing 7–3—the first winning season since Harry’s return. Subsequent seasons, however, lacked the sustained success that had defined the standard he had set before his departure. The Green Wave finished 4–5–1 in 1949, rebounded to 7–1–2 in 1950, then slid back to 4–5–1 and 3–6 over the next two seasons. The turnaround came in 1953 and 1954, when Narrows went a combined 15–5, the program’s best two-year stretch since before the war.

The improvement coincided with Harry’s adoption of a modernized single-wing system, detailed in Princeton coach Charlie Caldwell’s 1951 book Modern Single Wing Football—a story told at greater length in the pages of The Bandana Express. By the time the banquet committee began its planning, Narrows football had found its footing again.

The idea had begun in mid-October with Brooks Johnson—the same boy Harry had collared on his first day of school in 1930, and who, a year later, had returned the opening kickoff of his first game ninety yards for a touchdown. Nearly a quarter century later, Johnson was still thinking about his old coach and wanted to honor the man who had shaped so many of the town’s boys. He mentioned it to a group of former players, including now assistant coach Allen McClaugherty, and what started as an idea between old teammates soon snowballed into a full evening of tribute, organized along the lines of the popular radio and television program This Is Your Life.

To maintain the element of surprise, the planning required a conspiracy of silence that stretched across the county and beyond. His wife, Sarah, was in on the secret from the start, careful not to let anything slip in the weeks before. Three of Harry’s sisters and a brother were brought in secret from their homes in eastern Virginia and lodged at a local hotel. So thorough was the deception that when a local service station attendant congratulated Harry ahead of time, it nearly gave it away.

Brooks Johnson served as the master of ceremonies, and what followed was less of a collection of speeches and more testimonials and reminiscences of a quarter-century of service to the town and Narrows High School.

Professor William H. Barrett, Harry’s first principal, retold the story of the 23-year-old’s first day at Narrows — the fiery drainpipe, the paddling, and the young coach who almost walked out the door before he’d even started. He also recalled the years the two of them spent paying off much of the program’s first equipment, bought on their own signatures.

Edward L. Wright, Harry’s coach at Lynchburg College and by then the superintendent of schools in Richland County, South Carolina, traveled the farthest to attend. He told the crowd he would have driven much farther than that to say something good about Harry Ragsdale. Wright described the Harry he had first coached—a green, 140-pound freshman from Lunenburg County who had never played organized football before and nonetheless earned a starting spot at guard by his sophomore year.

Fred Helsabeck, a teammate and fellow lineman for the Hornets, called Harry the embodiment of a man who chose a community, grew alongside it, and gave back to it in turn. He also offered what may have been the night’s most resonant story — that of a discouraged freshman who had packed his bags and nearly left campus for good before a talk from Harry at the college’s front gate convinced him to stay. “Today, Orville Wake is president of Lynchburg College,” Helsabeck told those in attendance.

More speakers followed, each with their own memories of Coach. Brooks Johnson estimated that across all the sports he had coached since 1930, Harry had won upwards of 500 contests. Still, Vic Kreiter, the coach at rival Pulaski High School, delivered what may have been the finest tribute of the evening. “Speaking for all the coaches I know, as well as for myself,” he said, “we always leave Narrows after a game, win or lose, with a good feeling. You know you have lost to a gentleman when Harry beats you.” The rest of his remarks are recounted in the pages of The Bandana Express.

To close, Harry was presented with a plaque. It read: “In recognition of twenty-five years’ service to school and community as coach and teacher of sportsmanship, fair play, and a builder of character. Presented by athletes of Narrows High School and friends, 1930–1954.”

After nearly two hours, Harry, who had spent twenty-five years teaching his own players to accept victory with grace and humility, offered just a few modest words of thanks. He admitted he was “tickled to death” by it all, and said only that he looked forward to rounding out a half-century on the job in Narrows.

He would coach eight more seasons atop the Green Wave. Remarkably, his most successful stretch was still to come.

Next: The Streak

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The origins of Ragsdale Field began with a railroad spur that ran through the middle of town and across Wolf Creek before continuing onward to Suiter, Virginia. The New River Holston & Western railroad was incorporated in 1900, just after the arrival of the tannery, as a means of efficiently transporting lumber and bark for the purpose of tanning leather.

Prior to this, those in the lumber industry around Narrows floated their logs down Wolf Creek toward the mill dam as the best means of lumber transportation. This practice created a backup, and the logs would bang together upon arrival. This was especially true in the area across from the home of D.F. Hale, the father of Dan Hale. The sound was so loud that the spot was nicknamed the “Boom.” It became a popular swimming hole for generations to come.

Once the NRH&W Railroad became operational, lumber was transported more efficiently by train. It was commonplace to hear Old Number 3 engine chugging through Narrows every morning on the way to Bland County. On the return trip, the train would stop on the hillside above what is now Ragsdale Field and dump logs, rolling them down the hill into the flat, where they could be collected for a veneer plant located there. While the original track ran right through town (now Memorial Boulevard), by the time Harry arrived in 1930, it had been moved across Wolf Creek, and the line had been taken over by Norfolk & Western.

From the program’s first game in 1931 through the undefeated seasons of 1938 and 1939, the football field sat beside the high school, flush against Monroe Street. By then, Harry had acquired a single set of wooden bleachers—the first seating the field had ever known, the slats rough enough that they might have come straight off a sawmill. That same December, the Celanese Corporation of America began producing cellulose acetate at its Celco plant along the New River between Narrows and Pearisburg, and the county that Harry Ragsdale had arrived in nine years earlier—largely agrarian, shaped by tanneries and timber—began its transformation into a regional center of industry.

The Celanese brought optimism; graduation brought uncertainty. Entering the 1940 season, Harry was characteristically cautious—Toar Skeens and Allen McClaugherty were gone, and few experienced players remained. Waiting in the wings, however, was Allen’s younger brother Frank, the third McClaugherty brother to play in the backfield for Harry. Success continued. Yet after leading Narrows to wins over Blacksburg and Martinsville, McClaugherty and the Green Wave were turned back by the William Byrd Terriers, 19–0, at Leggett Field in Vinton, ending their twenty-three-game winning streak dating back to 1937. McClaugherty later suffered a season-ending knee injury, but behind the leadership of senior captain Jim Johnson, Narrows reeled off six straight wins and finished the year 8–1.

That November, the school was granted WPA funding to build a concrete stadium. To do so, the football field had to be moved. The concrete structure would be built into the hillside at the back of the school property, its top resting on the remaining grade of the original NRH&W railway bed. Even students in physical education classes helped move dirt to flatten the area that would become the new playing field.

The 1941 season was a solid one, finishing 7–2–1. Leading the charge up front was senior captain Kenneth French, whose story is told in the pages of The Bandana Express. French and Frank McClaugherty earned first-team All-Southwest Virginia honors from the Roanoke Times, giving Narrows an unbroken succession of players on the mythical eleven since its inception in 1937. Along the way, the Green Wave traveled to Christiansburg, where they faced a team running the T-formation—the novel offensive system beginning to spread across the country—winning 6–0. They also shut out Radford, 34–0, and defeated Pearisburg, 19–2, their sixth straight win over the Red Devils. Then, on December 7, 1941, Japan bombed Pearl Harbor. The world Harry had known—and the game he had coached—would never be the same.

By then, the new stadium was complete. The student body felt the project should be named for their coach, and by September 1942, it was already being called Ragsdale Field. “My commission came through the same day we were to open the 1942 football season,” Harry later recalled of his entry into active Naval duty. The first game at Ragsdale Field was against Martinsville, coached by former University of North Carolina standout and NFL player Tom Burnette. “I went with the team to the game, and then slipped away after halftime,” he added.

Bill Simmons coached the remainder of the 1942 season, winning just once. Over the next three seasons, Simmons, C.G. Smith, and Jim Woods held the program together while Harry served as a lieutenant commander in the Panama Canal Zone. They kept Harry’s single-wing system in place, and the players wore the same tattered jerseys left behind. The 1943 squad finished 3–6. The 1944 squad finished 2–5–2. Only in 1945, under Jim Woods, did Narrows manage a winning record, going 5–3. There was no substitute for Harry Ragsdale.

Harry returned to the sideline in 1946, but found a very different game from the one he had left for the war. Use of the single wing began to decline in favor of the T-formation. Meanwhile, lights and fencing were added to Ragsdale Field, and the field was shared with a minor league baseball team, the New River Rebels. On September 27, 1946, the Green Wave hosted their first night game, against Galax, losing 20–0. In fact, Narrows did not win a game—or score a point—all season. The highs of the undefeated years and prewar prosperity felt very far away. What those years had left behind, though, was a field that bore his name—and a program that kept the faith until he returned.

Next: This Is Your Life, Harry Ragsdale

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The county championship of 1931 was a beginning.

In 1932, Harry expanded the schedule beyond Giles County for the first time, adding teams from neighboring Mercer County, West Virginia, and Tazewell and Montgomery counties in Virginia. The results were mixed. After defeating Matoaka (WV), 34–0, the Green Wave hosted the Princeton (WV) junior varsity, but could manage only a 6–6 tie. The program was still experiencing growing pains. Nonetheless, the game produced a story that teammates were still chuckling about more than sixty years later.

Senior end Cecil Wilkinson had bruised ribs, and his grandfather, a sawmill man, had taken an old belt from a piece of equipment and fashioned it into a makeshift rib protector. It was an improvised solution to a real problem, but in the middle of the Great Depression, improvisation was a way of life. Somewhere in the course of the game, the belt slid up around Wilkinson’s chest. He could hardly breathe and had to come out immediately to have it removed, much to the amusement of everyone on the sideline.

The Green Wave finished their second season with a record of 3–1–3. Following the Princeton contest, Narrows defeated Christiansburg, 18–6, but fell to Pocahontas, 20–0—two games that produced stories worth telling—and, like several others in later seasons mentioned here, can be explored in the pages of The Bandana Express.

The 1933 season brought new challenges, and the wider world showed in the schedule itself. The Depression made travel more costly, so Harry filled the calendar where he could. For example, on October 6, Narrows hosted the Pembroke Civilian Conservation Corps—a team drawn from young men ages 18–25 enrolled in President Roosevelt’s Depression-era work relief program—and won 6–0. A week later, they lost 7–0 at home to the Pulaski All-Stars, a community team rather than a high school squad, proof that even a home game of this type was preferable to another away contest. The Green Wave played but six games that season, finishing 3–3, including the first-ever loss to Pearisburg, 7–0, to close the season.

The 1934 season was a step forward. Narrows finished 6–1–1, avenging the Pearisburg loss with a 20–0 shutout in the season finale. Harry also boosted the schedule to include new teams from West Virginia (McComas and Athens) and Southwest Virginia, most notably Radford. Leading the charge was senior captain Bob Bonham, who was rugged at fullback, and junior Jess Johnson, who had speed to burn at the tailback spot. Harry’s single-wing offense had taken hold, and the results reflected it.

The Narrows-Pearisburg rivalry laid the groundwork for the Narrows-Giles feud, and the 1935 battle was pivotal. The Green Wave arrived at the Pearisburg fairgrounds on the Friday before Thanksgiving, 8–0, riding a thirteen-game winning streak, and having already clinched the District VII Class B title. Schools across Giles County closed at noon for the annual clash. Harry’s team was undermined by injuries going in, but they still had Jess Johnson and fullback Harry McClaugherty, who would go on to play at the University of Virginia. Nevertheless, Johnson had a banged-up shoulder, which he suffered in the 39–7 shellacking of Galax at home the previous Friday afternoon, and had to leave the game just minutes in, too hurt to continue. As snow pelted the playing field, the injuries continued, and the two-win Red Devils shocked the undefeated Green Wave, 7–0.

The loss exposed just how thin Harry’s roster was that season. At various points, as few as fifteen players had been eligible to dress. Seventh graders Allen McClaugherty and Bill Simmons, whom Harry first saw during recess beside the grade school, had been brought up to practice with the varsity simply to give them enough bodies.

Narrows was slated to face the Clifton Forge Mountaineers, who had lost just once since 1932, in the western half-state championship game (state semifinal). Harry and Professor Barrett wanted to play the game, but after the slew of injuries in the last two weeks, they could count only seven or eight players fit to take the field. Reluctantly, Barrett released a statement: “We felt that in all fairness to our school and to District Seven, it was best to forfeit the game.” After the Narrows forfeit, Clifton Forge went on to lose to Suffolk, 12–0, in the Class B state championship game.

The 1936 and 1937 seasons were lean by comparison—a combined 7–6–3 record, including games against first-time opponents Blacksburg and Wytheville. Still, the era was not without its moments. End Ed Morris should have finished his football career after the 1935 season, but Naomi Crabtree—a fellow Narrows graduate who later became his wife—recalled that he and Harry cooked up a plan: Morris would purposefully fail English under teacher Lucy Muncy, allowing him to return for one more season of football in 1936. The rules of the era were relaxed enough to permit it. Morris took only one class, made himself scarce at school functions, and the 1937 Narrows annual noted his habit with a wink: “He is usually on hand for his class activities, except on warm Fridays, and then we can find him on the creek bank sleeping and fishing. Keep it up, Ed; we know you will get a bite before long.” He was conspicuously absent from the team picture.

Then came the undefeated seasons of 1938 and 1939.

Leading the charge in 1938 was senior two-year captain Junior “Toar” Skeens—his nickname borrowed from a massive, ageless caveman character in E.C. Segar’s Thimble Theatre comic strip, the strip better known today as Popeye. At six-foot-three and 215 pounds, the comparison was apt. Skeens had developed from a lineman early in his career into a rugged, punishing fullback, the kind of bruising ball carrier that was a signature of Harry’s single-wing offense of the day.

After seven straight regular-season wins, the Green Wave was due to face J. Leonard Mauck’s Saltville Shakers for the western half-state championship, but this time, Narrows was the beneficiary of a forfeit. Only Culpeper, coached by Morton Miller, stood in the way of a state diadem, but like Saltville, they declined to play. “Their coach told me he had seen us and didn’t want any part of us,” Harry would later recount. Thus, Narrows laid claim to the Class C crown. This championship, not recognized by the then-Virginia High School Literary and Athletic League, was an informal title, as only Class A, Virginia’s largest classification, was officially sanctioned. The winner declared themselves champions, even for a refusal to play.

Before the 1939 season, Harry married Sarah Simmons (Bill’s older sister) in what the Narrows News called the highlight of the summer social calendar. Several former players attended, including Jess Johnson. Harry’s younger brother, Tom, served as best man.

With Toar Skeens’s graduation, Allen McClaugherty stepped into the fullback role, tipping the scales at 186 pounds—still huge for a running back of that era. His play that season attracted an offer from Duke head coach Wallace Wade, who had just led the Blue Devils to back-to-back Southern Conference titles and a Rose Bowl appearance, though McClaugherty ultimately chose Virginia Tech. Behind him and others, Narrows again finished the regular season undefeated, outscoring their nine opponents by a margin that left no doubt about the program Harry Ragsdale had built. Along the way, Harry had the home economics teacher, Lucille Shumate, prepare the same ginger tea for the boys before every game, a superstition that he maintained throughout the winning streak.

During a mid-season road trip to Martinsville, the Green Wave played their first-ever night game, winning 13–0 at English Field. End Bill Simmons—now Harry’s brother-in-law—caught multiple passes from Ted Johnson, including a touchdown, in what his teammates later remembered as his defining game. Later, Narrows defeated rival Pearisburg, 21–7, now under first-year head coach Roy Lee “Ringie” Ringstaff, for their fourth consecutive victory over the Red Devils, effectively erasing the memory of the 1935 upset.

In early December, Narrows traveled to Bedford for the Western Half-State Championship, winning 25–6, before turning their attention to Warrenton, the eastern Class C champion. Harry was determined to make the game happen. Underwritten by several Narrows businessmen, he offered Warrenton’s coach, Tom Todd, a flat guarantee of $200 (about $4,800 today) and two nights’ entertainment if Warrenton would come to Narrows, or $150 and the same entertainment for a game in Warrenton. Todd still declined, and Narrows claimed a second consecutive Class C state championship by forfeit.

With that, the Green Wave ended the decade having won twenty-one straight games—a run that began in the autumn of 1937 and ended only because no one would play them. The Roanoke Times took notice, running a prominent feature on the program, noting that five of the boys pictured “have never played on a losing grid team.” Eight years earlier, the start of that same program hadn’t merited a single line of print.

Next: Ragsdale Field

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Despite the Depression, optimism was building in Narrows in the fall of 1931. The new Narrows High School on Monroe Street had just opened its doors, and for the first time, school buses were bringing students in from outlying areas, resulting in the largest enrollment ever. Built for $65,000 (about $1.4 million today), the new building housed the county’s first gymnasium and complete stage equipment, including a new piano, for the auditorium.

Football, on the other hand, was a new and unproven experiment in Giles County. Even though high school football in 1931 was truly a fall sport, with most teams beginning play by mid-September, the late decision to start the program meant county teams would not take the field until October. By then, other teams across the region had already played several games.

The schedule had been arranged among the four participating county schools—Narrows, Pearisburg, Pembroke, and Eggleston—on a home-and-home basis, with each team playing every other school twice. Pearisburg and Pembroke ventured outside the county for early-season tilts, with poor results. Pearisburg lost 32–0 at Dublin to open their season, and Pembroke fared no better, losing 19–2 to the Vinton High School (later renamed William Byrd) junior varsity.

The season opener for the Narrows Green Wave was slated for October 9, 1931. High temperatures would approach seventy, but the cool, cloudy mountain morning let everyone know it was the dawn of another fall in southwest Virginia. The foliage was on the cusp of those sweeping color changes that define the Appalachian landscape that time of year.

The front page of the local papers that Friday morning painted a picture of the wider world. Inventor Thomas Edison was being visited in the final days of his life by his longtime friends, automobile pioneer Henry Ford and tire manufacturer Harvey Firestone. Just thirteen years earlier, on August 25, 1918, Edison, Ford, and Firestone, along with naturalist John Burroughs, had camped along Wolf Creek near Narrows as part of one of their annual camping trips. Elsewhere in print, Chicago gangster Al Capone was on trial, the debate over Prohibition continued to rage, and manager Connie Mack was preparing his Philadelphia Athletics to face the St. Louis Cardinals in Game 6 of the World Series, seeking a third straight championship.

One event not mentioned anywhere in the black and white of that morning’s paper was the start of a football program in Narrows. By the start of the second day of practice at Maher Field in Roanoke, Alfred D. “Hunk” Hurt’s Jefferson High School Magician squad had swelled to 110 players. Harry’s first team was lucky to have twenty. Durwood E. “Ducky” Denton led the Wolverines of Salem High School (also known as Andrew Lewis High School) onto the gridiron despite the total loss of the high school building by fire in January. In the other direction, Stubby Currence, in his seventh year of writing for the Bluefield Daily Telegraph, was singing the praises of Beaver High School and head coach Clark “Bub” Brown. Princeton’s Lee Patton was looking to rebuild his line in his second year around a young end named Conley T. Snidow.

Narrows had fielded football teams before, though sporadically and without much organization. In 1917, amid American involvement in World War I, the school put together a team. Harold W. Hale, future postmaster of Narrows and son of town benefactor Herbert W. Hale, played left end on that squad. In a 1953 interview, he still remembered the demands placed on players that season. During a stretch of one week in early November, the Narrows boys played four games and helped to fight a huge fire at the Union Tanning Company’s new extract plant. “That was a long time ago, but I can still remember how tired I was,” Hale told the Valley Leader & Narrows News. No record of a coach was ever documented. In 1931, for the first time, they had both a coach and a plan.

Much like the makeup of the school itself, Harry’s first roster was a young one, with just three seniors. The two largest players were seniors Glenn and Homer Hoff, sons of Reverend G.C. Hoff, pastor of the First Baptist Church, weighing no more than 170 pounds. However, the average weight across the entire team would be lucky to exceed 135 pounds. His inaugural co-captains, Brooks Johnson—the same youngster Harry had collared on the first day of school the previous fall—and Hunter Hale, were both sophomores. Other notables included freshman Bob Bonham and Jess Johnson, who was still a year away from entering high school.

The day of the opening contest had finally arrived. Another senior, left guard David Cadle, was so eager, he went home during lunch, changed into his football attire, and sat in class the rest of the day in full dress, cleats and all. Harry, for his part, had chewed his fingernails down to the quick as he peered out the window of his afternoon algebra class.

Coach Lewis King brought his Eggleston team to Narrows to begin the season. King was a graduate of Dublin High School and the University of Virginia. The field had been configured directly alongside Monroe Street, closer to the road than its current location. A season pass cost fifty cents. There were no bleachers. Any fans in attendance walked the sidelines, and if they arrived late, they missed history.

Eggleston kicked off.

“In the first game we played at Narrows in 1931, Brooks Johnson returned the opening kickoff ninety yards for a touchdown after taking a lateral from John Tiller,” Harry would recount years later. It was a memory he carried with him—one that would later find its way into the pages of The Bandana Express.

The Green Wave rolled over Eggleston 27–0 that autumn afternoon, and Narrows had won its first football game under Harry Ragsdale. Touchdowns came by way of Johnson, Hunter Hale, and Bob Bonham. It was the only matchup with Lewis King’s ball club, as they would later be forced to fold the team and forfeit their remaining games after King was injured while practicing with his boys and had to be hospitalized.

The week vacated by the Eggleston forfeit, Harry’s younger brother, Tom, visited Narrows. The break was good for Harry, as he was himself nursing an injury, having fallen on the school grounds, enduring an ugly cut on his head that required eight stitches. That same week, Mr. and Mrs. William B. Patteson moved to Narrows. Less than a year later, they would welcome a son, William B. Patteson, Jr., who would one day leave his own mark on Narrows athletics.

Harry’s boys finished 5–1, including two wins over rival Pearisburg, allowing just eight points across the entire season. Their only loss came to Pembroke, 6–0, in the final game of the season, when a George Coburn kick—intended to win the game—was blocked and returned for a touchdown on the last play. Despite the setback, Narrows was still crowned Giles County champions.

A banquet was held in the team’s honor at Hotel Narrows on Friday, December 11, 1931. James Hughes, a former college teammate of Harry’s and principal at Falls Mill School in neighboring Tazewell County, served as the guest speaker. Harry awarded letters to fourteen players. The team, in turn, presented their coach with a sweater. Their team picture appeared in the Roanoke Times on December 13, 1931.

So impressed was Professor Barrett with Harry’s first season that he wrote a letter to the president’s office at Lynchburg College praising his coach. The letter was printed in the November 25 edition of the Critograph. Barrett wrote: “Mr. Ragsdale’s team this year has won all games in our class. He is an excellent coach and a fine young man. He is making a wonderful success in school work.”

Next: The Undefeated

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Before he coached his first football season in 1931, it is worth understanding who Harry Ragsdale was before he arrived in Narrows. Born in 1907 to Thomas and Tabitha Ragsdale, he grew up just south of Kenbridge, a tobacco-farming community in Lunenburg County. Harry was the second of six children, with three sisters and two brothers, and he attended Non-Intervention School, the local one-room schoolhouse within walking distance, before moving on to Lochleven School.

In the fall of 1926, Harry enrolled at Lynchburg College, a small institution of just under 250 students. Situated in the southwestern end of the “Hill City,” its centerpiece was the original Westover Hall, designed in the style of a French chateau, complete with turret spires that rose above the campus.

That same fall, a young coach named Edward L. Wright arrived on campus as the new athletic director and head football coach. A 1920 Wofford College graduate, Wright was a lineman under J. P. “Rip” Major, a former Auburn captain and All-Southern performer. Major’s coach, Mike Donahue, was an Irish immigrant who led Auburn to three national championships and was inducted into the inaugural class of the College Football Hall of Fame in 1951.

Following his graduation from the all-male South Carolina institution, E.L. Wright became the head coach at Wofford Fitting School, a military school in Spartanburg designed to prepare high school boys for admission to Wofford. From there, he moved to the Carolina Military & Naval Academy in Hendersonville, North Carolina, before heading north to Virginia to teach history and science and serve as the head football coach at Lynchburg High School. Wright’s Wofford roots were strong there. The principal at Lynchburg High, H.A.C. Walker, was not only a Wofford graduate himself, but his grandfather and namesake was an original trustee and instrumental in the founding of the college.

Also known as E.C. Glass, Lynchburg High was 12–2–2 in two seasons under Wright, reaching the state championship game in 1925 before losing to Newport News 7–6. Following this highly successful campaign, he was offered the position at nearby Lynchburg College.

Taking over for Roland C. Day, who had left for Petersburg High School, Wright brought several of his E.C. Glass players with him to the college, most notably the Sydnor twins, Clem and Raine—Clem a speedster in the backfield, Raine a force on the line. The Critograph, the college newspaper, noted Wright’s arrival: “Mr. Wright has brought with him several of the football team of Lynchburg High School last year, which he trained and which almost won the championship of this section of the state.”

As a freshman, Harry watched from the sidelines as Coach Wright’s first Lynchburg Hornets team finished 3–5–1, dropping games to Washington & Lee, Virginia, and William & Mary—three of the most powerful programs in the state. The highlight of the home schedule was the dedication of Municipal Athletic Park at 12th and Court Street, where renovations to the existing field had transformed it into a proper venue for college football. The ceremony coincided with the home opener against St. John’s College on October 2, 1926.

Among Harry’s teammates was an end from Pembroke, Walter Miller. Walter was one of three Miller brothers—Walter, Jeff, and Ralph—who would attend Lynchburg College, all sons of Dr. James Wallace Miller. Dr. Miller was fond of telling stories about his own football days at Roanoke College. He loved to recount how he played in the first football game he ever saw and how, in November of 1895, his team had played Washington & Lee on a Saturday, losing 6–4, and Virginia Military Institute on the following Monday, losing 26–0. It was this connection to Walter and his brothers that gave Harry his only prior familiarity with Giles County.

On September 24, 1927, Lynchburg faced Washington & Lee in Lexington, and Harry got his first career start at left guard. He played on the line despite barely weighing 140 pounds. That same season, the Hornets traveled to Annapolis, Maryland, to again face St. John’s College. In the course of the action, Harry left the game with a significant injury to his hand and was replaced by teammate Fred Helsabeck.

The next year, Harry was returning from football practice with Helsabeck when they were met at the door to Carnegie Hall, the men’s dormitory, by a freshman who rushed by with his bag in hand. They learned the young man, Orville W. Wake, was fed up with college and had decided to return home to Strasburg, Virginia. Harry went after him. He found the freshman at the entrance gate on Vernon Street and spent the better part of thirty minutes talking him out of leaving. Wake stayed. It would be a quarter of a century before he thought much about that afternoon again.

The 1928 season would be the first winning season under E.L. Wright. After losses to William & Mary, which saw the Hornets play their first night game in program history in Williamsburg, and Washington & Lee on the road, the “Wrightmen” (as they were referred to in the 1929 college annual, the Argonaut) rolled past the Bridgewater College Eagles, 62–6, in their first home game of the season at Municipal Athletic Park. The local newspaper, the News, called it a “devastating assault,” and in the second quarter, Harry recovered a blocked Bridgewater punt for a touchdown. The Hornets finished the season 5–4–0.

By his senior year, Harry had become a central figure in campus life at Lynchburg College. The week of the stock market crash of 1929, as the team prepared for Atlantic Christian College, the Critograph mentioned Harry, writing: “Ragsdale, left guard, has fought for the honor of crimson and gray for four seasons. He is a splendid player, always fighting at his post and encouraging the entire team to fight no matter what the score may be.”

Following the Bridgewater contest, the Hornets’ lone win of 1929, the Critograph added: “Ragsdale showed that he had plenty of fight in him. He hurt his knee in the first quarter but refused to be taken out.” Harry’s last college game was at home against Guilford College on Thanksgiving Day. He was presented with his letter at the annual athletic banquet by the president of the Board of Trustees, T. Gibson Hobbs, who would soon mention the teaching opening in Narrows.

As his senior year came to a close, Harry was on a shortlist for “Most Typical Lynchburg College Man,” and the 1930 Argonaut documented his college nickname, “Slippery Hips.” In the spring, the Critograph published Harry’s senior bio: “He has been a blockade to many of our opponents in football, and we can certainly say of Harry that he really has that ‘ole fighting spirit.’” After naming his many positions on campus, including president of the student body, the newspaper added, “From the offices he has held, we know that he is capable of leadership.”

He was indeed destined for leadership—he just didn’t yet know where.

Next: October 9, 1931

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On May 1, 1931, some 2,000 people gathered on Monroe Street in the drizzling rain to witness the laying of the cornerstone for the new Narrows High School. Giant Caverns opened to early visitors, the grade school children paraded through town, and students from the high school performed a traditional Maypole dance. Later that afternoon, the Green Wave baseball team took on Pembroke—and lost, 8–2.

It had been that kind of year.

But spring had been kinder to Harry Ragsdale. His baseball team, led by the strong arm of Fairless Cunningham, was holding its own in the county. In fact, a few weeks later, Narrows avenged the loss to Pembroke, 7–5 in twelve innings, highlighted by a game-winning hit by Hatfield Tiller. When the dust settled on the season, the Green Wave had finished second in the county behind the Corncutters of Pembroke.

In those days, coaches did not specialize. The school hired a “boys coach,” one man responsible for every boys’ sport on the calendar. So, despite not having football, Harry coached basketball and baseball that first year in Narrows, and would eventually add football and track, all in the same school year.

This multi-sport approach paralleled Harry’s own playing career at Lynchburg College. Harry played football, soccer (first team in school history), and ran track (880-yard run), in addition to being in the varsity club and participating in several other clubs and councils. During his time at Lynchburg College, eighty-five percent of men participated in athletics.

Still, he was ready to leave.

In reality, Narrows had never been his only option. After the job with C&P Telephone fell through, he had been told of three available teaching jobs: Chatham, Oceana, and Narrows.

Harry then received a letter from Giles County school board member Dan Hale. Hale was from one of the most prominent families in town, descendants of one of its early settlers, Edward Hale, and deeply rooted in education. His father was a former teacher, principal, and superintendent in Giles County, and his second cousin, Herbert W. Hale, had donated the land upon which the first high school building was built in 1908. Furthermore, his wife’s father, Benton Hobbs, was the schoolmaster of the first public school in Narrows, complete with a saloon in one end and a school in the other, and her brother was part of the first graduating class at Lynchburg College, then known as Virginia Christian College.

When Hale was looking for a quality candidate to fill an open position at Narrows High School, he contacted his brother-in-law, T. Gibson Hobbs, who, by that time, was president of the Board of Trustees at Lynchburg College. Hobbs had a name in mind—and mentioned the opening to Harry directly. Hale wrote with the formal offer, and, despite an offer from Principal Frank W. Cox at Oceana High in Virginia Beach, Harry accepted.

The first time he chose Narrows, he wasn’t sure why. This time, he knew exactly why he was considering leaving.

He had the opportunity to coach football. His college coach, Edward L. Wright, had just finished his first year at Rock Hill High School in South Carolina, and he wanted Harry to join him as an assistant. This was the man who had shaped Harry’s understanding of the game. “The people here gave me permission to go down there for the interview,” Harry would later recall, “and I came back with a contract from the school.” He was ready to go.

Professor Barrett, backed by Giles County school administration, wanted to keep Harry (after all, he had survived the first year). Upon receiving word of his contract offer, they countered with an offer of their own. Superintendent R. H. Farrier and the Clerk of the School Board, J. R. Stafford, met with Harry and agreed to officially start football in Giles County, including at the high schools of Pearisburg, Pembroke, and Eggleston. He would receive a $15-a-month raise, and the county would purchase twenty-two uniforms at a cost of $225. Other equipment, such as leather helmets and rudimentary shoulder pads, would be the responsibility of each school and its coach.

Pearisburg head coach and county agricultural instructor, William L. “Shorty” Hargis, had been an All-Southern Conference wrestler at Virginia Tech, as well as part of the “suicide squad” in football. With that connection, he was able to secure a donation of hand-me-down equipment from Virginia Tech and then-head coach Orville E. Neale. Despite being oversized, Hargis had secured equipment for his team, and as the players collectively painted their helmets the color of their mascot, the football “Red Devils” were born.

Harry’s situation was a little different. He and Professor Barrett had to purchase hard equipment for their team on their own good credit, over $600 worth. At a value of nearly half of Harry’s annual salary as a Giles County teacher, it would take many years for his debt to be paid, but he had made the commitment to Narrows. It was, as it turned out, the right call.

After Harry turned down the Rock Hill offer, his Lynchburg College teammate Jesse Barbour accepted. Coach Wright and Barbour would lead the 1931 Rock Hill Bearcats all the way to the Class A state championship game, where they lost to Orangeburg, 14–6. Harry would hear about it from Narrows while coaching his very first team.

Next: Slippery Hips

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From his vantage point, Harry could see most of what Narrows had to offer. Looking north, Route 23 (now Route 100) entered town as Main Street—the same road Dr. Newton had driven en route to rescue Harvey Amos—freshly paved for the first time just a year before Harry arrived, a modest but significant development in a county where muddy roads had once been reason enough to cancel school entirely.

Beyond it sat the recently vacated buildings of the Snowflake Tannery, which, upon its arrival, helped change the town from one composed largely of Johnsons and Hales. It had closed the previous year, a sad reflection of the times. Gone was the tannery whistle, which had served as the town’s alarm clock. It was said the view from Tannery Hill was of strategic importance during the Civil War, as the Confederates were able to keep a lookout up and down the New River and out toward Wolf Creek, a tributary that joins the river at Narrows.

Past the river stood the twin smokestacks of the Virginian Railway power plant rising 310 feet above the valley floor—a signature of the Narrows skyline since 1926. The Virginian ran on the eastern bank of the river, while its competitor, the Norfolk & Western, ran on the western side. The mountains pressed in on every side. Harry had grown up just south of Kenbridge, Virginia, a tobacco-farming community in Lunenburg County. Nothing in this picture reminded him of home.

Unlike his predecessor, he had returned after the Christmas holidays. He wasn’t sure that changed anything.

The town had its diversions. That summer, the Narrows Theatre, located in the Odd Fellows Hall, had shown its first talking picture, Douglas Fairbanks Jr. in Party Girl, admission fifteen cents. The Intermont Miniature Golf Course had also recently opened, featuring eighteen holes described as some of the hardest and most unique in the state, with experienced players traveling from Bluefield and Princeton to play the course. In addition, there was Giant Caverns, a popular tourist attraction and event venue that attracted thousands of visitors every year. And the billiard parlor owned by Lon Coburn, a member of the first graduating class of Narrows High School in 1912, which was billed by the locals as a source of “wholesome recreation.”

Downtown also had a brand-new Chevrolet dealership. The Narrows Motor Company, a two-story brick building on Main Street, was rated as the finest of its kind between Bluefield and Roanoke. Johnson & Johnson’s drugstore also sat on Main Street—the community social center, where everybody dropped in for a sandwich and a refreshing beverage from the soda fountain. There was A.M. Wheeler’s hardware and furniture store, several cafes and grocery stores, and even a steam laundry. Still, it wasn’t enough for Harry.

He found little reason to stay in town on the weekends. More often than not, he could be found making the trip back to Lynchburg College—back to the campus he knew and the life he left behind. Harry had been a vital part of campus life, having been elected student body president in his senior year. But those days seemed so far away.

In Giles County, people hunted elk in places with names like “No Business.” By mid-December, the stress had caught up with him. The Pearisburg Virginian noted on December 18, 1930, that “Mr. Ragsdale, high school teacher, Narrows, was confined to his room Monday, suffering from indigestion.”

His sister Mabel was a teacher, but Harry never envisioned himself in that role. He later told the Roanoke Times & World-News that he didn’t find fulfillment in teaching that first year. He wanted to coach football. Many of his college teammates were already coaching. Most notably, his good friend, Walter Miller, who had grown up in Pembroke, was the head football coach at Pocahontas High School in Tazewell County that fall, leading his team to a 5-1-1 record.

Staring out the schoolhouse window, Harry had a decision to make. The road out of town had recently been hard-surfaced for the first time, and as spring approached, he was seriously considering using it.

Next: A Way Out

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The drought of that summer slowly gave way to the cool of autumn. Since Giles County did not have organized football, basketball was played in the fall season. Contests were held with other schools in the county on a home-and-home basis. The teams involved were Pembroke, Eggleston, Newport, and White Gate in the eastern pool, and Narrows, Pearisburg, and Glen Lyn in the west. As none of the schools had a gymnasium, games were played outside, on dirt-floor courts. Weather conditions were a factor—the surface was hard in dry weather, soft and unpredictable after rain—and the ball bounced accordingly.

Narrows opened its season at Glen Lyn, another small community school just west along the New River, on October 10, 1930. It was Harry’s first game as the coach of Narrows High School. Despite a thrilling back-and-forth, the Green Wave came up short in a three-point overtime loss.

Pearisburg was next, the following Friday afternoon. It was an eye-opening experience. “I had no knowledge of the Narrows–Pearisburg rivalry until the first game,” Harry would recount years later. “We got on the court, and the first thing I knew, Fairless Cunningham [of Narrows] and Billy Martin [of Pearisburg] were into it. Then I found out a little about the local competition.” The Red Devils left town with the victory, and his boys were still winless.

The season did not improve from there. The Green Wave finished at the bottom of the western pool and failed to qualify for the county tournament — which, as it happened, was held in Narrows that November, admission twenty-five cents.

The most memorable moment of that first fall, however, had nothing to do with basketball.

On the same afternoon Narrows traveled to Pearisburg for their second matchup of the year—November 7, 1930—a pilot from Bluefield, West Virginia, named Harvey Amos, was attempting to land his Fleet model biplane at a local airfield along the New River, between Narrows and Pearisburg. Amos, who had reportedly barnstormed with Amelia Earhart, had circled the town twice before heading for the stretch of bottomland said to have once been used by Eddie Stinson, a nationally known aviation pioneer, in the early 1920s. Flying less than 100 feet above the ground on his approach, Amos clipped the 88,000-volt high-tension wires used to electrify the Virginian Railway and toppled over into the river, landing upside down in about four feet of water a short distance from the bank. A passenger, Herman Doyle, managed to free himself and swim to shore, where he collapsed, but Amos was still strapped in the cockpit, unconscious, his head completely submerged.

Dr. Maury C. Newton, one of the town’s two doctors and only two years into his practice, had served in naval aviation during World War I and immediately recognized the sound of the biplane circling his home on Main Street. Newton was the kind of Depression-era doctor who might accept a country ham or a bag of fresh garden vegetables as payment and rarely went anywhere without his cigar. He hopped in his car, one of many he wore out every year on cow paths delivering babies, and headed east toward the airfield. On his way, he saw Amos strike the wires and nose into the river.

Racing to the riverbank, Newton jumped a highway fence, descended a steep rocky embankment, ran across two railway tracks, and plunged into the water, wading out to the wreckage—all while risking his life navigating live 88,000-volt power lines. Newton then shouldered the wing of the plane and lifted it — with 240 pounds of force — just enough to get Amos’s head above the surface. His foot would slip. He would lift again. This went on for eight to ten minutes. Others eventually came to help drag Amos to shore.

Amos was given only a slight chance to live, but he recovered and went on to fly in the Army Air Corps. News of the rescue traveled fast. The story was picked up by United Press and appeared in newspapers as far away as Alabama. Dr. Newton was nominated for the Carnegie Medal for civilian heroism. He declined.

Harry and his boys had been in Pearisburg that afternoon. The road home ran directly past the crash site—there was no other way back to Narrows. The Red Devils finished the season 17-1 and advanced to the state tournament—the same team that handed Narrows two losses that fall, the second the same day a plane went down in the New River. As was the case most weekends, Harry was ready to leave Narrows, but he would be back by Monday.

Next: The Far Side of Familiar

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His name was Harry Ragsdale. In 1930, he stepped off a train in Narrows, Virginia—a mountain town of 1,300 people—to take a teaching job he wasn’t sure he wanted. He was twenty-three years old. There was no football team. There was no plan. There was just a parched county road, a brick school on a hill, and a young man trying to find his way in the Depression.

Over the next half-century, Harry built a legacy that outlasted him. He led the football program at Narrows High School for thirty-three years, later became the school’s principal, and eventually served as the town’s mayor. His son Steve applied the lessons he learned from his father to lead his team to a state championship in 1980.

That story is told in The Bandana Express. This series tells the one that came before it. Beginning before the legend, before the bandana, before any of it had a name. At the time, none of it felt historic. It felt immediate.

Thick pillars of smoke billowed from the Class K steam locomotive as the Norfolk & Western passenger train climbed out of Roanoke toward West Virginia. As Harry Ragsdale watched the landscape change, he was uncertain of what awaited him in the mountains of Giles County. He had never been to this part of Virginia before. In fact, he had never been west of Lynchburg, where he had been a popular student and athlete before graduating from Lynchburg College.

The summer of 1930 had been a scorcher. By early September, drought had gripped the country, and the mercury’s daily climb toward triple digits had old-timers telling tales. The air was already thick and heavy when Harry stepped onto the platform of the Narrows depot—barely three years old—that Sunday morning, and most of the townsfolk were in church. A dusty, deserted street was all that was there to greet him.

He passed the Hotel Narrows as he made his way into town. At the corner of Monroe and Main, he could see the First National Bank of Narrows—its motto: “as strong as the mountains that surround it.” Across the street was W.O. Coburn & Son, Giles County’s largest department store and the oldest business in town. The son, E. Dewey Coburn, was also the mayor of Narrows.

Nothing in this picture appealed to Harry at all. “I thought the place was the biggest hole in the world,” he would later recall. “I didn’t think I’d stay very long.”

He was reminded that teaching high school kids, some nearly as old as he was, was not his first choice. A promising position with the Chesapeake & Potomac Telephone Company had been the plan, but just as he was preparing to enter training school in Washington, DC, he was informed that the job had been eliminated due to the economic downturn earlier that year.

From there, a contact at Lynchburg College mentioned a job in Narrows, a letter followed offering $115 a month to teach mathematics, and Harry took the job sight unseen. Despite a competing offer from a school in Virginia Beach, he had decided on the unknown in the Mountain Empire.

Standing at that intersection, he had no idea why. A few of his college friends were from neighboring Pembroke, just east of town. That was about the extent of his familiarity with Giles County.

The next day, all the teachers in the county gathered in the Pearisburg High School auditorium for a one-day meeting before the start of the school year. It was there that he was cornered by John C. Fox. An electrical engineer at the Virginian Railway Power Plant in Narrows, and the son of a former mayor of Roanoke, Fox wanted to have a man-to-man talk.

“This is the meanest and roughest bunch of boys in the world down here,” Fox told him. “They ran the last man off. You just ball up your fist and knock the first one down.”

Harry was shocked. In fact, they had run the last man off. H.B. Jordon of Staunton had been hired the previous year and quit halfway through the school year. Harry was unsure if he would meet a similar fate. (As seen in The Bandana Express, some fifty years later, he could still remember that conversation vividly.)

The next morning was the first day of school, Tuesday, September 16, 1930, and Harry was scared to death. He climbed the stairs to the brick school overlooking town and walked directly toward the office of second-year principal William H. Barrett. His round face accentuated by his 1920s-style eyeglasses, the Washington & Lee and University of Virginia graduate would always be known as “Professor” to those in Narrows.

A native of Cuckoo, Virginia, Barrett believed wholeheartedly in the nature of discipline as outlined in the book of Proverbs, and Harry arrived just in time to witness what that looked like in practice. Several of the Narrows boys had discovered that by stuffing paper in the drainpipe on the side of the school and lighting it on fire, they could send flames shooting clear to the top of the building. Professor Barrett was putting an end to these shenanigans in the form of a spectacular whipping—physical, direct, and delivered without hesitation. It was clear John Fox had not exaggerated.

Harry turned around, put his hat back on, and headed for the door. Walking back down the steps and boarding the next train felt reasonable. It may have taken some convincing, but Professor Barrett persuaded him to stay. Unfortunately, the day was just beginning.

Later that day, Harry was put in charge of a large group of freshmen while school physicals were performed. At roughly forty percent of the overall enrollment, this group made up the largest portion of the student body. Less than half of them would make it to their sophomore year, as failures and dropouts regularly claimed much of the school’s freshman class. To put it in perspective, just a dozen seniors would receive diplomas the following spring.

It wasn’t long until Harry’s will was tested once again. Two boys in the back of the room, Brooks Johnson, son of a popular drugstore owner, and his first cousin, Marshall, were about to fight. Both Brooks and Marshall held the most prevalent family name in Narrows. The descendants of Patrick Johnson and his twelve children constituted one of the largest families in Southwest Virginia and Southern West Virginia.

Harry knew he would have to act quickly with every freshman in the room watching. There was no time to measure tone or consider alternatives. “I collared Brooks and shook the life out of him,” he would later say.

The room fell silent. It was a brief show of force, but it helped Harry establish himself. In Narrows, authority was not assumed. It was demonstrated. He would rely on that presence for years to come. Still, his stay in Narrows was far from certain. At this point, they didn’t even have a football team.

Next: The Long First Fall

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This passage is from Chapter 10, as Giles prepared to open the 1980 season against the defending Group A state champions.

The Blues were coached by forty-year-old Bobby Williams. A 1958 Parry McCluer graduate, Williams returned to his alma mater in 1974 after a decade under legendary coach Pete Brewbaker at neighboring Lexington High School. Since then, the stern-faced mentor had accumulated a 63–10–2 record, including state titles in 1977 and 1979. His stoic and no-nonsense demeanor commanded authority but required few words. Instead, he had assistants like line coach Dave Ellison to act as his taskmaster. Plays were also minimal in Williams’s T-formation, but like Steve, he was a stickler for details, and his offense hummed with the precision of a well-oiled machine.

Unfortunately, Bobby Williams passed away in 2005. I was, however, able to craft a picture of him through interviews with his former players. One of my favorite anecdotes was how Coach Williams paced the sidelines with his ever-present clipboard, which he kept shoved in the front waistband of his nylon coaching shorts. The better the run by one of his backs, his former players added, the farther he pushed the clipboard.

Steve Ragsdale expressed great respect for Bobby Williams. He noted that games with Parry McCluer between 1980 and 1985 were always tough, and it was those contests that helped shape the way he utilized the 5–2 defense at Giles. To read more about Bobby Williams and the Parry McCluer Fighting Blues, order The Bandana Express, out now from Koehler Books. Thanks for reading.

Jeremy

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This week’s excerpt from The Bandana Express highlights Graham head coach Glynn Carlock. With 244 wins and two state championships in his thirty-two-year career at Graham (1973–2004), Coach Carlock exemplified discipline and character. His teams were known for their physicality, instilled on the practice field through his hard-nosed coaching style.

The following excerpt is from Chapter 2, just before the G-Men scrimmaged Giles at Bluefield’s Mitchell Stadium in August 1978. It was Graham’s final exhibition before their opening-week border clash with Bluefield, formerly Beaver High School. The storied rivalry between the city’s two high schools, each set in opposite states, was preparing for its fifty-second iteration. When Coach Carlock arrived at Graham in 1973, the G-Men had not defeated their West Virginia counterpart in a decade.

Before his hiring, Carlock had served as assistant coach across town under Merrill Gainer and John Chmara. The former had coached him at Big Creek High School and brought him to Bluefield in 1964 following Carlock’s tour in the US Marine Corps and graduation from Concord College. During Carlock’s stint as an assistant, the Beavers won eighty games and two state championships, and they never lost to Graham. In fact, the Virginia-siders were shut out six times in the nine losses, including a combined score of 97–0 the previous two seasons. So when the G-Men blanked Bluefield in just his second year, 13–0, Carlock had his signature win, and his legacy at Graham was born.

Coach Carlock sadly passed away in 2005. While I never met him, I was able to describe him through the way others spoke of him. From former players to assistant coaches, they each told a story of reverence and admiration. Even opposing coaches like Steve Ragsdale, Dave Crist, and later Winfred Beale, a legend in his own right who took over at Floyd County in 1981, expressed to me their high regard for him. To read more about Glynn Carlock and the Graham G-Men, pre-order The Bandana Express, out July 29 from Koehler Books. Thanks for reading.

Jeremy

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During those years, Coach Bradley sported a thick black mustache and invariably had a mouthful of Levi Garrett–brand chewing tobacco and his spit cup in hand. He had a fire in his belly for coaching, evident even three decades later when I spoke with him for The Bandana Express. The following excerpts are from Chapter 9, just before Giles met Grundy for their preseason scrimmage in 1980.

Steve exchanged pleasantries with his counterpart, third-year head coach Larry Bradley. Both had been hired for their first head job in 1978, and like him, Larry was a second-generation football coach. His father, Lawrence H. “Burrhead” Bradley, retired in 1974 with an overall record of 145–91–15.

Larry had coached Grundy to their first state championship in wrestling in 1978, whereas Burrhead had guided the G-Men to a basketball title in 1956, six years before their gridiron crown. Looking on was Larry’s seven-year-old son, Brad, who dreamed of one day following in his father and grandfather’s footsteps.

Recognizing the lineage between Coach Bradley, his father Burrhead, and his son Brad was especially important to me from the very beginning. Like the other coaching families mentioned in the book, the Bradleys have influenced multiple generations of young men. The Grundy players I later spoke with acknowledged this firsthand. To read more about Larry Bradley and the Grundy Golden Wave, pre-order The Bandana Express, coming July 29 from Koehler Books. Thanks again for reading.

Jeremy

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Coach Robbins was the head coach at John Battle for six seasons before he took the job at Christiansburg in 1977. Even though there had only been one winning season since 1963, and they were coming off a 2–8 finish, the Emory & Henry graduate embraced the challenge, recognizing potential in the eighth- and ninth-grade classes. With just three run plays and two passes from his I-formation, the Blue Demons edged George Wythe 14–7 to start the year, their first win in a district opener in twelve seasons. His players had bought in, and so had the community.

The following excerpt is from Chapter 13, as Giles prepared to play Christiansburg in 1980.

Robbins was now in his fourth year at the helm of the Blue Demons. They had continually improved in his first three seasons, from 3–7 and 4–6 to 6–4 in 1979. Entering this season, Christiansburg had been picked to win the New River District by the Roanoke Times & World-News and the Blacksburg Sun, and at 5–0–1, they were off to their best start in almost a quarter century. The foretold potential of the now-upperclassmen had resulted in a roster of twenty seniors and nineteen juniors loaded with talent.

When I interviewed Coach Robbins, the aspect that stood out to me the most was his love of Southwest Virginia. He was so proud of the fact that, in that corner of the state, such football talent had emerged, and not just from Powell Valley. Yes, he coached NFL players Thomas and Julius Jones, but his mission seemed somehow larger than just his career. He truly wanted to shed light on an often-overlooked part of the state. Consequently, it was with that vision that I wrote The Bandana Express. To read more about Phil Robbins and the Christiansburg Blue Demons, pre-order a copy of The Bandana Express, coming July 29 from Koehler Books. As always, thanks for reading.

Jeremy

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Coach Lineburg shared that he woke up every morning to the sound of the Radford High School fight song, playing it as loud as possible as he prepared for the day. He repeatedly told his players it was the number one song in the country. Indeed, he and the Radford program had a rich tradition to be proud of. The following excerpts are from Chapter 7, prior to the Bobcats’ 1979 matchup with Giles.

Lineburg became the head coach in 1970, taking over for Harold Absher, the new superintendent of Giles County Public Schools. Since Lineburg’s hire, the Bobcats had been a powerhouse in Group AA. They owned a thirty-three-game winning streak from 1970 to 1973 and back-to-back state championships in 1971 and 1972.

By the conclusion of the 1978 season, Lineburg had an 83–12–3 record at Radford and an overall mark of 116–54–5, including previous head-coaching stops at William Byrd and Fieldale-Collinsville. The Bobcats had another solid year, posting an 8–2 record, blemished only by losses to Blacksburg and district champion Narrows. After the season, he was rumored for the head-coaching vacancy at Salem, the newest member of the Group AAA Roanoke Valley District, but Lineburg turned the job down. It was a near-perfect situation at Radford.

Like the Crists, the Lineburg family is steeped in coaching tradition. With his late wife, Joann, all four of Coach Lineburg’s sons—Robert, Mark, Paul, and Wayne—later entered the coaching profession. With his boys in tow, he watched from the hill as Giles took on Park View (Sterling) in the 1980 state championship, proud to support a fellow New River District team. To read more about Norm Lineburg and the Radford Bobcats, pre-order a copy of The Bandana Express, which is set to release on July 29 from Koehler Books. Thanks for reading.

Jeremy

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By the start of the 1978 season, Steve Ragsdale’s first at the helm in Giles, the Blacksburg Indians had already established themselves as the gold standard in the commonwealth. Entering his fourth season, Coach Crist had an impressive 30–5 mark, and his team was coming off their first Group AA state championship, having defeated perennial power Southampton 16–7. While he is featured throughout the book, the following excerpt from Chapter 4 offers background on the early part of his career before he arrived at Blacksburg.

The coach opposite Steve was thirty-one-year-old Dave Crist, who was no stranger to success in his young career. Before coming to Blacksburg High School in 1975, the Luray native had been an assistant at Madison County, a Group A high school located in the northern Piedmont region of Central Virginia. Under head coach Eddie Dean, the Mountaineers made the state finals in three of the four years of his apprenticeship, posting a 47–3 record and winning the state’s small-school crown in 1973. Following the 1974 season, a series of coaching changes at Blacksburg left the door open for Crist’s return to the New River Valley, the home of his alma mater, Virginia Tech, and he was hired less than three weeks before practice began.

I enjoyed talking with Coach Crist for The Bandana Express. He and his wife, Faye, were so hospitable and accommodating. The unique camaraderie among the coaches in the New River District at that time was clearly evident, and I hope that shines through on the written page. Along with their three sons, the Crist family is renowned for their coaching legacy, and I hope this book can be a source of pride for them as well. To read more, pre-order a copy of The Bandana Express, which is set to release on July 29 from Koehler Books. Thanks for reading.

Jeremy

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In this first entry, I include two excerpts about Narrows’s Bill Patteson, with whom I sat down at his home in August of 2010. While Coach Patteson appears multiple times throughout the book, these passages are from Chapter 3, just ahead of Steve’s first trip back to Ragsdale Field in 1978.

To complicate the situation, Steve was also facing his high school basketball coach, Bill Patteson. An Emory & Henry College graduate, the forty-six-year-old Patteson had led Narrows to nearly three hundred wins on the hardwood and was in his second year of double duty as the Green Wave’s head grid boss. Consistent with the traditions of his role, he had served as the junior varsity football coach for much of his twenty-year hoops career in Narrows.

The community was familiar with Patteson, a staunch disciplinarian dubbed “Wild Bill.” In the fourteen seasons and four head coaches since Harry retired, many former players remembered the impact of their jayvee coach. He consistently produced winning junior varsity teams and directed the recreation department for the town of Narrows. He had a proven track record, so they were not surprised when the Green Wave finished 7–2–1 in just his first year. It was a football renaissance in Narrows, and Patteson won multiple Coach of the Year honors.

To read more, pre-order a copy of The Bandana Express, which is set to release on July 29 from Koehler Books. Thanks for reading.

Jeremy

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He’s been a player. A coach. A leader. A media personality. A storyteller.

Bill Curry was a team captain at Georgia Tech for Bobby Dodd. He played in the NFL for Vince Lombardi and Don Shula. He started at center for the Green Bay Packers in Super Bowl I and the Baltimore Colts in Super Bowl III and V. He snapped the ball to Bart Starr and Johnny Unitas and won championships with both. He was a two-time Pro Bowl selection.

Later, he served as the head football coach at Georgia Tech, Alabama, Kentucky, and Georgia State, achieving success at each of those stops. He was a recipient of the Bobby Dodd National Coach of the Year award. An Amos Alonzo Stagg Award winner. ACC Coach of the Year. SEC Coach of the Year.

He was a college football analyst on ESPN for over a decade. He’s appeared in multiple documentaries and films. He is an author himself and a motivational speaker.

At age 82, there isn’t much that Bill Curry hasn’t seen or experienced in the game of football. So, when I reached out to him to see if he would be interested in reading an advance copy of The Bandana Express and providing a quote, I had no expectations. After all, the man has done enough for the game. I certainly did not expect him to discover anything novel in my writing.

After we exchanged a few emails, we spoke on the phone, and I provided him with some background on the story and how I became interested in the Bandana Express. He said he was intrigued by my passion and agreed to give it a look. A week later, he sent me the following quotation. He told me he read every word.

“Between 1955 and 2012, almost seven decades, my life was consumed by the sport of football. I thought I had experienced every ounce of its passion and pain. I was wrong. Jeremy Haymore, in his brilliant book, The Bandana Express, forced me to suffer, celebrate, and laugh out loud as it wound to its unlikely conclusion. If you love football, read it. If you don’t love football, read it anyway. You will love it, and it will make you a better person.” —Bill Curry

Needless to say, I was blown away. It perfectly captures everything I tried to accomplish with this book. Not because I am an exceptional wordsmith—I am just the steward of this incredible true story—but because that’s how much I believe in it.

Bill Curry didn’t have to provide such a glowing endorsement for me, but he did. Despite all his credentials, he remains remarkably humble. He said he doesn’t see himself as a “big name” but rather just as a “broken down old lineman.” Nonsense. He is a living legend. It was an honor for him to read it, and I look forward to everyone else having the opportunity to experience it as well.

Jeremy

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Pre-orders for The Bandana Express are now live! The hardcover version is $29.95, while the paperback lists for $19.95. There will be an ebook version for $9.99, but it will not be available until release day, July 29, 2025. The entire work is 304 pages, including the author’s note, foreword, photo gallery, endnotes, and bibliography. Links for Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Bookshop are below.

Amazon: a.co/d/cv1ieKg

Barnes & Noble: tinyurl.com/hskhx824

Bookshop: tinyurl.com/2s37az33

As a special bonus here on my blog, I have included the two original pictures used on the cover. I can’t wait to share this story with the world, and I hope you will consider purchasing a copy! Thank you.

Jeremy

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Koehler Books has unveiled the cover design for The Bandana Express.

Thanks to everyone who voted and helped select this design. Pre-orders will begin in the coming days, so if you haven’t already done so, subscribe to receive notifications!

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The Bandana Express chronicles the coming-of-age tale of a high school football team and their young coach, Steve Ragsdale, as he strives to follow in the footsteps of his legendary father in the Appalachian Mountains of Virginia. Faced with a threat directed at his star player, Coach Ragsdale unites the school and rural community behind a symbol of hope: the boy’s red bandana. With a colorful cast of memorable characters, the underdog Spartans employ grit and an old-fashioned offense to propel their improbable season toward an unforgettable finish. A nostalgic journey through sports and pop culture, The Bandana Express illustrates why high school football remains an enduring thread in the American fabric. Reminiscent of Friday Night Lights, The Junction Boys, and Twelve Mighty Orphans, the true story of the 1980 Giles Spartans will captivate football diehards and casual fans alike.

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