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51 YEARS IN SPORTS
Smokey Harper Retires
By MAYNARD ROGERS
Sports Editor
Anyone who has been in and
around sports for over 51 years
has bound to have accumulated a
lot of friends, experiences and
memories that add up to some
thing of a legend in athletic an
nals.
Charles (Smokey) Harper, vet
eran Aggie trainer, teacher and
athletic psychologist, is such a
man.
But, like in every person’s life
that works for a living, there
comes a time when you take those
memories and experfences, quit
working and settle back to a well-
deserved life of ease.
So, after a colorful and reward
ing career on the playing field, in
the dressing room and around the
training table, the 66-year-old
white-haired gentleman of the tape
and liniment is retiring.
Harper will leave Aggieland on
June 2, and head back to his old
stomping grounds in Alabama aft
er 10 years service with A&M ath
letic teams.
Reports are that he has a semi-
retirement job with his old boss,
Paul (Bear) Bryant, at Alabama
University, in Tuscaloosa.
When he and his wife pull out
of Bryan, Smokey will be hauling
a mindload of remembrances of an
athletic career that began when he
was 15 years old—a career that
took him to the top.
Of course, the many friends he
claimed during his stay at Aggie
land won’t have him, except in
their memories.
Smokey, as just about every
coach and sports writer in Texas
knows him, has been around a
long time, and the athletic knowl
edge he has collected during his
golden years in sports would even
make Dr. Joyce Brothers flinch.
Harper was bom just one day
ahead of the New Year in 1898,
in Milledgeville, Ga., but he start
ed his journey through the sports
world in Macon, about 30 miles
away.
He began his formal athletic
training at the local secondary in
stitution, Lanier High School, play
ing football, basketball and base
ball, with the diamond his best
field.
As a matter of fact, baseball
was indirectly responsible for his
handle, Smokey.
“I was just a kid of 15 when it
happened,” Harper said. “I was
playing on the high school base
ball team for Macon, and we went
to Milledgeville for a game. Well,
since we were so far from home
we thought we were pretty big, so
we all bought the biggest cigars
we could find, lit them up and
started strutting around the Geor
gia State College For Women,
there in Milledgeville. It was quite
a day for me. I was wearing my
first pair of long pants.”
A big day it was until Harper
remembered that his aunt taught
at the Milledgeville school. Sud
denly he saw her turn a corner
and walk toward him.
“I couldn’t let her see the cigar,
but there was no time to put it
out. So I stuck it in the back
pocket of my new pants. We stood
there and talked a few minutes.
By the time she left my pants were
on fire. After that, all my friends
called me ‘Smokey.’ ”
After high school Smokey at
tended Mercer University in Ma
con, where he played basketball
and baseball. It was there he
picked up the knack of wrapping
ankles and giving rubdowns.
Harper took his first training
job at Clemson in 1926, and from
there he began his hopscotching
tour that carried him from one
coast to the other.
After the stint with the Tigers,
Smokey made more moves than a
nervous checker player.
From Clemson he went to Van
derbilt, then to Florida, back to
Vanderbilt, over to Alabama and
another bounce back to the Van-
dies.
Next was the long haul to Cali
fornia to work with the immortal
Red Sanders at UCLA.
After the Los Angeles job,
Smokey headed for Kentucky, who
was building up a football power
under the direction of a guy named
Bear Bryant. And that’s where he
stayed until he followed the Bear
to Aggieland in 1954.
Throughout his career as a
trainer who was pretty close to the
athletes, Smokey is a renowned
judge of player and character. But
one time he says he was really
wrong.
“That was back in 1950 when I
first came to Kentucky for the
Bear,” Smokey explained. “I saw
this sophomore kid, Ray Corrall,
who I didn’t think had what it
takes, so I told Bear to run him
off. Well, Bear said he was sorry
to hear that because he thought
he was a good prospect.”
As it turned out, the Bear knew
something that Smokey didn’t
know, and Corrall did everything
the trainer thought he couldn’t do.
“Bryant didn’t tell me the boy
was redshirting and was just fool
ing around,” Harper said. “Any
way, he went on to make All-
American at guard his senior year.
“I’ll never forget that because
when I told Bear to run Corrall off
Connie Lasslie, one of the line
coaches said ‘Smokey, I’m glad you
told Paul that because I’ve been
trying to run him off for a year,
but he wouldn’t do it. Maybe this
will verify my judgement on him,”
Smokey laughed.
“Well, two years later,” Harper
continued. “Corrall came back for
a visit and Connie shook his hand,
congratulated him and told him he
knew he could do it. But I said,
‘Connie, you’re a liar. You wanted
to run him off just like me.’ 01’
Ray sure laughed about that.”
Smokey branched out into a new
field when he came to Aggieland.
He started teaching students to be
trainers, and since then the state
is being scattered with Harper-
taught men.
“Right now,” Smokey comment
ed, “Jerry Rhea is out in Odessa,
Billy Pichert is working in Free
port and Jerry Elledge is in Kansas
City. All those boys are Ag
gies, and everyone of them is an
officer in the Southwest Athletic
Trainers Association. Roy Don
Wilson’s my last boy. He’s still
here at A&M. I think he will make
one of the greatest.”
That prediction cannot be far
from wrong, especially when the
teacher is a man who has pam
pered and trained 13 All-America
gridders during his 38 years in the
business.
Some of the men who entered
the portals of Smokey’s training
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room were Babe Parilli, Kentucky
and Boston Patriots; Don Moo-
maw, UCLA and formerly of the
Los Angeles Rams; Vaughn Man
cha, Florida State athletic director;
and of course the Brazos Bottom
twins, John David Crow, Jack Par
dee and Charlie Krueger.
Harper still keeps up with the
trends in modern sports, and he
thinks today’s athletes are far su
perior to those in his younger days.
“Football is 10 times better to
day than when I started,” Smokey
asserts. “Well, athletes are better
all around today. Football has
really changed, especially from the
fan’s standpoint. Just look at the
crowds.”
“I can remember in college
when you played football there
wasn’t any stands and maybe a few
thousand people on the sidelines.
A crowd of 5000 was tremendous,”
he added.
And Smokey should know, be
cause if it ever happened in sports
he was probably there to see it.
To show what his friends
thought of Smokey, in a kind of a
last gesture of friendship before
his retirement, Rhea and other
members of the Southwest Ath
letic Trainers Association gave
Smokey a breakfast on April 4,
and presented him with a nomina
tion to the Helms Foundation Hall
of Fame.
“You know,” the retiring train
er said. “I guess that’s about the
best ending of a career in sports
anyone could have.”
THE
Thursday, May 14, 1964
BATTALION
College Station, Texas
Page 7
Randy, Ted Try
Olympic Berths
Three Texas Aggies — Danny
Roberts, Ted Nelson and Randy
Matson — still have a lot of track
action before them.
Roberts, leading shot putter a-
mong the nation’s collegians this
year with throw of 60-7, plans to
concentrate on lifting weights in
prepartion for the NCAA cham
pionships June 18-19 in Eugene,
Oregon.
Nelson, who leads the nation’s
collegians in the 440-yard dash
with his 46.6, will compete in the
Coliseum Relays at Los Angeles
this week Friday, the U. S. Fed
eration meet at Corvallis, Ore.
June 12-13, the NCAA at Eugene,
Ore., June 18-19 and the National
AAU June 26-27 at New Bruns
wick, N. J.
Matson, top weightman among
the college freshman (and most
of the rest of the world), has a
busy schedule facing him as he
prepares to make a strong bid as
a shot putter on the U. S. Olym
pic squad.
MOVING!
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