Chafin remembered as father/friend first and coach second
Jim Chafin influenced many lives during his long career in Montgomery. He passed away this past weekend at the age of 92. (Contributed)
By GRAHAM DUNN
Mike Vinson remembered the last time he visited with his former Robert E. Lee High School football coach, Jim Chafin.
Like other meetings, it was memorable.
“Paul Scott and I had gone out to watch Texas A&M and Auburn play four years ago,” Vinson said. “We drove over to Tyler (Texas) to see him. By the time we left, we were all crying.
“I remember what was said as we left. I told him that he had blessed so many lives and were so thankful for all he had done. He said, ‘no, I am the one that was blessed.’”
Chafin passed away on Saturday at the age of 92. Funeral services will be held Tuesday in Tyler, Texas.
For most of his players, he was known more of a father figure than a coach.
“He was another father,” stated Ronnie “Knute” Elmore, who played for Chafin at Lee. “Coach Chafin, if he got mad, you knew it but that was seldom. He was cool as he could be, even in a ball game.”
“Coach was more of a preacher than a coach,” Vinson added. “He was really involved in everybody’s well being. He was a great motivator. He loved his players. He touched a lot of lives. Only time I think I heard him cuss was he said ‘piss ain’t.’”
In the 1950s and 60s, Lee was a powerhouse led by all-state performers such as Ralph Stokes, Lee Gross, Paul Spivey, Cedric McIntyre and George Pugh, all of which who went on to collegiate success.
They played for Chafin, who had a major influence on all of them.
“He was more than a football coach,” said George Pugh, who went on to star at Alabama and later as a coach for numerous teams, college and pro.
“He was a teacher, father, inspirational leader, he always had time for his football players. With my years there I learned so much. It was similar to Coach Bryant and what he taught.
“I would say I was prepared for just about anything at Alabama, knowing the toughness of the program. But Coach Chafin, Coach Pete Lee and the staff prepared us for all of that.”
A native of Albertville, Chafin began coaching before he graduated college in 1949, beginning with Isabella High School. After serving in the military during the Korean War, he would find his way to Montgomery and Sidney Lanier High School where he spent 1954 as the school’s baseball coach. The Poets won the state title in his only season.
Chafin was part of the coaching staff that built the Generals into a state power almost overnight. He was an assistant for 11 years including the first year of Lee football in 1955 under Tom Jones.
In that time frame, the program won 95 games and five state titles.
Jones left Lee in 1966 and Chafin was named the head coach and continued the winning tradition, leading the Generals to back-to-back titles in 1969 and ’70. Lee had a 32-game winning streak between 1969-71. He also led the school’s wrestling team to a state championship.
As important as winning the titles was, Chafin also led the program through the time of integration when Booker T. Washington, an all black school in Montgomery, was closed and the students were sent to predominantly white schools.
Several of the top players were sent to Lee and became a part of the program.
Pugh joined several of his teammates and learned firsthand the moral and straightforward thinking of Chafin.
“We made up our minds to make something of the situation,” Pugh said. “Life was never going to be easy and we played with the hand dealt. We made up our minds to take the opportunity to make something out of it.
“The people who we did this with… Ricky Stallings, Knute Elmore, Mike Vinson, Cedric McIntyre, Lee Gross, Ralph (Stokes)… I could go on but we were the meaning of what a true family was. We didn’t let our differences hinder our progress and we knew we could make it. We did it because of the men around us.”
In 1971, Chafin left the program to work with the Montgomery County Board of Education before taking the athletic director’s job at Trinity Presbyterian in 1982. He hired Randy Ragsdale as the school’s head football coach in 1989.
Ragsdale was all but handpicked by the Trinity AD, although Ragsdale was not initially interested. He was part of the coaching staff that had just won the Class 4A state title at Northview in 1985.
“He called me and said he had a position in Montgomery that I might be interested in,” Ragsdale said. “He invited me and I couldn’t turn him down.”
After the visit to the Trinity campus, Ragsdale decided to stay in Dothan but a conversation between Chafin and Ragsdale’s wife reversed the fortunes.
“That was one of his qualities – he had faith in people and he had it in me,” Ragsdale said. “He saw potential. But it wasn’t about him. He had been through so many things. It was never, ‘this is what you need to do.’ He did this with so many personalities, he seemed to know what to say and how to say it.”
Ragsdale changed his mind, took the job but initially didn’t have a place to live. Chafin and his wife let the new coach stay in their home for the first three months until the new coach settled.
“I didn’t know him deeply but he allowed me to move in with them for about three months. He was invested in me and I felt like I couldn’t let him down,” Ragsdale said.
Others would follow Ragsdale to Trinity and the athletic program became one of the best among private schools in the state.
“We were in the beginning stages,” said Elisa Bowden, who coached in the girls’ athletic program. “I was hired to get the girls’ sports going. I was the only female on the staff and not that many guys were fulltime coaches. Coach came in and I wouldn’t say we were floundering, but he brought knowledge, he brought expertise, he brought structure, he brought work ethic.
“He stayed in the background, but he made us all look good.”
Bowden was sold on Chafin when he raised several thousand dollars to improve the Trinity athletic program over a short time.
But it wasn’t just the money. Chafin not only raised funds – he raised a group of coaches who would go on to win state titles in several sports.
“For me, he was unique in that as a young coach I wanted him to tell me an answer,” Ragsdale said. “He would come back with questions. He would watch you, evaluate you but when he brought you in, he would encourage you but he’d also get onto you if needed.”
Chafin left Trinity in 1992 but would hang around the facilities to keep up with the program for several years. He would be inducted into several different Hall of Fames with the most notable coming in 1992 when he was named to the class for the Alabama High School Sports Hall of Fame.
In 2013, Chafin moved with his family to Texas where he spent the final years of his life.
He is survived by his wife, Joanie, daughter and her husband, Cindy and David Sykes; son Jim, Jr.; granddaughter and her husband, Jenni and Jason Holman; granddaughter Laura Grace Sykes and grandson and his wife, Robby and Erin Chafin.
He had six great-children, Lizzie Holman, Caroline Holman, Ada Liner, Grant Holman, Cecilia Chafin, and Robert Chafin.