A Wildcat Still

By Dean Poling

November 05, 2007 12:29 am

— VALDOSTA — A strange note is listed under 1929 in the annals of Valdosta High Wildcat football. It is often found in the team’s program. The note reads: “... The Albany High game was never finished, as VHS withdrew its team late in the fourth quarter.”
For Charles O’Neal that 1929 withdrawal is more than a footnote. He was there. Not in the stands, not on the sidelines. No, Charles O’Neal was there as a player. He played end for the Wildcats from 1929-32, playing first for VHS Coach Mike Herndon, then Coach Bobby Hooks.
At the age of 95, Charles O’Neal is often referred to unofficially as the “oldest living Wildcat,” says Troy Black, a Wildcat Touchdown Club board member.
O’Neal is part of a Valdosta-Lowndes County football dynasty.
In 1967, legendary Wildcat Coach Wright Bazemore led a Valdosta Touchdown Club dedication to John Robert O’Neal, Charles O’Neal’s father. Bazemore wrote of the “great privilege” of coaching so many of John Robert O’Neal’s descendants.
“I’ve never coached one of his descendants who didn’t give 100 percent on the field and conducted themselves in a manner that made me proud of them,” Bazemore wrote. “They all seemed to have that extra something called desire, spirit and character that made them Champions.”
Bazemore first became the Wildcat coach in 1941, nearly a decade after Charles O’Neal had played his last Valdosta game, but the descendants to whom Bazemore refers, as well as other relatives, are all part of O’Neal’s family.
Charles’ older brother, Johnny O’Neal, was a Wildcat player from 1924-27. Charles played the same 1929-32 years as his younger brother, Lonnie. Glenn O’Neal played for the Wildcats from 1941-43.
Lowndes High School had opened by the time Charles’ sons, Charles Jr. and Jerry, were old enough to play football. Charles Jr. and Jerry played for LHS from 1959-62. Many of Charles Sr.’s nephews, such as John Robert O’Neal, played for Valdosta, including Billy Grant for whom Valdosta State University’s Billy Grant Field is named.
Many of Charles O’Neal’s descendants and relatives have played football for Valdosta or Lowndes. His great-grandson, Cale O’Neal, currently plays for Lowndes High. High school football has seen many changes since Charles’ 1929 team and Cale’s 2007 team.
In Charles O’Neal’s day, players wore leather pads and leather helmets. Helmets were optional. He shares the story of one teammate who refused to wear a helmet in practice or during a game. This continued until the player was matched against “a big ol’ boy” on an opposing team. The player “ran to the sidelines and got a helmet. That other fella was so big. He always wore his helmet after that.”
The 1929-32 teams never played a night game. There were no lighted fields. All games were played on afternoons.
Most high schools played a football game on Thanksgiving Day.
Wildcat football wasn’t a throwing game then. “We would run with the ball,” O’Neal says. While the ball itself had the essential shape of today’s football, the 1929-32 ball was a bit rounder and thicker in the middle.
To train, the team ran and practiced plays but there was no weight training. For many of that era’s players, muscle conditioning came during chores performed before the start of school and after school and football practice.
Such chores kept the then-6-foot, 160-pound Charles O’Neal and his brothers in good shape. They worked the family dairy farm before going to school and playing football with teammates whom O’Neal recalls as Robert Shannon, Fred Nijem, “Hambone” Larsen, J.W. Martin, Reed Odom, Harry Garbutt, Joe George, Frank Garbutt.
The end of high school spelled the end of Charles O’Neal’s football days. He kept to the family dairy farm. He married wife Gladys. They had two sons, Charles Jr. and Jerry, and two daughters Lisa Chapman and the late Susan Metcalf. After the dairy farm, Charles O’Neal also drove an ice cream truck before retiring. He now lives at Heritage House, where he discussed his Wildcat days with The Valdosta Daily Times, son Jerry, and Troy Black.
During the visit, Charles O’Neal shared his recollections of the story behind the footnote for the 1929 game.
Valdosta High was pitted in a hard-fought contest with Albany. VHS ran a play down the middle of the field and scored, but the officials apparently favored Albany. Even though the play was clearly in the middle of the field, O’Neal recalls, officials claimed VHS was out of bounds and the touchdown no good.
1929 Coach Mike Herndon had quite a temper, O’Neal says. “If he called you in, you had better’ve said, ‘yessir,’ or you wasn’t going in,” O’Neal says. The out-of-bounds call piqued Coach Herndon’s temper.
The coach argued with officials, but the officials wouldn’t change their call. Instead of telling his players to return to the field, Herndon “told us to take the bus,” O’Neal says. “We got on the bus and went home. We never did finish that game.”
It’s been a while since O’Neal, now in a wheelchair, has attended a football game. But he listens to them on the radio. He listens to the games of a new generation of Wildcats. He listens to the games of his Lowndes High great-grandson. He listens to these new games, recalling his own games from nearly 80 years ago.

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