The stories, subtle jokes and seemingly endless stream of track & field knowledge that graced the western Pennsylvania high school T&F/XC scene for decades took a hit Wednesday with the death of WPIAL icon Chuck Hemphill.
Hemphill was a coach, a clerk, an announcer, and more, who injected his dry sense of humor into everything he did. With it, he would relax nervous athletes and entertain a crowd as the hours and events ticked by at meets large and small. And he was a track historian. The keeper of the WPIAL records, indoor and outdoor, for decades - updating the top 100 in each event after each season. By hand, of course, with his trusty Remington manual typewriter.
But according to those who worked with him, he was a fan first.
USATF official and Fox Chapel coach Mark Schwartz called Hemphill "a true contributor" to the sport. "He used to help officiate the PIAA State XC meets, refusing to accept a free bed the night before and driving through the night to places like Bucknell, Lehigh, Hershey. He truly did it for the love of the sport."
As an announcer, he presided over the entertainment and commentary at one of the premier spring track meets in western PA - the Baldwin Invitational - for over two decades. Posting on the PennTrackXC forum, 'MarkMadden' noted that Hemphill 'made those long days at the Baldwin Invite fun with his mic (microphone) antics. My favorite was, 'if you don't come by to collect your awards in four seconds, you'll have to buy them back, at a flea market somewhere in Canonsburg'."
Making athletes feel at ease when they were preparing for an event seemed to be one of his gifts. Forum member 'Zoom' remembers the 2004 TSTCA Championships as they readied to sort into heats to race the Mile, when 'Mr. Hemphill says, "Alright men...anybody planning to run 3:59 or faster step forward'."
Schwartz remembers Hemphill's famous line when working as a clerk. Speaking to coaches as they lined up to register their athletes, he'd say, "OK, who's a member of the Liar's Club today?"
"And he knew all the WPIAL records by heart," recounts Baldwin coach and TSTCA Vice President Ed Helbig. "It seemed he was at every meet. He would cheer, walk around, talk, clerk, announce, hand out awards... everything. And he and his buddies would hold court in the stands and tell stories of days gone by." Hemphill was awarded the Tri-State Coaches Association (TSTCA) Lifetime Achievement Award in 1995 for his contributions to the sport.
Some of those bygone days were more than likely his coaching tenure at Penn Hills, where, after serving as an assistant, he replaced Glen Davis as the head coach. In the late 1980's, one of his athletes captured two national prep records that still stand today. Dion Bentley, who competed in the Long, Triple and High Jumps, as well as the Hurdles, holds both the US Prep indoor Long Jump record of 26-06.50, and the outdoor Long Jump record of 26-09.25. As a math teacher at Penn Hills, Hemphill taught other prominent people including long-time NBA coach George Karl and NC State coach and Carnegie Merit Scholar Herb Sendek.
Both Schwartz and Helbig remember Hemphill as a man who shunned the computer. "He scored a cross country meet by hand. It took 20 minutes to half-an-hour," notes Helbig. Schwartz remembers Hemphill scoring a meet in his head. Not an easy task.
And Hemphill expected athletes to act respectfully, says Helbig. "If he didn't see common courtesy, he said something."
"But," Helbig says, "he was always just a fan. If he were driving home from a meet and saw school buses near a track, he'd just pull in and watch another one. It wouldn't matter that he didn't know the kids."
Funeral and memorial contribution details are available.
The story in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.