A Word on Words; 3928; Carrie Gentry

liz from nashville studio way celebrating offers literature ideas for more than three decades this is word on words ron johnson the welcome once again to award own words my guest today is carrie gentry or sixty three years you share the life and her memory of that life the remarkable man who had made a notable accomplishments life worth living a biography of our gentry singer talks about professional careers a football coach athletic director for tennessee state university yet the distinct honor of being in an odd remember the tennessee state you're settling qualifying and has been immortalized on campus with the main effort building being named in his arm parents allies to have either talk about your husband howard gentry was my friends thank you so much for having me here let me ask you on at the outset i know he answered bought share

with our audience why you decided to write this book well kelly but when a husband and their attack and we use it to we were going to write about our lives to get there but i made a decision instead of doing that to write only about healing the calls so many people would come in to nashville who did not know him young people around who did not know him and that so many of whom work from ten to ten ask why did they name the building after him i like to sit before decided instead of writing about our lives i decided to write about my husband's life and what he had done is specially here at tennessee state university and with the national organizations and so forth that caused him to walk having a building named after him and so that's what

we know is that moment fred humphries then president does he stay so sets up in your blood and sciences with them in that building that must've been thrilling moment for you to follow my goodness if my heart could have jumped out it would have done that it was just a wonderful wonderful exciting moment you know i said in the introduction that you were sixty eight years married you think is over still been married to our children he was after forty eight years when he died but i was interested in how his career began running with partying with ohio and from cleveland won a little i say it was a different world than an id laws say that many african americans there was a quota system at work and the un and so we didn't get to go to

us at that which was it for short instead it goes in a different direction and you think he ever deeply regretted that given how is how successful his career was well at first he was devastated because he really did want to go to ohio state university but as it turned out he ended up that sense they did not sure give him a scholarship because of the quota system he ended up going to school at forty and m university and tell tallahassee florida now did he regret not having gotten to ohio state university he say it that he he really really felt that if he had dawned on the state university he would've graduated

from there the calls self few if any of them graduated the athletes we begin schools and so forth so but after he grew up and went for e n e m and graduated from there and it had a successful life after that he did not regret not he did not regret the fact that he did not go to ohio state university because he feels like his life would've been entirely different well he may be a great record where we're everywhere and we made a couple stops along the way before he got the tennessee state he never knew he had been a baseball coach just briefly but he is a hipster you with football that's that's where he made his name and that's where he made his career

and it was basically on the football player a football coach and then because it was such a successful football coach the game athletic director and i had not remembered that that first year when he came to see state as coach what a great year it was talk a little bit about well the first year that he came to tennessee state university he came as an assistant to coach him half a theme in american teen who was known as the thought that talks to fox get so he came here to be coached king's assistant know how did that happen manager during that period of time that was a game being played in washington dc that being called the capital classic that's right and it was said to be like the super bowl of today because once that beat

it was a game between the two top black universities teens football tickets and that you know tennessee state was one of those teams and wilberforce university closely uplifting and that's where mothers one was working at that before you forget your right he was working on the country listening and an end so after that during that game of course it was felt that the landlady was something that calls to wilberforce to win that game they want with tennessee state university so there's a man who is a round now wheaton also wheaton who tells the story of the fact that dr davis who was a president of tennessee state university and coached team the heat coach a football it was that night after they win that will force

that they got after me to a howitzer and recall the story first of all the country who has had an assistant coach keen it was interested in the country and while losing ground then so he recommends howard which may have been his big mistake that that he paid for it on a football field in it and then we'll talk a little bit about that that moment of decision making and which all of a sudden howard decides it's gonna beat tennessee state party's future well and that of affidavits and coach keen vs one that hit land coach because they felt that the land was the thing that beat tennessee state university well all it was hurt that vehicle which country lewis

when they talked about a meeting a land go at a tennessee state university he mentioned that book how would a century who had gone before him in yemen he was a great lang coach so yes he reckoned he said that because even one wins gm his head looked so anyway they started after howard gentry to competency state university because oh jim did not they did not want to lose jim so in a way they asked how it that night another and that he will be interested in coming to tennessee state university and how centrist say it will always liked about my situation but in reality relative to really didn't want a movie but because he was doing good at the wilberforce and he'd gone back to graduate school at nc state at ohio state of all places out to work on his

masters in physical education but they kept after him and kept after him until the infernal come down here for an interview and coaching coach kaine has been there for while on a winning design and howard was going to be his successor when dr davis decided but when i mentioned that first exciting year for the record my husband became tainted become ill and could not come back as the head coach else so in a way it started out where they need to go into a person too keep the team going in and muslim happen to be in that interim battle and they get excited bet and the one who would get that x would be that the yahoo the all of the assistant coaches were in the running for kings an ongoing

job one in particular was alarmed some of the seafood have been there before my husband came so they really wanted to her long sentence and the idea but then they found out some things that kept them from being able to keep him as they are possible he had come tj so just inadvertently the president came up to howard's interesting here at a basketball game and say it to him that he i don't know that was advanced welding but they want if they did tell him that they wanted him to be there it football coach so anyway my husband came home and he said they want me to be the hip football coach of the water don't know whether or not i wanna be a good football coach and he told me that and i looked at him in that scene i thought wow you and it wasn't you it is that when i read that line the book gaza that is so kerry or you interviewed you talk to really and they made arrangements won the guardian and other work

on his doctorate i really meant well why don't you go on to him and when i didn't say that i did so within well you in the world that first year it blows away the economy and why and it so we did become very good coach that was in nineteen fifty six and they didn't win and they didn't lose an endangered know him and they did in the morning first became the head coach now britain's impending lose again that's exactly what successful as they go dry undefeated right is up substantially they were now an interim coach who had an undefeated season so again head coach and it was successful career absolutely no one else no doubt lead director heat reflected found something

now referred to live golden era he employing great coaches football basketball and what teams they had on the john merrick a memory of martin bailey is he was head coach part of what this book does is tell us about your life with him it had relationship in which he shared his challenges when it came time to retirement in your assignment traveling right indeed he did it came a time after great success anomaly great success as a coach but out of athletic director tennessee state continues to win and not only and in football and basketball

but they had trouble comes in as head of the track team and they go the olympics and then blow everybody away he was a great job jim captain ann a great judge of talent where that come from that ability to pick people like john merrick in a temple to run of programming well he had the head a great deal of training other coaches before coming to tennessee state university he had the opportunity to work under his old coach from ford at home the old male he had opportunity to work on their own country blues though wilberforce ohio and his life before coming to into athletics even with his own

family members they were great motivators and down as a matter of fact his older brother upon the death of his father took the role of father far those he had a disability so and then one of his brothers um was a deacon in the church and you know he had wonderful simple vision and direction as a youngster so i guess all of that really played a part in causing him to develop into that kind of sorrow knowledgeable spiritual person who could make judgments about him thousand we had to convince the temple here to convince john mair had convinced ed martin and others to come on board but just momentarily audience for those if you're just tuning in

i'm talking with teri gender about a book a life worth living is a biography of her husband alexander now in an advance of this question but it's interesting how you went about gathering materials of a lifetime to write this book because you know you're looking back sixty years on end i'm a jew to tell our audience what what it took to put together the research to finally to live well well i'll tell you what that referred to the family if it was a handout saying in the end the book in which you're in a room and the floor is covered with the orioles it's covered with newspaper articles in newspapers magazines and you couldn't walk in that room and i had them land up according to the period of ten

starting from his own waiting for the sports in junior high school with articles being written and then up through high school and then on to college and then apparently are made and then on from that i hit all those newspaper clippings and then the follow up so i had that opportunity and then another very very useful thing which you'll find in that book is the young ingenue along when our flesh was doing he is a section on because of google books he called an ask you a person could come down from his office to interview a muslim pertaining to his experiences in sports in the various colleges and universities primarily the black colleges and universities as well as international organizations his experiences there so that man came down and he was in the house for the whole day an ask of my husband

questions and muslim would answer him this was in about nineteen add something or other after my husband's retirement and so those tapes when the man he say that he was gone sent us a copy of the tape and he beat he sent a copy of that tape of the question finance of all day long i love he is asking and my husband answered and so a great deal of that information is in that book were to work as they questioned and as the answers would delay adds another dimension to a story really to read the verbatim tapes because not all things howard would stop and reconsider the question on end it's it's so very informal and so very conversational you get the feeling you submit talking to howard zinn and seniors that whole thing goes on now at fascinated i

am fascinated the fact that arthur ashe the science and the road to victory is going to examine the evolution of black athlete any sense from the foundation an interviewer to howard gentry in nashville tennessee because he knew by that time with howard had such an influence in international and national associations that that carried his record from new jersey state across those national organization so the national association's summer which you served as officer of an egg how do you react when arthur as gollum oh my goodness that was quite quite a surprise that big man who won all of those of the tennis competitions

and so forth all of my husband to get information this man who's known all over the world almost as rose so they are exciting they're exciting and certainly welcome this person that he's sincere into it and it was a wonderful one is it with that interview is wonderful and ends at the mention of that look that we otherwise wouldn't get you know it strikes me that your relationship with him was a unique you write yourself a survey went on the standard is our audience listen to you yourself were involved in the whole athletic program and and you're a member and talk about that a little bit if you were to eat really well you know i used to sit in bali was sounding like my son insisted listened to and when i'm talking to people now we need to stop talking about us and don't have to say exactly what i'm

asking you but so anyway yes i came with my husband you to nashville i am at one of the one of the awfulness that the administration at tennessee state university had given to my husband was that accurate have a job he also saw at my job and health and physical education how terrible primarily a leader on in rhythmical activities and i was the director of the marching one hundred major and slavery isn't a famous man hours of the major routes for fifteen seventeen years i believe and i we went to many places with the team you know to perform at halftime and the like and one of those times we will remember the first year the muslim was hit cult that was the first year that i became the director of the major acts

and we went for ordain him to play that allers was in class and they held the department akbar and i was sitting up in the stands and people all around those were some mumbling in saying that they wish we would you know that they wish that we would hurry up and come on the feel and get off the field the band and a major is a soulful and so if their team john saluted marching what one hundred bills for him at a festive and as and girls the girls had that accident i think i did but they were there just american get on the ceiling you know so but only other hand from the first two sound came out loans of the princes they aristocrat of bands they set up and they say it and these has stepping drum majors and of course the major it's coming out as stepping also they said i can say it won't be a good so anyway i worked with major its the seventeen years and certainly traveled with the

band we went to various places we were in the arm upgrade for the inauguration which one was it that name does look a smell it anyway we were that they are in washington for the inauguration of president kennedy was not me just ask you about will our generation he's been active in politics a highly successful they've working in community enterprises now designed to help with the nashville society and i have to ask you were you got a book about yourself and i think i

think you give me a little hint i think i know the answer to this question but unlike for the audience to hear the wealth right now for we did say that we were going to write about ourselves when we retire due announcing the us house singing me and media topics job and we rolled in we won with drab and one would write me alone would drag in the us on what's right and we have a whole lot of material but we never put it on one global to get into any kind of vocal so when whey in that building was named after my husband i wrote the book about him now you come to how it's intruding et and you speak of healing and you speak of when i don't write about me i feel that instead of writing about me i would like to write about my essay he made a tremendous market

here in nashville tennessee when he went into the political arena and he forbid such a remarkable job here and raised nashville tenn another wrong too all until i wanna write about him so that investment and somewhere to do that and i do that as you know domino is a reaction but what is i think that my son would be proud that i think of him in that particular way i know we were in i really thinking well we've run out of time we had i am honored that you came to doctors about our gentry singer in his great career about your great career i think it's pretty well i thank you for having me and i leave you're going to start to say that i

believe that those who might choose to read that book will enjoy the store paul integrated stewart thank you very much and thank all of you for watching and johnson in gulfport own words keep reading fb