On November 23, 1932, the student newspaper, the Teco Echo, announced a historic moment in athletic history with a front-page banner headline, “East Carolina Teachers College’s First Football Squad.” Below, a team photograph powerfully communicated the moment. In the caption, the Teco Echo gave the names of the twenty-four pictured, including five who had not dressed out, and the team’s coach, C. Kenneth Beatty. With minimal financial support but clear doggedness from the players, a football team had made the scene. The Teco Echo soon devoted a page to “Sports,” with the football team often featured. Not all faculty and students were excited about it, but the coach and players were determined to charge forward, regardless.
Beatty’s position as coach for the Men’s Athletic Association at ECTC came without compensation. He was responsible for all men’s teams, including basketball and baseball, as they emerged on the scene in 1932. Beatty had played football at Mount Holly High School, and later at Guilford and then North Carolina State College. The Teco Echo described him as “a man of exceptionally fine qualities of character,” adding that “the athletic committee was most fortunate” in securing him as coach. The faculty advisor for Men’s Athletics, R. C. Deal, had been at East Carolina for ten years as founder of the Foreign Languages Department. Earlier Deal had served as president of the North Carolina Association of Modern Language Teachers.
The team was referred to as “the Teachers.” In their first year, they neither won a game nor scored a point. In their second season, 1933, the Teachers played Wake Forest Freshmen (home), Guilford (away), Presbyterian Junior College (home), Campbell College (home), and Appalachian Teachers College (home). By season’s end, they had won one game, against Campbell, 6-0. Those six points were the only ones scored the entire season.
In the “Sports” section, the Teco Echo sought to awaken spirit. First and foremost, students were encouraged to go to the games. Statistics for faculty and student attendance were cited to reveal shameful levels of apathy. The school’s newly formed cheerleaders provided an announcement, published in the Teco Echo, to educate students, overwhelmingly female, about how to display school spirit. For the “Kick-Off Yell” they were repeat: “S-s-s-s-s—s (to be held until the ball is kicked) B-o-m Bah.” One group cheer was, “Fight Team Fight. Fight Team Fight. Fight team, fight team. Fight Team Fight.” The words to the “College Song” were also printed to prep the student body on game day enthusiasm. Despite these efforts at building school spirit, the 1935 yearbook did not mention the new football team.
However, the 1936 Tecoan corrected that with a multiple page spread on the team, now coached by G. L. “Doc” Mathis and known as “the Pirates,” and their much-improved season in 1935, finishing 3-2, with a 46-0 romp over Chowan. The name change had occurred in 1934 when the Men’s Athletic Association voted to call men’s teams “the Pirates.” Coach Mathis, incidentally, was to be paid for his efforts. During his first season, the Pirates won only one game, but scored three touchdowns in the process, and tied one game with William and Mary, making for a far more successful season that ever before.
While a new age in sports history had opened at East Carolina, it did so within the confines of Jim Crow athletic culture then pervading the country and most especially the South. It would be a full decade before Jackie Robinson broke the color line in professional baseball, signing with the Brooklyn Dodgers and heralding the beginning of the end of segregated sports. At East Carolina, however, desegregation of first the campus and then sports did not occur for another three decades.
Sources
- Bratton, Mary Jo. East Carolina University: The Formative Years, 1907-1982. Greenville, N.C.: ECU Alumni Association, 1986.
- “C. Kenneth Beatty.” Teco Echo. November 23, 1932. Vol. 9, no. 4. P. 6. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/37996.
- “East Carolina Teachers College’s First Football Squad.” Teco Echo. November 23, 1932. Vol. 9, no. 4. P. 1. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/37996.
- “Fatalities of 1933.” Tecoan. 1934. Greenville, N.C. East Carolina Teachers College, 1934. P. 136. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/15339.
- Ferrell, Henry C., Jr. No Time for Ivy: East Carolina University, 1907-2007. Greenville, N.C.: East Carolina University, 2006.
- “Football Games Are Announced.” Teco Echo. October 18, 1933. Vol. 10, no. 2. P. 3. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/38008.
- “Football Group.” Tecoan. 1933. Greenville, N.C. East Carolina Teachers College, 1933. P. 160. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/15338.
- “Mathis Will Coach E.C.T.C. Athletics This Year.” Teco Echo. October 3, 1934. Vol. 11, no. 1. P. 3. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/38008.
- “Pirates Accepted as Official Name for Teachers.” Teco Echo. February 28, 1934. Vol. 10, no. 9. P. 3. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/38014.
- “Program, E.C.T.C. vs. Oak Ridge, October 23, 1935.” University Archives # 40.01.02.00.19351026. J. Y. Joyner Library. East Carolina University. Greenville, N.C. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/19276.
- “R. C. Deal.” Teco Echo. November 23, 1932. Vol. 9, no. 4. P. 6. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/37996.
- “Season’s Resume.” Tecoan. 1936. Greenville, N.C.: East Carolina Teachers College, 1936. Pp. 149-153. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/15341.
- “Students Urged to Attend Games.” Teco Echo. October 18, 1933. Vol. 10, no. 2. P. 3. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/38008.
- “Very Bright Outlook Predicted for Pirates.” Teco Echo. October 3, 1934. Vol. 11, no. 1. P. 3. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/38020.
Author: John A. Tucker, PhD
Date of Publication: 7/30/2019