Two former successful Atlanta High School athletic coaches are hoping for another victory.
Gordon Pynes and Ben Scharnberg want to encourage the creation of an Atlanta High School athletic hall of fame. They are planting the seeds by speaking before groups, and they recently met with AHS' Class of 1967 during its 50th reunion.
"We're kinda beating the drums a little bit," Pynes told the group. "We've started making a list of both boys and girls who might be chosen for the athletic hall of fame, and we find it's very extensive."
"We're pretty excited about the idea," Scharnberg said. "It would be part of our school's fine athletic tradition."
Such recognition would have to do not only with the athletes' abilities but also their heart, character and post-high-school contributions , Scharnberg continued.
"We know of other school districts which have such a program," Scharnberg said, "and we would want ours to be right. So, we're going slow simply by letting you know what we are thinking about. We hope you'll be hearing more about this as time goes by."
"It's like an airplane we are trying to get off the ground," Pynes said. "We wanted to come here tonight and speak to you about the idea. Alumni like you is where it would start. We have a tremendous athletic history. We want to encourage others to follow in it."
Pynes and Scharnberg had longtime, successful coaching careers in Atlanta. Pynes in track and Scharnberg in football.
Scharnberg is, in fact, a member of the Athletic Hall of Fame at Kerrville High School in Kerrvile, Texas, where he graduated in 1970. There, besides playing on the state basketball team, he lettered three years in football and four years in both basketball and baseball.
As AHS athletic director and football coach for 21 years, Scharnberg took the 2003 Atlanta Rabbits to the state championship in football.
Pynes has the popular and well-attended Runnin' Rabbit Relays named after him. He, too, took the Rabbit track team to a state championship in 1989.
"If we can do this, we are going to do it right," the two coaches told the alumni class of 1967. The class seemed ready to join in the effort. After all, they had a record of their own. The football players that year were undefeated in their season of play.