Charles Ralph Holt

Jan. 20, 1922 – Sept. 23, 2002

Ralph Holt sank his soul into his hometown soil

By Steve Short

Dad gum it, son! If you can’t be part of the solution don’t be part of the problem. Gee whiz!

Ralph Holt, former teacher, coach and principal, is probably the only person outside of Archie comic books - and singer Carla Thomas - who actually used the phrase “Gee whiz.”

But when Holt said it he expressed utter disdain. If you were the one being spoken to, you looked around expecting to see a bush burning nearby.

When you were thirteen or fourteen years old and Ralph Holt was your teacher, coach or principal at Park Avenue School, he ruled over your eight-to-five world like Jehovah in the Old Testament.

Holt had a huge and lasting impact on hundreds of children in Milan. For many of us, he was the first coach we had outside of Little League or Babe Ruth summer baseball. He invested himself in children and his community as few others have. In an age when many people seem to have lost their ties to place, Ralph Holt maintained strong roots. As minister Roy Hall noted in eulogizing him, Holt sank his soul into his hometown soil. 

Born in Milan, Jan. 20, 1922, Charles Ralph Holt graduated from MHS in 1939 and attended Cumberland University in Lebanon, playing football, basketball and baseball. He served in the Air Force during World War II. Entering his career in education, he taught and coached varsity sports at Manville, Wyoming and then returned to Tennessee to coach at Greenfield and Sharon before coming back home to Milan where he taught Tennessee history and English and coached junior high football, basketball and track and field. His teams won 80 percent of their games.

Altogether, he taught 32 years, 28 of those coming at Milan where he also coached 15 years. He was an administrator and principal at Park Avenue Elementary School from 1966-1979.

Holt and his school system cohorts – fellow coaches, teachers and administrators Wylie Wheeler and Milton Mayo – wielded so much power and influence they were referred to as Milan’s “Holy Trinity,” or in Holt’s words, “The Milan Mafia.” Holt’s joking characterization was funny, because in reality he was a church-going man who practiced daily the philosophy he preached: “Do right.”

“He considered himself a teacher first and then a coach,” said son, Robert Holt about his father. “He probably would have coached as a hobby without pay.”

Holt brought the same intensity to a discussion of English grammar as he did an analysis of football X’s and O’s. He was known for his classrooms devoted to diagramming sentences. Students spent hours reducing convoluted sentences to a single subject and predicate, and distinguishing modifying clauses. Holt had a curiosity about language. One of his memorable lessons illustrated the unpredictable nature of English spelling rules. Using chalk on the blackboard, Holt wrote the word “fish,” spelling it phonetically “ghoti.” The “f” sound was derived from “gh” in the word “rough,” the “i” sound from the “o” in “women,” and the “ti” pronounced like “sh” from any word ending in “tion.”

Holt earned the nickname “Bird” as a young boy probably because of his hawk-like profile, but apparently he never liked it. For many who had him as a teacher or coach, he was never “Bird” or even “Coach Holt.” He was “Mr. Holt.”

 An All-West Tennessee football player at Milan and versatile athlete, Holt had a life-long passion for sports and forever a scout’s or coach’s critical eye. As a junior high coach and assistant to high school coaches, he was responsible for steering many young athletes in the right direction or team role. He taught fundamentals and developed talent, but because he was behind the scenes in some regard and not officially a high school coach, he was something of an unsung hero. He was perhaps most proud to have helped Wylie Wheeler coach the Milan girls who went undefeated (37-0) and won the 1960 state championship. “Ralph was one of the best basketball scouts around and played a big part in picking out athletes with talent and developing them,” Wheeler once recalled. 

Holt was the preeminent Milan sports historian and probably the only person in town who saw every game when Milan played for a state championship between 1942 and the year of his death in 2002. Those state title games included boys basketball in ’42, girls basketball in 1960 and 1981, and football teams in 1971, ’77, ’93, ’98, and ’99.

He admired the expertise of Milan football coach John Tucker and once consoled Tucker after a tough loss, telling the coach he and his Milan team had battled bravely and come close to winning. “’Close’ doesn’t count except in horseshoes and hand grenades,” said Tucker. “And slow dancing,” added Holt, undoubtedly with a wide grin.

Holt was a compelling storyteller, and would sometimes reminisce about going to USO dances while he was in the Air Force in California during World War II. In those days he listened to the famous big bands and would even win a dance with a movie star. It was during the war when he once saw baseball legend Ted Williams bat in a military ball game. Holt’s friend, pitcher Homer Spragins from Grenada, Mississippi, threw two fastballs by Williams. Then the Splendid Splinter ripped the third heater 500 feet into a grove of pine trees. Spragins went on to pitch one year in the majors.

Holt was a life-long St. Louis Cardinal baseball fan. When he was 13, he and a buddy enjoyed the adventure of a lifetime, riding a passenger train from Milan to St. Louis to see the Gashouse Gang play the Giants. There were seven future Hall of Famers in the game including pitcher Dizzy Dean.

One of my fondest memories of Mr. Holt occurred in 1964 when he brought his television to the classroom at Park Avenue so we could watch the Cardinals, behind pitcher Bob Gibson, beat the Yankees 4 games to 3. He just wasn’t going to miss it. Of course, we worked double time to cover our regular school assignments.

Decades after I knew him as a teacher and coach, I moved into Mr. Holt’s neighborhood and lived just two houses down. I came to value his knowledge and friendship. The fact that I’d endured one of his disciplinary paddlings back in eighth grade seemed forgiven. On occasions when I wrote for the Mirror-Exchange newspaper about Milan sports history, Mr. Holt was the primal reference source. He was inducted into the Gibson County Sports Hall of Fame in 1998, joining his colleagues Milton Mayo and Wylie Wheeler.

Holt and his wife, the late Helen Holt were parents to three children: Sara Beth, Robert, and Martha Holt Gasser, and four grandchildren.