January 21, 2009

Long time coach to be inducted into Tiger Athletic Hall of Fame

Serving successful coaching stints with four different athletic programs at Arkansas City Junior College, W.G. “Bunt” Speer will be inducted into Cowley College’s Tiger Athletic Hall of Fame on Saturday, Jan. 31.

Speer coached football, basketball, track and field, and golf at ACJC. He coached the football team from 1946-1954. With ACJC not playing football during the 1943-1945 seasons due to World War II, Speer coached the team to a record of 6-3 in its return to the gridiron.

Speer also led the ACJC men’s basketball team to a record of 69-61, while serving as coach from 1946-1952. Along with coaching football and basketball, Speer coached the ACJC track and field team from 1952-54 and the ACJC golf team during the 1961 season.

Along with coaching athletics at ACJC, Speer was a teacher in the Math and Science Department. He also served in World War II and was a lifetime member of the VFW.

Former Tiger basketball coaching legend, Dan Kahler, remembers Speer as a purist, that is, he did not recruit outside the school district. Speer believed that because taxes came from Arkansas City for Arkansas City Junior College, local youngsters who enrolled deserved to play.

Kahler, who assisted Speer in football, basketball, and track and field, said Speer knew the X’s and O’s of the sports he taught. He also spoke highly of the person he was.

“Bunt was as modest a person as I have known,” Kahler said. “He would do anything within his power to help student-athletes and friends. If Bunt had an ego, I never saw it surface. He was genuine without a phony bone in his body. You could not find a better friend than Bunt Speer!”

Kahler, who was inducted into the Tiger Athletic Hall of Fame in 2000, is looking forward to attending Speer’s induction.

“I'll be more emotional when that actually takes place than I can remember since I walked down the aisle May 29, 1949 to marry Violet, who became the greatest human being and the dearest love I have ever known,” Kahler said. “No one deserves a place in the CCCC athletics Hall of Fame more than W.G. Bunt Speer.”