WAYNESBORO – It’s been said that the past determines the present and future.
Waynesboro’s Bill Smith fits the aforementioned adage to a proverbial T.
Born Willam Lamar Smith in 1934, Smith, who as a child was often called by his middle name before Bill became his permanent name, laid the groundwork for the future in the sport of wrestling. His legacy spans not only the high school wrestling program but also youth wrestling in the community.
The 1960s was a decade that saw growth in scholastic athletics at Waynesboro High School. Boys’ soccer and baseball were added to the list of sports. Wrestling soon followed in 1964.
Smith was the one who put together the pieces. Most of the wrestlers representing the first team ever at Waynesboro High School never wrestled.
“We practiced in the cafeteria, we practiced in the hallways, we practiced on the stage of East Junior High,” said Smith. “We put mats everywhere. Several times we went to the junior high on Snider Avenue. There was nothing in there; all we could do were exercises. We couldn’t wrestle or drill. That’s how we built a team. We were competitive, we just couldn’t seem to push it over the top.”
Smith was often late for practices. He taught third grade at the time at Mowrey Elementary School, and he wasn’t able to alter the practice times to a half-hour later. So, he taught school, coached wrestling and was busy raising a family, something he began when he was a student at State Normal School (later named Lock Haven).
He did some wrestling in college as a junior varsity grappler. His wrestling days were short, but his interest in the sport was like a burning fire, needing very little to kindle while he worked diligently to ensure a future for wrestling in Waynesboro.
Smith could have easily spent his early life in DuBois, in Clearfield County. But his father, Laun Smith, moved the family to Waynesboro when he got a teaching job in Waynesboro. Smith taught 40 years and was the head of the math department.
Bill Smith, who along with his wife Audrey (McCarney) Smith had four children (Brad, Melanie, Brian and Melinda), began the arduous task of gathering necessary tools for his position as head coach: a mat and uniforms. Smith finally was awarded a $1,000 to purchase a Resilite wrestling mat. The team competed in the Tri-State League, which also included North and South High in Hagerstown, Martinsburg, West Virginia, among other Maryland schools.
But there was one more thing to enable the program to grow and that was a feeder program. Smith approached the “athletic association – I guess that’s what it was. They had a meeting, all the coaches met. In there I asked to start up a little league in wrestling. They said, ‘No, it’s too young.’ So I went to Boots Meager at the Y and he said, ‘Yeah, come on, sure.’ So I started little league wrestling at the Y. We had 19 kids. After a while, I resigned from that and I turned it over to (Howard) ‘Chic’ Hutton, who by the way wrestled years before they even had a wrestling club.”
Smith said Meager provided mats and uniforms for the wrestlers, and the number swelled to around 70. Hutton took over and ran the wrestling program from 1967 to 1975 under the auspices of the Junior American Athletic Union.
“Brad was one of the reasons I was involved in it. When he was in third grade, we drove to Cheltenham near Philadelphia. He took third place. There were a lot of good wresting kids around there.”
Smith, who knew how to wrestle, needed to convey the mental and strategic aspects of the sport as well as the actual moves and counter moves. Job number one, however, was building strength.
“I was always attracted to wrestling,” Smith said. “I liked the physical aspect. If I was coaching today I’d say you cant enter a Volkswagon in the Indianapolis 500. You have to have a body.”
Brad Smith went on to wrestle at Northern Michigan, then followed coach Bob Fehrs to Nebraska. Younger brother Brian, who enjoyed a successful scholastic wrestling career in Waynesboro, continued to wrestle at West Chester University in the early 1980s. He went on to have four children with wife Fawn, three of whom wrestled for the Indians (Jacob, Jonah and Jessie).
After three seasons coaching Waynesboro High School’s varsity wrestling teams, Smith resigned due to conflicts with his teaching schedule.
“It was just too much,” Smith related. “My teaching schedule was not good for the coaching because I would always get there late.”
Smith, who has worked numerous jobs (he was a courier for Waynesboro Hospital for 14 years), sensed it was time to move on with his life. He did – literally. He lived in Dover, Delaware for five years while Audrey was studying to be a nurse.
They moved back to Waynesboro, and in 1980, Smith helped out with the start-up wrestling program at Greencastle-Antrim High School. He was an assistant coach the first year and the head coach the following season.
Another big moment in Waynesboro wrestling was when the wrestling room was constructed.
“Carrol Pensinger came over and said he wanted to give $15,000 to the wrestling team for a wrestling room,” said Smith. “And I said you better name it for Dave and Dan (Ireland). He said, ‘No. If I can’t name it for you I’m not giving the money.’ I said, ‘Go ahead, name it for me.’ He did, and that was that.”
After Smith stepped away from the Waynesboro wrestling program, the team had four coaches over the next six years, until Dave Weber inherited a strong program in 1973. He was Wayne Liddick’s assistant coach. But Weber returned to Johnstown, and when he expressed an interest in coming back to Waynesboro, Liddick called and told him of the head coaching opening at Waynesboro. Weber wasted no time in making the trip back to Waynesboro.
He got the job, and the rest is, we could say, history. That is, Weber coached 24 years before retiring following the 1995-96 season. He coached one state champion (Kurt Bowman). His son Dana finished second in the state in 1994. You can find both names, among many others, on the wrestling room’s Wall of Champions.
“Dave Weber was excellent. He wrestled for Penn State and he got injured and had to quit,” said Smith. “His coach was Bill Koll, I was in my motel room and my door was open and he came in and sat down chewing a cigar because he was trying to quit smoking. He sat down there and said – and at that time I didn’t know who Dave Weber was – he said ‘Dave Weber was the best prospect I ever had. He would have been a national champ but he had to quit.’ Later on, he came here.”
Bill, who will turn 89 in November, will be married to Audrey for 70 years this coming April.
