Logan High School displays championship banners honoring Aracoma High School Bulldogs
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Logan High School displays championship banners honoring Aracoma High School Bulldogs
Robert Fields | WVOW News
LOGAN Two new banners honoring the Aracoma High School Bulldogs are now displayed prominently on the Logan High School football field scoreboard.
The all-Black school won back-to-back state championships in 1948 and 1949 during the era of segregation. The school opened in Logan in 1929 and served generations of African-American students from around the area.
Aracoma High School closed in 1962, eight years after the U.S. Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Education decision outlawed segregation in public schools, and its legacy became part of Logan High School.
The banners were dedicated Thursday night before the Logan-Man football game at Willis-Nisbet Stadium. Several people connected to Aracoma High attended the dedication, including former Aracoma High School students Cora Hairston, Judy Murphy, and Karen Garner Pierson, a former Aracoma Bulldog cheerleader; and Michael Williams, grandson of Robert Johnson Jr., an Aracoma football player.
Logan High Principal Zach Anderson says the achievements of the Aracoma Bulldogs and Coach Lacy Smith should remain part of Logan High’s sports history.
"We wanted to make sure that their successes and what they accomplished, which was remarkable, would be enshrined in Logan High School sports history forever," Anderson said on MetroNews Midday.
Coach Smith educated, coached, challenged and inspired young people in Logan County for 43 years, according to Logan County Schools. The district said in a press release that Smith's influence "extended far beyond athletics, and his life remains a powerful part of the story of both Aracoma High School and Logan High School."
Following integration, Coach Smith continued his career at Logan High School as a teacher and coach. In 1980, he became Logan High School's head football coach and the first Black head football coach of a AAA high school in West Virginia.
Anderson says recognizing Aracoma’s accomplishments honors those who came before the current Logan school community. He also hopes other schools across West Virginia will recognize the segregated schools that preceded integration and preserve their accomplishments as part of their communities’ histories.
"Anytime somebody comes walking on the Island, anytime somebody comes to a football game, any outside athletic event or even pull onto our campus, they will see the enduring legacy of Coach Smith and those Aracoma Bulldogs," Anderson said.
PHOTO | AM Stone - WVOW Radio
