June 19, 2021
Every month this blog seems to become more and more a column of obituaries, and this past week it hit close to home. One of my two or three best friends in the world, Stephen Sidney Price died after enduring the ravages of cancer and its aftermath for 31 years. In all that time Steve never gave up and cancer never won. Life won like it always does. And Steve lived his life to the fullest.
We were getting ready to leave for a track meet in Knoxville, TN
Steve and I met in 1964, both getting a ride to a road race in Columbus, Ohio with Richard Trace who that day also became a life long friend. Steve and Richard initiated me, a miler, to long distance running, and that July day in the blazing heat of the American Midwest was a painful initiation. It was my Sun Dance.
Our paths did not cross again until ten years later in 1974 when I was on a Spring Break trip down to Ohio from my residence in Northwest Quebec. We met on a beautiful April afternoon in Kettering, Ohio where I took one of my Quebec runners for some warm weather training, and Steve was there coaching his well established club the Kettering Striders. He was clearly in charge of a workout with a bunch of kids and was yelling out instructions to his athletes. We jawed a bit and he gave me some advice about getting my runner into a local high school event. At that time Canadian high schoolers attended up to grade 13, and most US coaches didn't want their kids running against 'older' athletes. So he suggested I go to Trotwood Madison High School northwest of Dayton, and they accepted my runner Daniel Laquerre. At that time Bill Schnier, my other best friend, was assistant coach. Although we didn't meet, we did cross the planet's surface at the same time and have since developed a lifelong friendship.
That was one of Steve's gifts, bringing people together. Steve had grown up the oldest of five kids and with the early death of his father, became the patriarch of his clan. His mother, Irene was a music teacher and all the Price kids were able to play piano and Steve took a liking to the guitar as well as blues and bluegrass music, one of his other great loves in addition to track and field.
He founded the Kettering Striders, a running club for girls, in 1966 while teaching at Rolling Fields elementary school at a time when there were only a few clubs in America for girls to learn our sport. The Striders thrived under Steve's guidance and grew to almost three hundred children, even taking the radical turn of accepting boys and then adults into the club. They won national cross country and age groups competitions and travelled extensively. But by the mid 1970's when Title IX legislation started leveling the playing fields for girls track and school based teams came into play, the club system began to fade.
In those early years he also co-founded the Ohio River Road Runners Club and began putting on road races in Southwest Ohio. And he found time to run the Boston Marathon in 1965. Another great event he co-founded with John Wilderman was the Dayton River Corridor Half Marathon. That event brought world class runners into Dayton. And in those years we travelled annually to the Springbank Road Races in London, Ontario for more of the same.
He was not just a long distance coach but also a very good hurdles coach as evidenced late in his career in 2008 when Kirby Blackley won the NCAA D II hurdles indoors for Findlay University under his tutelage.
Steve's next stop was in starting up the cross country program at the University of Dayton which was primarily a basketball, football and soccer school. Dayton had to expand its programs to remain in D I basketball. It was a low budget affair, but Steve began a tradition there which is still going strong.
Steve was being recognized for his contribution to women's running and served as women's assistant coach at the 1974 indoor dual meet against the Russians in Moscow, when Mary Decker threw her shoe at a Russian runner after getting knocked down and pushed off the track. When asked by reporters what he was going to do about that incident, he said, "I'm just going to make sure she's on the plane when we leave tomorrow."
He also served as US women's coach at the 1977 World Cross Country championships when they were held in Dusseldorf, West Germany, and was the national coach at the 1980 world race walking championships. In 1982 he was head coach of the women's north team at the US Sports Festival.
From there Steve went on to the Kingdom of Bahrain in the Middle East to be their national cross country coach and assistant track coach. By then I was in Zimbabwe teaching and coaching and we continued our friendship through letters. Steve brought in another player to my life, Roy Mason. The three of us exchanged letters from Ukiah, CA, Roy's bailiwick, Bahrain, and Marondera, Zimbabwe. Again Steve bringing people together. The three of us began this blog out of our friendship and connection years later.
By 1989 Steve came back to teaching in Ohio but was soon recruited to coach the women's cross country and track teams at Bowling Green State University. The same year I began a similar job at Wittenberg University in Ohio. So we remained in close contact. Bill Schnier by then was the head coach at the University of Cincinnati.
Steve's women's teams at Bowling Green were nothing short of phenomenal, and they were able to break into the NCAA cross country nationals having to run on equal terms against much more heavily financed teams at Michigan, Michigan State, Notre Dame, Indiana , and Wisconsin.
It was shortly after he began coaching at Bowling Green that he had his first bout with throat and mouth cancer and underwent surgery and radiation treatments. As Steve once said, it's not the disease that's bad it's the medical treatment that really is difficult. As a result of less than successful reconstructive surgery, he lost his ability to swallow and lived his last ten years on a feeding tube. But he was also a guy who never complained about his state in life. One of his favorite sayings was "What a treat." whether it was listening to Buddy Guy play the blues, dining in a great restaurant, or coming out of radiation therapy. It must remembered that his wife Christine made a lot of Steve's adventures possible with her love and care through all those challenging years.
If you travelled with his teams you did not eat in fast food joints but in real restaurants. You waited til everyone was served, and you said Grace before eating. He could get opponents you wouldn't expect like a triangular in New Haven with Yale and North Carolina.
After he retired from Bowling Green he took up another job assisting at Findlay University in Ohio. On his way the fifty miles up I-75 from his home in Piqua, he would stop each day at nursing homes and entertain the residents on the piano. He had a list of over 50 retirement communities that he served. When he could no longer do this, his sister Linda took over the singing gigs. She had formerly sung with the Les Brown and Nelson Riddle ochestras.
There are so many tales to tell about Steve that this edition could go on and and on and on. But one of the best and one which shows the respect that came from his peers involved a time when Steve was in the hospital recovering from surgery that removed half of his tongue. He could not attend the cross country dual meet with Miami of Ohio, a huge rival. That day the Miami coach, Rich Ceronie, knowing of Steve's predicament took matters in hand. I'll let Rich describe that occasion. (You have to remember this was a time when we all felt that Steve's condition was terminal, everyone except Steve.)
If Steve couldn't be at the meet, then I would bring the meet to Steve. Well one has to remember that in the early 1990's , cell phones were quite large, and actually looked like a loaf of bread it was so large. On meet day I called Steve to let him know I was going to describe the meet to him as it actually happened. I got very emotional just listening to Steve's voice and his excitement on the possibility of taking part in the meet. One thing it did for me was to give me tunnel vision in trying to take in all the sights, sounds and action in order to describe for Steve what was happening. As the race went on I was driving around with one hand steering and this large cell phone up to my head. Very quickly Steve got into "coaching mode" and began telling me what to tell his athletes. Not wanting to disappoint Steve, I began to yell instructions to Steve's athletes. I can remember one of them looking over at me and probably wondering who the heck this dude in red and white was. I actually remember during the race that I had no idea how "my " team was doing and that worried me, but I was having so much fun talking with Steve that it really didn't make any difference. At Miami the course took athletes down into a long wooded section before they came up, made a sharp right hand turn, and then headed back down toward the finish line. I had parked the Gator at the top of the hill and was describing to Steve one by one who was coming up out of the woods first. He told me to hold the phone up so he could yell at his athletes, so there I stood holding this large cell phone in the air and Steve was doing his best to yell through the phone. I couldn't help but laugh to think that any athlete that heard Steve's voice would think that they have gone into the "dark" zone of racing and were imagining it. Anyway, I quickly drove back to the finish line and then realized it was a close, close meet and each athlete was pressing hard to pass someone wearing the opposite color. As the runners hit the finish line I knew it would be close. Steve kept asking over and over again who had won and I told him he would have to be patient. Well in a couple of minutes my assistant told me that we had lost to BGSU 27-28, and I had to relay that information to Steve. And I remember I had to compose myself because on the one hand I was disappointed that we lost, but was excited to tell Steve the good news. To hear the emotion in his voice is something that will last a lifetime with me. I couldn't help but start crying due to how important this was to Steve. It was one of my greatest days in coaching.
Comments:
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Well written, George. Steve not only defined what a coach should be, he defined what a human being should be. He, you and I exchanged tape recordings for years. We had tape recorders in our cars and would plug in the newly arrived tape and respond and/or just rattle on mindlessly. Just this morning I found a collection of tapes Steve made. Yes, I have the same 32 year old Miata, one of the few cars on the road today with a tape player so I can listen to Steve as I drive. Roy Mason Ukiah, CA
Steve was a very special person, who lived a great life by positively impacting so many lives. I met him in 1967 when Ed Winrow took me and the Ball State cross country team to my first road race in Monroe, OH. Steve was ahead of his time as a serious promoter of distance running in Ohio and Indiana, at a time when running/jogging was just becoming popular. We were all connected to Steve and fortunate to have him as a friend. We miss him.
Dave, in ’67 I don’t think Ken Cooper had come out with Aerobics yet. It was a time where if you were a high school kid running CC you were a nerd. Road races were like small group cult gatherings. Growing up in Santa Clara Valley it was that way. Not sure about the Midwest George, This is a classic! A keeper. I love the early and later pictures of the 3 of you.
Mike Waters MA
Dir of Health promotion
Fitness over 50
Corvallis, OR
Tom Osler said that back then if you put your mind to it, you could personally know every marathoner in the country. There was only Boston, Yonkers, and Culver City marathons.
George I am so sorry to hear of the passing of your good friend Steve. I inly knew him through your words and obviously you had a high degree of respect for him and that is good enough for me. By the sounds of things he will be missed by a large part of the Track community. Please accept my condolences for your loss. Geoff Williams Victoria, BC
So sorry to hear of the passing of Steve Price, your long term friend, George. Released from this mortal coil. Your faithful readers can abide and wait for your in memorium. And one day, when the time is right, I am betting it will just flow right out of you.
2 comments:
I would like to share a comment posted on the University of Findlay Alumni Facebook page by one of Steve’s former athletes, Lydia Guagenti as it captures so well how we felt about this wonderful man.
“If you knew this man's energy, knowledge and charisma, you know this rebal [sic]-of-a-gentleman will live far beyond the concept of time.”
Marc and Lisa Arce
Former coaches at the University of Findlay
Lovely piece of writing George. Great photo's of him with his lifelong friends. I bet this was hard to keep it clean!! You boys were up to many adventures that would make beet turn red. I was surprised to read he was the US Coach in 1980 for World Race Walking Championships. His accomplishments never cease to amaze me. Words like "can't be done" just didn't seem to be in his vocabulary. He could do it. And he put that belief into everyone he coached - "You" could do it. "It" meant to be your best. Nothing more. Just give it your all. If you won a race that was fantastic. If you got a PR that was fantastic. If you met your goal, well, that was the goal! Expect to win. Expect nothing but the best of yourself. Give nothing but the best of yourself. And Steve gave us all the very best of himself. Cheers to Steve - clogging and clapping forever.
Susan A
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