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Charlie Kurtz, who served as Parry McCluer High School’s head football coach in the mid-1950s and early 1960s, died on Tuesday, Jan. 30 in Roanoke. Kurtz, 90, had been living with dementia for about 10 years.
A 1951 graduate of Robert E. Lee High School in Staunton, Kurtz went to Virginia Tech, where he played football, but an injury brought him closer to home. He finished his undergraduate degree at Bridgewater College, where he was both a guard and linebacker for the football team and was captain of the 1954 squad. He also played basketball and baseball and, in 1996, was inducted into the school’s hall of fame. In 1998, Kurtz was inducted into the Virginia High School League Hall of Fame.
Kurtz served as PM’s head football coach from 1955 to 1957 before being called to duty in the U.S. Army. Upon his return, he worked as an assistant to then-PM head coach Joe Downing for three years before taking over the head coaching duties in 1962 and leading the Blues to an 8-1 mark. Kurtz also served as a junior varsity baseball and basketball coach.
Kurtz was the assistant principal at PM in 1963 before returning to Robert E. Lee High School in 1965 as assistant principal. He earned his master of education from the University of Virginia in 1967 and was named the Staunton high school’s principal the next year and held the position for 20 years.
In 2014, Kurtz was inducted into the PM Athletic Hall of Fame. At his induction, according to an account in The News-Gazette, Kurtz said he was often asked how he got to do what he did as a coach. “The only answer I have is, if you have the kind of athletes we have, you’d understand,” he said. “We were fortunate to have those great athletes. We were fortunate to be in a situation where we were able to use them in a manner that brought pride, brought victory and brought great vision to the city of Buena Vista.”
After telling several humorous stories that night, Kurtz concluded by saying, “It is an honor for me to stand here this evening and say that I am going to be a member of the Hall of Fame. My part was not nearly as large as the young men who put the scores on the scoreboard, made the tackles, who hit the home runs, who made the winning baskets. So often coaches think they’re the ones who did that.”
A funeral for Kurtz was held last Saturday at Oak Grove Church of the Brethren in Roanoke.
