GUILFORD COLLEGE ANNOUNCES ATHLETICS HALL OF FAME CLASS OF 2009
Greensboro, N.C. — Guilford College will recognize four alumni, including three former student-athletes, as the 38th class inducted into its Athletics Hall of Fame Saturday, Sept. 19. Robert E. Fredrick ’65 of Mullica Hill, N.J., Laura Haynes Spainhour ’98 of Rural Hall, N.C., Catherine U. ‘Kitty’ Steele of Greensboro, N.C., and Jordan Washburn ’59 of High Point, N.C., are this year’s inductees.
The group will be formally inducted at a 4:00 p.m. ceremony in Guilford’s Bryan Auditorium and honored prior to the start of the Quakers’ football game versus Averett University later that night. Individuals who wish to attend the ceremony should contact Guilford’s athletics department at 336-316-2190.
Fredrick played for coach John Stewart’s football team from 1962-64 and received a degree in health and physical education from Guilford. Fredrick earned his master’s degree in physical education from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in 1969 and later taught and coached at Page High School in Greensboro where his 1970 Pirates’ wrestling team captured the North Carolina State Tournament. Fredrick enjoyed a 30-year career as a teacher, coach and athletic director at Paulsboro (N.J.) High School from 1970-2000. His wrestling teams recorded 14 unbeaten seasons in his 18 campaigns and four of his teams were ranked first in the state. Paulsboro, a Group 1 school, went 299-7-2 in dual meets under Fredrick and the Red Raiders won 14 District 29 championships and 16 Colonial Conference titles. He spent 10 years as the director of the New Jersey State Wrestling Tournament and was inducted into the National Wrestling Coaches Hall of Fame/New Jersey Chapter in 2002. Retired since 2000, Fredrick remains active in athletics as an assistant to the athletic director at Gloucester County College.
Spainhour enjoyed arguably the most successful women’s basketball career that Guilford College has ever seen. She scored a school-record 2,283 points, which remains the 10th-highest total in NCAA Division III history. Spainhour also collected 1,021 rebounds and is one of seven Division III students with 2,000 points and 1,000 rebounds in her career. She helped coach Barb Bausch’s club to 74 wins and graduated with 18 school records and 11 Old Dominion Athletic Conference (ODAC) standards. Spainhour won ODAC Player of the Year honors in 1995 and 1998 and became the league’s first four-time first-team all-league selection. She also was a finalist for the 1998 Jostens Trophy, given annually to Division III’s top basketball student-athlete, and earned Guilford’s first All-America honor from the Women’s Basketball Coaches’ Association. In 1998, Spainhour was one of 48 women invited from all three NCAA divisions to play in the inaugural Women’s Collegiate World Games in Hampton, Va. Her jersey number (33) was retired last January as part of Guilford’s basketball legacy weekend.
Kitty Steele served as a physical education professor at Guilford from 1957-76 and was instrumental in developing the school’s recreational and women’s sports programs. The wife of former Guilford men’s basketball coach and Athletics Hall of Fame member Jerry Steele, she sponsored the Quakers’ cheerleaders and directed the Guilford’s Women’s Recreation Association and intramurals program with fellow Guilford Athletics Hall of Famers Joyce Clark and Gwen Reddeck. Steele’s efforts in expanding the school’s intramurals program led to club sports that competed against other local schools. With the passage of Title IX in 1972, Steele was the first coach of Guilford’s women’s intercollegiate teams in volleyball, basketball and tennis. She coached all three teams from 1972-74 before moving on to teach and coach at High Point University. She coached tennis and field hockey at High Point for 20 years, winning 12 conference titles and 12 conference and district coach of the year honors before retiring in 1996. The 1949 Woman’s College (now UNC Greensboro) graduate was inducted into the NAIA Hall of Fame in 1993. In 2007 High Point dedicated the Jerry and Kitty Steele Sports Center, which houses athletics offices as well as locker room and academic study hall areas.
Washburn played tennis at Guilford from 1955-59 under Hall of Fame coach David Meredith. Washburn won the Old North State Conference doubles championship three of his four seasons, including in 1956 when he teamed with Robert Atlas ’57. He served as president of the Monogram Club and Men’s Athletic Association in 1959. Washburn continued to play in tennis for 25 years after Guilford in city and state tournaments. He won the 35’s and 45’s High Point City Tournament Championship in 1983. Now retired after a 40-year career with the Morrissette Paper Company, Washburn received the “2 Those Who Care Award” from WFMY-TV for his work with the Victory Junction Gang Camp in Randleman, N.C. He is a board member for the Victory Junction Gang Camp and recently stepped down as director of First Bank in Troy, N.C. In 2008, he received the Outstanding Volunteer Fund-raiser Award from the North Carolina Fund-raising Professionals.
This year’s class raises Guilford’s Athletics Hall of Fame membership to 208. Past inductees include NBA stars M.L. Carr ’73 and World B. Free ’76, major-league baseball players Ernie Shore ’13, Rick Ferrell ’28, Tom Zachary ’18 and Tony Womack ’91, and professional golfer Lee Porter ’89.
Dave Walters
Guilford College Athletics