Mighty, Mighty, Come Sunday Coach C.K. Siler will turn 90 and we wish him Nothing But The Best:Happy Birthday Coach Siler(Southern Guilford HS/Sumner HS)

Birthday #90 on Sunday for Coach C.K. Siler and the man has seen many a good day over the years and he coached many a good athlete, during his time in charge of the sports programs down at Sumner High School and then Southern Guilford High School…

Back in his day in the 1960’s and maybe even into the early 1970’s Coach Siler coached football, basketball and baseball at Sumner High School….You go down Randleman Road and make a right on to old Randleman Road, then make another right on to Kivett Drive, and then hang a left on to Drake Road and you are almost there….

You take that route and you will head into Southern Guilford territory, and the Southern Guilford and the Sumner community is the area that Coach C.K. Siler put on the map…

They thought about calling this area “Siler City”, but that name was already taken, so the area we are talking about today, on the eve of Coach Siler’s 90th birthday, that part of the county became known as Southern Guilford county and the Sumner community, and for most of the folks that have dwelt there over the past half century, this part of our county has been known as the spot where C.K. Siler served…..

He served his community and he has served it well…

Happy Birthday, Coach C.K. Siler….

Like we were saying earlier, he coached all three of the major sports at Sumner and Southern Guilford High Schools and he was coaching all of them in the same school year, and that included coaching varsity football, basketball and baseball, and he was in charge of the JV teams as well…

How did this man do it???

Well my friends, you have to remember this man was a Siler and that is what this group of Silers and Browns do, they coach and they really can coach, and for coach C.K. Siler he coached them all, but he might be best remembered for his football teams at Sumner and Southern Guilford…

Hey, they named the stadium after him….If you take the trip down into the Southern Guilford community and you end up on Drake Road, you can’t miss the place…This is the place where C.K. Siler coached football, and this is where you came if you wanted to see good football in Guilford County..

I have always told people, people that would listen that is, if you played and lost to Coach Siler and Sumner or Southern Guilford High School, it was a learning experience, and if you played against a football team coached by Coach Siler and you won, it was divine….

Hard to beat that man and his band of Indians….

You had the old school at Sumner and then they built the new school and it became Southern Guilford High School…Southern Guilford came along back about 1968/1969 and in those days with Coach Siler at helm, come Friday Night, those Indians would shine….

When I take these trips back in time, I always like to drop in a few names that were a part of this fabric of our lives, and in the early to mid-70’s, and that would be the 1970’s, some of those names that played for Coach Siler and his brigade of Indians, are names that we will never forget…

The ones that I recall the most and I will end up leaving some out, but let me just give you the ones that jump off of the page for me here this morning…..

Let’s see you had those McCuiston Brothers, Barry and Larry, there was Mickey Atkinson, Kim Smith, David “Ace” Waters, Roland Atkins, Joey Hackett, Dino Hackett, Buddy Hackett, one of the first African Americans to play for Coach Siler and that would be Ralph Brown, and Ralph Brown went on to nearly reach All-American status and we could go on all day long, but the list is simply too long if we try and mention all of the young men that served on the football field, the basketball court and the baseball diamond for Coach C.K. Siler over the years, in the Sumner community and at Southern Guilford High School…

The fact of the matter is Coach Siler served his community and the Guilford County Schools system well and the good part about all of this is, it is not time to close the book on C.K. Siler….The man is still going strong at 90 years old….

You have to love this man and the efforts he has put forth, as he has tried to help others and to make others look better in coaching them and bringing these kids up to where they have become reputable young men and women….

Reputable, that is a good way to describe Coach Siler….

He is one of the good ones and we are lucky to have had him on our side over the years and we do wish him well on his 90th birthday….If you think about it, we have been lucky and very fortunate to have Coach Siler, Coach Slayton(Southeast Guilford HS), Coach Kirby(Page HS), Coach Grayson(Eastern Guilford HS), Coach Kemp(Ragsdale HS) and so many of these former football coaches that are now living in their golden years….Just about all of these men coached multiple sports at the schools where they served/coached…

Coach Siler is a true gem and I am not sure what the C.K. stands for, but it must be standing for something like Coaching Kids….C.K./Coaching Kids Siler….That is what this man has done over the years and we thank him for that…

If you get a chance, give Mr. Coaching Kids Siler a call this weekend and wish him a Happy Birthday, as he hits the “Mighty, Mighty” big 90…

Thank-you Coach Siler and we wish you the best as you celebrate your 90th birthday on Sunday….

The man has a great family and he still loves to come over to Jamieson Stadium and watch his grandson’s Grimsley Whirlies play football on Friday nights….He will sit there in a pickup truck down by the West gate and watch every minute of Coach Daryl Brown’s games, as the Whirlies work to get that win/victory….

But for me, the true spirit of Coach C.K./Coaching Kids Siler will always be nestled in those pines down on Drake Road and when you walk into the C.K. Siler Stadium at Southern Guilford High School, you are walking where true legends like Coach Siler walked and built winning programs…

We all love the man and are proud to have been a small of his legacy, so as we close this out on this chilly Saturday morning, let’s just say it one more time, Coach Siler, thanks for the memories and Happy Birthday on January 13, 2019…..

HAPPY BIRTHDAY COACH C.K. SILER and in your heart, you are still C.K. Siler, Coaching Kids……

8 thoughts on “Mighty, Mighty, Come Sunday Coach C.K. Siler will turn 90 and we wish him Nothing But The Best:Happy Birthday Coach Siler(Southern Guilford HS/Sumner HS)

  1. HS FB FAN
    BACK IN THE DAY WHEN SMITH WAS DOMINATING ALL THE GREENSBORO AND GUILFORD COUNTY SCHOOLS IN FOOTBALL, OUR TOUGHEST GAME WOULD BE LITTLE SUMNER HIGH SCHOOL.THEY
    WERE TOUGH AND WELL COACHED. AND OUR COACH(CLAUDE MANZI) WAS NO SLOUCH, AS EVERYONE FAMILIAR WITH THAT ERA KNOWS.

  2. I think back in the day, Sumner/Southern Guilford only had two coaches coaching football, and it was Coach Siler as the head coach and his assistant, a big man, Coach Jones, I think it was…

    Smith had Coach Manzi, Coach Sal Gero and I think they had a couple of other assistants..

    I heard back in the day, it was just pretty much Coach Slayton as the head coach and Coach Tom Hogan as the assistant, at Southeast Guilford….

    Western Guilford had Doug Henderson and Coach Hollifield as his assistant and there was another man, John Brooks that helped out and I can tell you, Coach John Brooks could coach with any coach in the state….Hollifield could have been a head coach, but he never went for it….

    More should chime in here on their old head coaches…

    I heard before Coach Manzi was over at Smith, he and Coach Gero were over at Grimsley, with Whirlies head coach Bob Jamieson…..

    More coaching history for this day????????

  3. Careful Andy, you’re about to tell your age. Coach Jones was Neil Jones who later became head coach at ALLEN Jay, in High Point.
    Manzi was at Grimsley.
    As good as Sumner was, correct me if I’m wrong but I don’t think Sumner ever beat Bessemer.

  4. Good calls and age does not matter in game of football recollection…I was reading the paper when I was in second grade and I remember Bill Hass back when he was covering high school sports for the News and Record…

    Then there were others like Tom Northington, Tony Barnhardt, Bill Gupton, Charlie Atkinson, Jeff Carlton, Jason Wolfe, and I loved this name, Kate Hairopoulos, from over the years and I heard about an old high school sports writer, Ladd Baucom, that used to cover high school sports for the Greensboro Daily News….

    I even remember the stories of Al Thomy, with old newspapers like the Greensboro Record…Bill Hass really kept that old Greensboro Record popping back in the day and if anyone can top the looks of Kate Hairopoulos, I want to see them…She is currently writing for the Dallas Morning News and an excellent writer, and she now covers the Dallas Cowboys…

    By the way, Ed Hardin was named the 2018 Sportswriter of the Year for North Carolina today…Nice honor there…

    And back on Allen Jay…I remember the Jaybirds back when they had Gary Meredith and Gary Thayer running for them and those young men were tough and they could fly….

    Great memories and we would love to hear more about the old coaches, the old players and the old sportswriters from the past….

    This all makes for a super local football topic and this thread continues to honor Coach C.K. Siler….

  5. And does anyone know if Sumner ever beat Bessemer???

    I do know Buck Bain was over at Bessemer back in the day, with the Whippets…Our old friend Jim Allen also played football for the Bessemer Whippets back in the day…

    That’s Jim Allen of Allen Boat Company fame, and his favorite line was, “Hey you wanna buy a Boat?”…..

  6. Anybody remember a kid named Johnny East that played for Southern Guilford/Sumner back in the day…

    Pretty tough football player if I remember correctly….

    Last name was East and thinking the first name was Johnny…

    Also another one of the News and Record writers from back in the day, was David Bulla…

    Bulla later became a high school basketball coach and ended up there in Indiana or Kentucky, coaching high school basketball….

    I’m thinking Bulla was a Grimsley HS grad and he coached some over at Dudley and Smith….

    Lots of names we can hit from the past…..

    And remember, we cover the 60’s, the 70’s, the 80’s, the 90’s, the 2000’s, the 2000 teens and the best of today….We cover a large piece of the local pie…..

  7. I loved going to football games at Sumner High School.Coach Siler was such a great coach.He made you feel like you were just as important as the next person.When you got picked on and belittled by the students who thought they were better than you,Coach Siler always made you feel like you have just as much right to have the opportunity and respect as anyone.Happy Birthday,Hope the year ahead will be a healthy and blessed one God Bless you!!?

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