Walter Atkins, 76, coach who won state championships

Walter Atkins wouldn’t let his son play on the high school basketball team he coached. He said it wouldn’t be proper and that people would say it had more to do with bloodline than skills.

So coach wasn’t having it, said his son, Walt Berosky, a podiatrist who lives in Atlanta. “I cried about that,” he said. “Even if I could play and was the best on the team, he didn’t want me perceived as just ‘the coach’s son.’ He wanted to avoid the criticism, so I grew up watching his teams, watching them play.”

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Coach ‘Chat’ Atkins started his coaching career at Bunche High and finished at Lithonia High School.

And win.

When Mr. Atkins retired in 1982, he had netted 591 victories at various schools in Georgia. His boys and girls basketball teams won six state championships. At Lithonia High, he coached football, baseball, track and volleyball for decades.

To some of the athletes, Mr. Atkins was like a father figure. He was a disciplinarian with the players’ best interests at heart. His athletes weren’t allowed to have sweets or sodas the entire school year, not just during the playing season, said Joe Thomas of Madison, Wisc. He played for Mr. Atkins at Ralph J. Bunche High in Canton.

“He was a task master and a strict disciplinarian,” Mr. Thomas said. “He even used to walk the streets of our community to make sure we made curfew.”

Walter Bert “Chat” Atkins Jr., 76, of Atlanta died Thursday of cancer at Emory Adventist Hospital in Smyrna. The funeral will be 11 a.m. Saturday at Westside Community CME Church in Atlanta. Donald Trimble Mortuary is in charge of arrangements.

In 1952, Mr. Atkins received an athletic scholarship to attend Morris Brown. There, he lettered in basketball, football and baseball and picked up the nickname “Chat.” After graduation, he was drafted into the Army during the Korean War and was stationed in Kaiserslautern, Germany. In 1956, he became a physical education teacher and athletic coach at Bunche High. Years later, he relocated to Scottsdale’s Hamilton High, where he stayed four years.

In 1968, he came to Lithonia High to coach multiple sports. He also taught health and PE. He retired in 1986 due to multiple sclerosis and eventually became wheelchair bound. He sold insurance for Franklin Life Insurance.

Mr. Atkins has received numerous honors. Among them: inductee into the Cherokee County Sports Hall of Fame; DeKalb County Tip-off Club’s 1972 Coach of the Year; and the Atlanta Tip-off Club’s Lifetime Achievement Award.

Dr. Berosky said his father was a physical specimen during his playing days. He stood 6-feet-6 and weighed about 205. He was inducted into the Morris Brown Hall of Fame for baseball.

When it came to coaching, his son said it was easy for Mr. Atkins to switch from player to coach.

“He cared, naturally cared, about those kids,” his son said. “All of them want to be pallbearers for his funeral.”

Additional survivors include his wife of 51 years, Jaquelyn Tripp Atkins of Atlanta; a daughter, Loujuana Felita Atkins of Decatur; another son, Dr. Elston Durwood of Lithonia; two brothers, John Atkins of Chattanooga and James Atkins of Conyers; two sisters, Dr. Corine Gore of Lithonia and Betty Burney of Detroit; and five grandchildren.