Gary Anderson, who founded the softball program at Decatur High School 20 years ago, has announced his retirement, an act practically unimaginable for several generations of athletes he coached dating to the 1980s.
He’s worked in the school’s attendance office since 2000 and for the last 18 years was “The Voice of the Bulldogs,” doing P.A. for Decatur and DeKalb County football and basketball games. Along the way he was head softball coach at Agnes Scott for two years (2000-02) and assistant softball coach and recruiting coordinator for 11 years at Emory University.
The truth is, however, with Anderson the designation “retirement” should be lightly simmered in quotation marks.
“I’m still young enough I can give 30 to 40 hitting lessons a week,” said Anderson, whose age according to former players has long been fluid. “I can go watch my [high school and travel ball students] play tournaments, and I’ll continue working with the youngest Decatur students, the elementary and middle school girls.”
Anderson had worked for a time in Savings and Loan and then later as a salesman for AT&T, his vocation when he moved to the Atlanta area in 1989. But long before coming here he had a deep athletic background.
Born and raised in Arkadelphia in southwest Arkansas, he was one of the few Black players in his little league, The Dixie Youth League, where he remembers playing with a Confederate flag patch on his uniform.
He was a standout running back/wide receiver at the Historically Black University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff, and after a three-year stint in the Army graduated from Columbus State College (now University) in 1979.
During the 1980s he coached football and baseball in St. Louis, and one of his early Little Leaguers was Cornell Iral Haynes Jr., better known today as the rapper Nelly, though Anderson says, “I still call him Cornell.”
Through the urging of then Decatur High Athletics Director Carter Wilson, he organized the school’s softball program in 1999 ten years after Georgia made fast pitch a varsity sport.
Never certified as a teacher, Anderson was never officially head coach during his 20 years, but he always ran the program. That included creating district’s first middle school team in 2005, the same year Decatur High won its first regional championship and made it’s first state-playoff appearance.
Though remaining at the high school’s attendance office until it closed for COVID 19 last March, he retired from softball program after 2018, advancing to the state playoff in each of his last seven seasons. His overall record is unknown since there are many years when no statistics are available, but a conservative estimate is that he won at least 300 games.
Anderson said he doesn’t see much difference in coaching baseball or softball, that girls are just as mentally tough as boys. One of his former players Julia Banks said recently, “Coach Gary always told us crying’s for funerals and weddings, not softball.”
He’s particularly meticulous in preparation for games, practices and workouts, a habit dating to his youth. He remembers watching his parents studying The Green Book, a guidebook for African Americans published 1936-66 that recommended safe hotels, gas stations and restaurants.
“We’d travel from Arkansas to Chicago, to Flint, to Cleveland, and my parents would lay out the map and plan every step of the trip from beginning to end,” he said. “Well, you’ve got to have a road map with coaching, you have to know where you’re going long term with a team, or with an individual player. You have to invest that time and preparation with a kid, because if you don’t you can’t possibly ask them to give you anything.”
About the Author
