Our senior year, we welcomed eleven new teachers to our school and many new coaches. Which ones were your favorites and made a big impact on your life?
Teachers still teaching at CHS as of 2009:
Mr. Lincoln Bryant
Mr. Terry Regnier
Mr. Hal Sauter
Mrs. Urdahl
Classmates teaching at CHS:
Mr. Jay Martin
Mrs. Julie Tibbitts (Martin)
OK so she wasn't in '79
but she graduated in '78.
In Memory of:
Jim Hatch Sr.
Tom Oswald
Pete Jones
Millie Thompson
Mia Nyman
Ed West
Eldon Engel
Hal Harvey
Edna McKeehan
Ruth Hanrahan
Neva Heath
February 19, 2009
Cheney to dedicate gym in
longtime coach’s name
Jim Hatch will be honored Friday in Cheney.
Courtesy of family.
It’s been called the old gym or the practice gym and soon, it will be Jim Hatch’s gym.
Cheney High School will honor the late, longtime teacher, coach and athletic director by naming the old gym after him Friday night (2-20-2009)during halftime of the boys’ varsity game. Hatch died Nov. 4, 2007. He was 80.
Cheney Free Press 1616 W. First St. · Cheney · WA · 99004 · Phone: (509) 235-6184
Jim Hatch, Sr. was many things over his lifetime, including athlete, as seen in the picture from his days at Coeur d’Alene High School, and administrator and coach, as shown at Cheney High School.
PAUL DELANEY Staff Reporter
Some simple words seem to do the best job of helping sum up the life of Jim Hatch, Sr. Words like teach, loved, humor, competitor, rock, coach, cared, successful, fun, honest and straightforward. Then there are others – vociferous for example – that might send one to their Funk and Wagnall’s to do a little research.
Expect many more such words to be said this Saturday at 11 a.m. at Cheney High School in the old gym, when a memorial service is held for the long time, and much beloved coach, educator and administrator who passed away Nov. 4 at his home in Cheney from complications due to lymphoma. Hatch had just turned 80 on Sept. 10.
Hatch is survived by his wife of 54 years Betty, son Jimmy Hatch (Celia), daughter Jana Berg (Cliff), daughter Lori Wyborney (Hank), and daughter Krisann Hatch (James Sloan), grandchildren Kelsey, Cami, Adam, Jenna, Dane, Tatum, H.D., Brett, and Kylie, as well as many nieces and nephews. He was preceded in death by his parents, stepfather Pete Hansen, and brothers Robert and Jack Hatch.
In lieu of flowers, the family has asked that donations be sent to the Cheney High School Haas Foundation in care of Jim Missel, in memory of Jim Hatch. The Haas Foundation provides for scholastic and activity fees for students who are unable to pay.
Hatch’s wife Betty, spoke of just a few of the memories of their long life together.
Betty Hatch first met her future husband when she was just 4. Jim Hatch was her brother’s best friend she said. And having eight older brothers, Jim was always sticking up for Betty and protecting her from their teasing.
Jim Hatch would graduate from Coeur d’Alene High School in 1945 where he played football and baseball. After high school he went to the University of Idaho on a football scholarship and was a four-year letterman. Hatch was later drafted into the U.S. Army in 1950 and served primarily in Germany. Upon his return home from the service, Jim and Betty struck up a more serious relationship and were married on July 10, 1953, fueled in part, perhaps, by a first date at Spokane’s old Playfair Race Course. “He loved to bet the horses, Betty Hatch said. “Even when he was so sick, he loved to bet the horses.”
Jim started his teaching career in Huntington, Ore., a small railroad town where he taught social studies and coached six-man football. He guided that team to the quarter-finals in the state playoffs. Next, Hatch took a teaching position at Harrington, Wash., coaching eight-man football along with basketball. Hatch’s team was undefeated in his first season. “Small towns experience cycles of being either down and up and down and up,” Betty Hatch said. “We had the up and had a great time.” Betty Hatch struggled for words as she described her husband’s coaching style. Then it came to her. “Vociferous?” she said with a laugh. “He did a lot of yelling, a lot of yelling. He yelled at the kids, he yelled at the referees. I mean he was just loud.” She recalled one game, possibly in Washtucna. “(It was) terrible officiating,” Betty Hatch said. “I think he got like 60 yards in penalties. It was the most yardage the opponents got all day. He just kept talking and they (the refs) kept walking.”
Hatch then moved on to Tolt High in Carnation, Wash. before arriving in Cheney in 1964. His first Blackhawk team went winless but his 1966 squad was one for the ages. They went undefeated and were ranked second in the state. In those days, state playoffs were still on the drawing board, however. Bob Crabb was a member of that 1966 team. The bonds Jim Hatch helped forge then are still in place over 40 years later. “To us, he was always coach and we were his kids,” Crabb said. Crabb recalled one story about how inventive his coach was. It was the old Northeast A league that Cheney played in with Medical Lake, Colville, Chewelah, Colfax. “We were a big school in a smaller conference,” Crabb said. Trying to keep alive their hopes of an undefeated season, Crabb recalled that, “In ’66 our second to last game was Mead. They weren’t (in our) league, but to have an undefeated season we had to beat them and Colfax.” Mead had installed an all-audible offense, Crabb, said. It was similar to today’s no-huddle, 2-minute offense. To counter, Hatch had his team learn an all-audible defense, and do so in just a week. “It was one of the best coaching jobs I really ever saw,” Crabb said. Cheney won the game and went on to go undefeated. “It was a great experience to have an undefeated season,” Crabb said. Being before the advent of state playoffs reminded Crabb that,”now teams don’t get to finish undefeated. One team might, but that’s it.” “Jim was the epitome of the old coach,” Crabb said. “I don’t know anybody who wanted to win more than Jim. He was a heck of a competitor and prepared us well.” Aside from his rant against the referees in the Washtucna game, there are plenty of other stories about Hatch losing his temper. “Jim could get wound up and go pretty ballistic,” Crabb said. Hatch once got so mad at the team he threw his clipboard about 40 feet in the air, Crabb recalled. “It was the end of the year and the clipboard was full of papers and it rained,” Crabb said. “And our biggest task was to keep from laughing.” Crabb said Hatch “took great pride in how we played. Like a lot of other coaches then, he was an old-time, hard-ass coach.” But he cared an awful lot about his players, according to Crabb. “We really wanted to do the best we could. For him, for each other. It was a good experience.”
Hatch retired from coaching in 1973 to become the Cheney athletic director. He served in that position until 1987 and retired from education in 1988. And 20 years later, Hatch’s influence is still very much present.
“There’s an awful lot of guys who still stick together,” Crabb said. “Part of that is because we had a successful experience. But you can’t have a successful experience unless you have somebody at the head.” “Jim was Jim, Crabb said. “There was no pretense. He cared about us and he cared about the game. With Jim, what you saw right there was Jim Hatch,” Crabb said. Honest. Straight forward.” “And he cared,” Crabb said. “He cared a lot about us.”
Paul Delaney can be reached at pdelaney@cheneyfreepress.com
Cheney's Oswald dies: Cancer claims longtime coach.
Publication: Spokesman-Review (Spokane, WA)
Publication Date: 06-AUG-06
COPYRIGHT 2006 The Spokesman-Review
Byline: Dave Trimmer
Aug. 6--Tom Oswald was a man whose life was measured by numbers, but not the obvious ones. Oswald, who logged 165 games in 25 years as the football coach at Cheney High School, died Friday evening after a long battle with cancer. He was 57. "Think about how many kids he got through school because they came across Tom Oswald's path," former Cheney principal Jerry Knott said. "It wasn't just athletes. He helped thousands of athletes, but he helped a lot of students."
"He was a warrior," Ray Hare, another former Cheney administrator said. "He was a tough, tough, hard-nosed guy, but he had a kind heart for people." Hare graduated from Gonzaga Prep in 1967, the same year Oswald, a star quarterback, graduated from Cheney. They played together one year at Spokane Falls Community College. Oswald went on to Oregon State to play. After a year as a graduate assistant, he spent two years coaching at Grants Pass, Ore., where he met his wife Susan.
Oswald then went to Illinois as a graduate assistant before becoming the head coach at Kennewick for two years. He returned to his alma mater in 1977, which is where Hare finished his career in education.
"He was a coach's coach," Hare said. "He lived it and loved it and the players loved him." John Hook, the principal at Mt. Spokane who coached 17 seasons at Lewis and Clark beginning in 1983, said Oswald was one of the first friends. "We weren't a very good program and he was one of the first people that reached out to me," Hook said. "He invited me to his cabin, where we'd talk football. He was a great friend and a great competitor. He was very dedicated to his family and he genuinely cared for every kid in his program. "He said you can't run those marginal players out of your program. He said you might need them to win, but, more importantly, they might need something to hang on to." Cheney and LC met in preseason jamborees or in non-league games many times and Hook, the coach from the larger school, was usually impressed. "His teams were just like him -- tremendously competitive, good basic fundamentals, hard-hitting, a great deal of enthusiasm," Hook said. "Our kids loved going against them. "He had a strong faith. He was a strong, competitive man that battled to the end." It was Oswald who convinced Knott to apply at Cheney and he stayed for 16 years, the last 15 as the principal. "He touched so many of us and made us better people," said Knott, who retired in 2002. "Not just the players he coached -- his coaches, other students, principals, too. I told him that. I'm sure glad I got to do that.
"He was pretty good to remind you that you were a young kid once, or a young teacher one time yourself, and we all made mistakes."
Oswald tried to retire after 20 years at Cheney, making the announcement after the 1997 season, but had a change of heart before the position was filled and coached for five more years. The CHS football field was dedicated as Tom Oswald Football Field in January. "My most prevalent thought about Tom is he got along with all kinds of people," said Joe Richer, a longtime Cheney coach and athletic director, now retired. "He was able to get along with ... all different diverse personalities. He was a people person. It's a pretty sad day." Oswald is survived by his wife of 31 years; three children, Sarah, 29, of Spokane; Aimee, 27, and her husband Shane Kernen, of Cheney; and Drew, 22, attending school in Yakima; two sisters, two brothers, and his father, Mike, in Airway Heights. There will be a memorial service at the high school on Saturday at 11 a.m. "I'm not sure that will be big enough to hold everyone," Richer said. In lieu of flowers, the family asked that donations be made to the Tom Oswald Memorial scholarship fund that will be set up in the coming week.
Copyright (c) 2006, The Spokesman-Review, Spokane, Wash.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.
’83 and ’76 Willis “Pete” Jones, 70, MA education, school administration, and BA education, social studies, died March 23, 2007. The longtime Spokane resident served 20 years in the U.S. Air Force and worked at KXLY television before embarking on a 20-year teaching career at Cheney High School. He was also an assistant coach of Cheney High’s volleyball team.
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