Living in a Man's World: Coaching Football

By Mamie Parker

The book is about growing up in the south and coaching children's football for 30 years.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Dec 28, 2010
• ISBN: 9781456712501

Book preview

GROWING UP

My mother said several hundred times as I was growing up that you can do anything in life that you want to do, if you want to do it bad enough, and believe me, she was right. Not only did she tell me that; she told my brother Mickey who is two years older than me and my sister Renie who is two years younger. My father, Michael Joseph Glavan, was a merchant marine and came home only every two years or so (which explains the difference in our ages). Daddy was a great guy and loved us dearly. When he came home it was like Christmas. He always brought us all kinds of wonderful things from around the world. As we grew older his time at sea shortened. It started out being two years and later dropped to one year, then six months and finally three months. My father died in my senior year of high school. He was just three days out of port and on his way home.

My mother, Mary Percival Glavan, better known throughout her life as Percy, was the best and was my best friend. She was always there when I needed her. No matter what we were doing she was always there to support us in our endeavor. With Daddy gone so much, Mama pretty much raised us by herself.

She used to tell me a true story about when I was six months old. I had started pulling up on the side of the crib and holding on. I would walk back and forth. Back in the good old days, at least that’s what I like to call them; doctors came to your house to check you out if you couldn’t make it to their office. My doctor came by to see me and as he was leaving he told Mama that I was in fine health and should be walking soon.

Mama tells me that it wasn’t 30 minutes later that Issie, who was our housekeeper, was yelling for Mama to come quickly, that something was wrong with Mamie, her leg was dangling. Mama took one look at me and realized that I couldn’t move my right leg at all. She immediately called the doctor. He came back and brought another doctor with him. After examining me he turned to my mother and said, Mrs. Glavan, Mamie has polio. We are going to have to put her in a cast from her waist all the way down to her toes on her right leg. After a few months of wearing this we will put her in a brace. More than likely she will be crippled on that right side, but miracles have happened. All we can do is pray and ask God to help. They put the cast on that afternoon. He told Mama to bring me in immediately if the polio started to affect the other side of my body. If it didn’t, to bring me in to see him in six months and they would make a decision about the cast.

Well, I guess that I must have been a stupid baby because I did not realize that anything was wrong with me. I kept trying to pull up on the side of the crib and walk back and forth. Dragging the cast did not matter to me. Mama said that I would even try to crawl with the cast. I must have been building quite a set of muscles in my arms and my left leg.

One day Mama noticed a red mark on my pelvic area and decided that the cast had to go. Mama had been reading about the Sister Kenny treatment for polio victims and how it seemed to help others. This was evidently a regimen of soaking in hot water and exercising the limbs that were affected by the polio. So, she and Issie cut the cast off my leg and began the treatments without consulting the doctor. Mama told me that I would scream and cry very loud, and that she and Issie would cry right along with me. I am sure that it really hurt them to have to do this, but I am glad they did. When I was taken back to the doctor at the end of six months, I walked in to see him. He was totally amazed that I could walk. He told my mother that sometimes a mother’s intuition is far better than the knowledge of a physician. They both agreed that God had a helping hand in this little miracle. And I haven’t stopped since I took that first step.

Growing up in the South, you were supposed to be a young lady at all times. Not me!! I liked scuffed shoes, torn jeans, playing marbles (I was the marble champion of my neighborhood!), shooting BB guns, fishing, climbing trees and going as high as you could go. God must have been with me when I was climbing. I would not have let my children do this; it was too dangerous. My mother didn’t know I was doing such a thing. I was good using a sling shot, making and using bows and arrows out of bamboo, playing baseball, basketball and my favorite, football. I guess you could definitely say that I was indeed a tomboy.

I went to St. Catherine’s Elementary School, located on Springhill Avenue along with the church and convent. It was a great school. My mother always told me to take care of my brother and sister. Well, when I was in the first grade this boy in my brother Mickey’s class hit him. My brother would not hit him back. He was being taught not to fight. After school this boy hit Mickey again and with that I jumped him and began to beat him up. My mother drove up and had to jump out of the car and pull me off him. Of course she told me to tell him that I was sorry. Well, I did but I really did not mean it because he did not tell my brother he was sorry for hitting him. This boy did this two more times in the afternoon after school, and each time I would beat on him and Mama had to pull me off him. He finally told Mickey that he was sorry for picking on him and I finally learned that fighting never solved anything.

In our neighborhood we had a beautiful southern antebellum mansion surrounded by massive oak trees. It was built in 1855. Mr. and Mrs. A. S. Mitchell bought the house in 1934 and lived there for years. Back then we called it the Mitchells’ home. It has a curved staircase and fifteen foot ceilings. I actually slid halfway down the banister at the bottom of the staircase. I was having fun, but Mrs. Mitchell told me get down from there before I fell and hurt myself.

In back of the mansion there were acres of open field with a few large trees—pecan trees, oaks, and a popcorn tree with leaves that changed colors in the fall. Reds, yellows, and greens: it was magnificent. The popcorn tree was my favorite tree to climb. From the top of this tree you could see my back porch and backyard. We would sit up in that tree for what seemed like hours. In this field, which we called Mitchell’s field after Mr. Mitchell who owned the house, we played many games of baseball and football.

Mr. and Mrs. Mitchell used to come outside and watch us play sometimes. He had told us that we could come and play in his field anytime we wanted to. I can’t begin to tell you how many crawfish and snapping turtles we caught in the ditch that ran behind Mitchell’s.

Their property met our property at the end of our backyard. When I was about ten years old, I decided that I was going to fry some bacon outside in the backyard. I snuck some bacon out of our fridge, some matches, picked up a concrete pot that you could start a fire in the bottom of, got the wire rack to put over the pot, got some twigs to start the fire, found an old frying pan that was rusty that had been in the yard for a while, and began to fry the bacon. Now, I knew that I could not eat the bacon because the frying pan was rusty and the bacon was dirty. It sure smelled good. I threw the bacon away and carried the pot to the end of our yard and dumped the ashes and twigs out onto the ground. I went inside to put the matches up. I just knew that one day I would be a gourmet cook. My mother had no idea what I had been up to.

A little while later I heard sirens and looked out back. I saw some men running around in Mitchell’s field and some fire trucks were out there. My mother and I ran out back. When we got to the end of our yard, all I saw was burned grass. Now, the grass was never high in the field they always kept it cut close to the ground. It was all black. The firemen had put the fire out. One of them said that the wind was blowing just a little and that made it spread. I knew that this was my doing. I had caught the field on fire by dumping the ashes on the ground. Some of the twigs must have still been hot and the slight breeze was enough to ignite the grass. Thank goodness the breeze was blowing away from the houses. I started crying, not because I knew I was in trouble, but because I loved that field and I knew it was going to take a long time before the grass would be green again.

I told my mother what had happened and, needless to say, I was in trouble for a while. The worst part of all of this was that I had to face Mrs. Mitchell. I just knew she was going to kill me. That afternoon my mother told me to go meet Mrs. Mitchell in the field. She wanted to talk with me. I was scared. I had no idea what this lady was going to do to me. We met in the middle of the burned field. I looked up at her when I stopped. You know, she had the kindest eyes. She looked down at me and she spoke in a soft but stern voice. She asked me to promise that I wouldn’t cook in the back yard again until I was grown. I looked her in the eyes and said, Mrs. Mitchell, I’m sorry I burned your field and I promise I will not cook in the backyard anymore until I grow up. She bent over and gave me a hug and I hugged her back and again told her I was sorry. She said that I could go back to the house and I told her goodbye. You can bet your bottom dollar that I did not do that again.

Today Mitchell’s home is called the Bragg-Mitchell Mansion and is part of Mobile’s Science Museum, the Exploreum. It sits on 12 acres which also contain one of Alabama’s oldest schoolhouses. The mansion is used for weddings, luncheons, teas, evening functions, receptions, and corporate parties. It is a beautiful place to have any type of function.

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LEARNING TO PLAY BALL

There was a house next to the mansion that