By Keith Mills

It was back to school for most area students this week, although something was clearly missing at both Arundel and Forest Park High Schools. For the first time since Richard Nixon was president of the United States, Bernie Walter and Obie Barnes Sr. were not there.

"I know one thing, I didn't miss getting up early," Walter said. "I didn't have to set my alarm for 5:45 in the morning."

Walter arrived at Arundel High in Gambrills in 1974 and never left, but for the first time in 43 years, he was not in the classroom when school started this year. He's known more as the Wildcats’ incomparable baseball coach and athletic director, but as a teacher and department chairman he helped turn the school's physical education department into one of the best in the nation.

Leaving Edmondson for Forest Park, Barnes left one West Baltimore school for another in 1977 and, like Walter at Arundel, never left. For the first time in 38 years, Barnes was also a no-show when school began. He coached the football and lacrosse teams at Forest Park and was also the school's athletic director and physical education chairman as well as a huge presence in the community for more than three decades.

"It was a lot of fun," Barnes said. "But it was time to leave. Thirty-eight years in the system's a long, long time." 

Obie “O.J.” Barnes Jr. will replace his father as Forest Park's football coach. The all-time leading rusher at the school, he has been an assistant to his father since 1997.  "He's ready," Barnes Sr. said. "He's been with me the last 11 years and has done a wonderful job."

Chris Barnes, who played at both Baltimore Polytechnic and Dunbar before moving on to Boston College, also assisted his father the last two years at Forest Park and will continue to help his brother coach the Foresters. 

When practice began nearly two weeks ago, Barnes Sr. was in Atlantic City with his wife Itetha.

"She made sure I was out of town when practice started," he said. "She knew it was going to be tough. So we went to Atlantic City for a few days, then Ocean City. I was there to help O.J. give out the equipment, but I was gone during the first day of practice. It was strange not being there." 

Damon Bomar takes over for Barnes Sr. as athletic director at Forest Park while Lee Rogers, also the school's girls basketball coach, replaces Walter as Arundel's athletic director. Walter is hoping to remain as baseball coach. 

"It's not official yet," Walter said. "There are some things we have to work out, and though it's close, it's not 100 percent as yet." 

Walter may or may not coach baseball again at Arundel, but he is still active in amateur baseball, both locally and nationally. He will spend the Labor Day weekend in Jupiter, Fla., running an Under-14 national baseball tournament for the U.S. national program. 

In 1988, Walter coached the U.S. junior national team to its first world championship. Walter coached and taught at Archbishop Curley for six years, then left in 1974 for  Arundel. He has won 597 games and 10 state championships as the baseball coach.

Walter is also a member of the Anne Arundel County Sports Hall of Fame and is one of just a dozen high school coaches in the American Baseball Coaches Association Hall of Fame.  Barnes won 152 football games at Forest Park and is a member of the Maryland State Football Coaches Hall of Fame and the Baltimore Touchdown Club Hall of Fame. He has also been a huge presence in the development of the Baltimore City Lacrosse league.

Now, the two local icons will take a step back to spend more time with their families, specifically their grandchildren.  Bernie and Barbara Walter's daughter Kelly was an outstanding soccer and basketball player at Andover High School. She and her husband have four children, and Obie Barnes Jr. and his wife Gabrielle have two.

Their shoes will be impossible to fill. Both never wavered in their coaching and teaching philosophies although bureaucratic challenges have taken a lot of the fun out of teaching and may have ultimately helped expedite their retirement.  They stressed education and taught discipline, fundamentals, teamwork, responsibility and accountability and directly helped influence the lives of thousands of boys and girls.

"Three things have happened," Walter said. "Class sizes have gotten much larger. The kids’ desire to learn is less than it was. They're more interested in what grade they get now instead of what they learn. They're satisfied now with a ‘D’ as long as they pass. And once the politicians got involved, it changed things a lot. Now, they tell us what we're supposed to teach, and they are so far removed from the situation that they really don't know what the kids need.

"Politicians always talk about the teachers needing to be motivated. They don't know anything about motivation. The people that need to be motivated are the students, not the teachers."

ART MODELL FIELD  DEDICATED AT MERVO

Obie Barnes Sr. has watched area high school football improve dramatically in both performance and participation since the Ravens moved to Baltimore 14 years ago, and now Art Modell's legacy will live on at Mergenthaler Vocational-Technical in East Baltimore

Art Modell Field at Mervo was dedicated last week, triggering memories of a promise Modell made to the city when he moved his Browns in November 1995.

"I guarantee you," Modell said then, standing in an empty lot that is now M&T Bank Stadium, "my franchise will get involved in the community. We promise to become part of the community at every level."

Modell and the Ravens’ commitment to high school football has been nothing short of extraordinary. It is being continued by current owner Steve Bisciotti, Chris McAlister and the Ravens' All Community Team Foundation, which donated $1 million for the Sportexe turf field Mervo will use along with the Northwood Youth Football Program. 

It is the second city high school stadium the Ravens have renovated. Three years ago, the organization donated $1.26 million to add Sportexe to Lumsden-Scott Stadium at the Poly-Western complex on Cold Spring Lane.

"Mr. Modell set a standard to how his team would interface with the community," said Brian Morris, chief executive officer of Legacy Harrison Enterprises and a graduate of Mervo. "It has been an integral part of the community."

"I can't tell you how proud we are to be a part of this," Bisciotti told the Mervo and Northwood players on hand. "We want to be here when you need us. Obviously, this is in our strike zone. Our players care very deeply about the kids and how they are being raised and how they live."

Bisciotti and Modell attended last week's dedication at Mervo, as did McAlister, who along with Ray Lewis, Ed Reed, Jason Brown, Dan Wilcox and countless other current and former Ravens, have made area high school football a top priority.

"I still hear from a lot of kids," Brown said. "They say, 'I want to play football or basketball, or I want to play a sport when I grow up.'"

Brown went to Northern Vance High School in Henderson, N.C., a small town in the north-central part of the state. He was the state champion in the discus and a two-way  all-state lineman who went on to earn all-Atlantic Coast Conference honors at North Carolina.

"I was a country boy, and I didn't start playing football until the eighth grade,” Brown said. “I was either going to go home and do farm work, or I was going to stay at school and play football and hang out with some of my friends. My coach told me I could hit people if I played football. I liked that."

Brown speaks regularly to local middle and high school students. "Kids today don't say they want to be doctors or lawyers or firemen or truck drivers when they grow up," Brown said. "They say they want play a sport. You can't limit yourself to just one thing. There's so much you can do academic-wise to make you 10 times more successful than you would be as an athlete.

"I try to tell them God has given every single one of them a gift, and it's important at a young age to recognize that and be responsible at whatever you do. If I hung out with the wrong people, I would not be the person I am today.

"I tell the kids if you give 100 percent on the football field or basketball court, it's not guaranteed that you're going to make a pro team, but if you give 100 percent in the classroom, guess what? Going to college and getting a degree, that's guaranteed."

And what's guaranteed now at Mervo is another state-of-the-art field that will be shared by the high school and the community and one that will carry Modell's name. 

Issue 3.35: August 28, 2008