The County Line
Long time, and I do mean long time, followers of sports in Hamilton County will remember Dick Nyers, the man who “made” Carmel football the statewide power that it is today. Dick is one of my favorites. He was one of my teachers at CHS.
At the age of 84 he is still receiving accolades for his athletic performance as a football and basketball player at the high school, college and professional level, and as a winning coach at Carmel and later at Indiana Central.
In recent days he was selected for induction into the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame. He was earlier inducted into the Football Hall of Fame.
Now the Indianapolis PBS TV station, WFYI, has completed a documentary about Dick, his playing and coaching career and his part in creating the Carmel Dads’ Club. It will air later this year on PBS and/or ESPN. He presented the idea of the Dads Club in the late 1950s to give youngsters early experience in organized sports and provide a feeder system for the high school team. Now, 60 years later it is recognized as the state’s premiere youth sports organization with more than 10,000 participants.
But, the story of how Dick came to Hamilton County to coach involves one of those lucky twists of fate. After a couple of years on the Baltimore Colts team, he was released in 1958 and looking for a job. He learned there was an opening for a teacher and basketball coach at a little school in Hamilton County. That would be Carmel with all of 380 students at the time.
When he arrived he was told the basketball job was taken by a guy named Bill Shepherd. But, the principal asked if Dick would be interested in coaching football. He took the job teaching social studies, coaching football and assistant in basketball. It was Carmel’s lucky day.
In his first season his team was 5-5, not great, but an improvement for the struggling program. During the remainder of his 10 years at CHS he had all winning seasons and Carmel football became respected around the state. It continued when Dick resigned to take an assistant coaching position at Ball State.
The Dads’ Club did feed good players into the high school, and in the years since CHS has won eight state championships and numerous runner-up titles.
One of my classmates, Tad Sinnock who played quarterback for Nyers, thought the football stadium should be named for Dick Nyers. Tad and I went to see the principal a couple of years ago, but alas it had been too long. Almost no one in the school system really knew of Dick and his accomplishments.
Too bad, but Dick is still getting recognition elsewhere, and deservedly so. We’ll let you know when the documentary is scheduled.