Remembering Charlie McFall

One of the first people he met when he arrived was a counselor eight years his senior, a rising sophomore at Randolph-Macon College by the name of Charlie McFall.

 

Little could Blair have imagined back then that he and McFall would become fast friends and share a personal and professional journey that would truly last a lifetime.

 

“He was somebody I could look up to,” Blair said one day recently. “He was a really decent human being. He was as consistent as anyone could possibly be. You always knew what you were going to get. He was thoughtful and generous. It’s cliché to say, but if he had a dollar and it was his last one and you needed it, he’d give it to you.”

 

Blair saw that kindness and decency as a novice camper. He saw those noble attributes through the many summers that followed at Camp Virginia and later at Camp Rivers Bend. And he saw them on a daily basis during the decades they shared the Collegiate experience as colleagues.

 

McFall came on board at Collegiate in 1970 and served in many capacities during his 43 years, including math teacher, athletic director, football coach, and baseball coach. McFall Hall, on the North Mooreland Road campus, was named in his honor in 2013. He was inducted into the Athletic Hall of Fame in 2014.

 

Blair joined the team in 1978 following his graduation from the University of Virginia, and, during his 41 years at Collegiate, served as a history teacher, head varsity boys soccer coach for 38 years and head of the Middle School for 29. The Charlie Blair Field on the Robins Campus bears his name.

 

“A good part of the reason I got into teaching was Charlie,” Blair said. “I saw the impact he had on others. I found myself following the same path. The quality that I most admired, that Charlie imbued, was that he was more interested in what somebody else was doing than in what he was doing and making certain that others were finding success and happiness. He took absolute joy from that.

 

“He didn’t do things for others because he wanted them to thank him. He certainly appreciated it, but his motivation was just so intrinsic to decency. I keep coming back to decency.”

 

McFall slipped peacefully away this past Sept. 21. As his health declined and in the aftermath of his passing, Blair (among many others) has reflected, reminisced, smiled at the telling and retelling of myriad Charlie McFall stories, and shed a tear or two or three.

 

It was the summer of 1967 that Blair and McFall met.

 

“Charlie was a counselor working in campcraft, where you learn how to do things like build fires, pack a backpack, hike, and cook outdoors,” Blair said. “I remember him vividly up in a tree working on a treehouse we were building. Part of it wasn’t very much fun for us because we carried all the wood and supplies, and they [the counselors] did the building. I remember him down at the river teaching us how to swim. I was not one of his great success stories. I’m not kidding about that.”

 

Unless you knew McFall in his younger days, you might not realize what a talented athlete he was at Randolph-Macon Academy, where he starred in football, basketball, and baseball, and later at R-MC.

 

“He could do anything,” Blair said. “He could walk by a basketball court every day for a month at camp and never pick up a ball. One day, one would roll over next to his feet, he’d pick it up, and hit shot after shot.”

 

True story. When McFall was in college, he went out one afternoon to watch a tennis match. A Yellow Jacket player was sick and unable to compete. The R-MC coach asked McFall if he wanted to take his place.

 

“Charlie said, ‘Sure,’” Blair said. “He hadn’t had a tennis racquet in his hands in years. He goes out there and wins and ends up lettering in tennis. He could play any sport. I’m sure if he’d played golf, he would have been great.”

 

Just before his health began to decline, McFall accompanied Blair to his house in Mathews County.

 

“We’re out on the end of the dock,” Blair recalled. “Charlie was sitting in one of those low chairs facing the land. I said, ‘Are you going to fish?’ He said something like, ‘I might throw a line out there.’

 

“McFall looks over and grabs a rod and reel and says, ‘Where’re they biting?’ I said, ‘Over there’ and pointed toward a crab pot. He kind of looks over his shoulder and throws the thing backhanded over his head within two feet of [the target] from about 35 yards out. He sits there and catches a fish.

 

“It was unbelievable what he could do athletically. Shoot a rifle. Shoot a bow and arrow. It didn’t matter. He was so athletic.”

 

True to McFall’s nature, there’s more, of course.

 

“No one ever knew because he never bragged about it,” Blair continued. “When he walked onto the campus here at Collegiate, no one would have ever known what a talented athlete he was if you had to depend on him to let you know. He’s always been so unassuming.”

 

When McFall served as Athletic Director, he was, on paper at least, Blair’s supervisor.

 

“You worked with him, not for him,” Blair said. “He had no interest in hierarchy. He understood how you develop teams, how you develop loyalty, and how you develop chemistry. He shared the leadership role. You have to be confident in yourself to do that. Charlie was a model for that, although he would never articulate it.”

 

McFall worked with his football and baseball assistants in much the same manner.

 

“Watching Charlie and hearing him talk about the authority he gave assistant coaches to make decisions serves as a great example,” Blair said. “He didn’t care one bit about getting credit for anything. He wanted to make sure the experience was right for the kids.

 

“He had no thought that he was the only one who understood the game of football or that he had all the right answers. He invited assistants to be involved at a level that would be far greater than for people who have more of an ego. That’s what he believed in. That’s how he worked with people.”

 

While McFall evolved over the years, he remained true to himself and the same humble, unpretentious, sometimes self-deprecating, caring advocate and friend that he had always been.

 

“Even though I was a camper and he was a counselor and I was a rookie teacher and he was a veteran, we were friends, always,” Blair said. “That didn’t mean there wasn’t a lot of learning going on for me, from him, the entire time.”

 

It’s been almost four months since McFall passed away. The celebration of life in mid-November was a cathartic moment in time for the Collegiate Family. That said, Charlie’s loss still seems surreal for so many.  Those who knew him well continue to work through and help each other work through the grieving process.

 

“When you have friends like that…,” Blair said, pausing to allow the emotion to subside. Then he continued, in halting voice. “Gosh, Weldon, I’m so lucky, so grateful, to have Charlie in my life.”

~Weldon Bradshaw