By Mike London
mike.london@salisburypost.com

SALISBURY — Services for Salisbury-Rowan Hall of Famer Aaron Albert Neely, who died at 81, were held on Dec. 30.

A coaching legend at East Rowan and Salisbury high schools, Neely was universally admired by those who played for him as well as by those who battled against him.

No matter what uniform you wore or where you went to school, you respected Coach Neely.

Hundreds will testify that he was the best kind of coach and teacher — firm but fair, compassionate but demanding, strict but kind. He got the best out of his track and field and football athletes and social studies students. He even got the best that his driver’s education kids had to give.

A moment of silence was observed for Neely at the recent basketball Christmas tournament at Catawba College prior to the semifinal game between the Salisbury and North Rowan girls teams. Quentin Woodward, who had served with Neely on the Salisbury-Rowan Hall of Fame committee, directed the moment of silence.

Brian Perry, who is now the head basketball coach at Carson, was an East Rowan track and basketball star in early 1990s. He offered a personal story about Neely at the basketball tournament. Perry had just completed a grinding basketball season and decided to give himself a day off before reporting to the track team coached by Neely. Neely had just returned to East Rowan for that school year after a long run at Salisbury.

“I was in the hall the next day and saw him coming and he didn’t look happy with me,” Perry said. “I explained to him I felt like I needed a day off before I started track, and he pinned me up against the wall and said, ‘Perry, you’ll get your days off, but I’ll let you know what those days are.’ That was a valuable lesson in communication for me, and it’s a lesson I still carry with me as a coach. I know he was a great track coach. He was so organized at a track practice that we didn’t do much standing around. We got our work done efficiently every day and we got out of there.”

Neely was born on Nov. 14, 1942, in China Grove. His grandparents were the Neelys who founded the Neely School between China Grove and Salisbury, a school hidden in the woods that provided ground-breaking educational opportunities for Black children.

In 1961, Neely graduated from Aggrey Memorial in Landis, the school for southern Rowan’s black students during segregation. He was a standout football player and went to North Carolina A&T to continue his playing career and to get an education.

Despite favorable court rulings, social change was moving at a snail’s pace in the South when Neely was a college student. Whites and Blacks lived and worked in the same towns, but opportunities were not equal. There were separate beaches, swimming pools, movie theaters, water fountains and restrooms. There were “whites only” restaurants, hotels and schools.

The Woolworth’s department stores had lunch counters. Whites could sit down and eat at Woolworth’s. Blacks usually had a takeout option at a separate counter. They could buy from the store, but if they sat down at the lunch counter, they were ignored.

North Carolina A&T students led a sit-in at the Woolworth’s in Greensboro. When they were denied service, they refused to leave the store — staging a literal “sit-in.”

Protestors were in danger of being arrested for trespassing, disorderly conduct or disturbing the peace, but the sit-ins led to Woolworth’s and other establishments changing discriminatory policies.

Neely was part of the sit-ins during his days in Greensboro. They were always non-violent protests, based on the methods of Dr. Martin Luther King. There were small victories won, one step forward at a time. Those protests led to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and tangible progress.

Neely graduated from N.C. A&T in 1965. His first teaching and coaching job was at Artesia, a Black school in Hallsboro, near Whiteville.

In 1967, Neely married Brenda McEachin, a Livingstone College graduate who had been in Washington, D.C., four years earlier to hear Dr. King’s best-remembered words, the “I have a dream” speech delivered in front of 200,000 people after the March on Washington.

The Neelys came home to Rowan County for teaching jobs. Aaron was a pioneer at East Rowan, the first Black coach and one of the first Black teachers.

A number of Black players helped the Mustangs make a surge athletically in the late 1960s. Neely was a role model for those players, someone they could turn to and talk to. “The Godfather” they called him.

Neely was a key assistant for head coach W.A. Cline. East won its first ever conference championship in 1968. In 1969, East went 13-0 and won the Western North Carolina High School Activities championship. East won a third straight North Piedmont Conference title in 1970.

In 1972, Neely began a rewarding coaching career at Salisbury that would last until 1990. He earned a master’s degree in education from N.C. A&T in 1975.

He was a tall, imposing figure, always on the back row of the coaching staff pictures in programs and yearbooks. He served as an assistant coach at Salisbury for a long line of head coaches.

He was an assistant for the Pete Stout-guided teams that won WNCHSAA championships in 1973 and 1974. He served on football staffs led by Ray Wilson, Mike Carter, Bob Patton, Roger Secreast and Gus Andrews. His area of greatest expertise was defensive line play, and he was the defensive coordinator throughout the decade of the 1980s.

Neely also enjoyed a tremendous run as head coach of the Salisbury boys track and field program during the 1980s. There was a long row of conference championships, and the Hornets won county titles in 1982, 1983, 1984, 1985, 1986 and 1987.

In 1988, North Rowan, coached by Robert Steele, stopped Salisbury’s run of county dominance, but the Hornets were undaunted.

They got healthier and won the Western Regional. Then they took the 1A/2A state championship, with North Rowan finishing second.

Andre Steele, a Salisbury freshman, won the 400 meters, the first of his four straight state titles at that distance. Adam Boyd and Steele went 1-2 in the 200 meters. and the Hornets won the 4×400.

When the Post’s Ed Dupree asked Neely how his team won the state after not winning the county, he had a solid answer.

“I told them in practice they couldn’t run the same times they had been running,” Neely said. “They had to run better times. They worked hard and they were determined to win.”

In the spring of 1989, Salisbury repeated as 1A/2A state champion.

Neely coached eight conference championship teams at Salisbury and piled up a stack of conference coach of the year awards.

When a new head football head coach was hired and brought in a new staff, Neely returned to East Rowan in the fall of 1990, re-joining Cline, who also was on his second tour of duty. In 1991, Neely helped East football have its best season since the glory days. East went 8-5 that season and won two playoff games.

Neely retired from the school system in 1996, but stayed busy as “supervisor” of his wife’s dress shop in China Grove.

He was never too busy to help a fellow coach. Rick Roseman, who was a long-time track and field and cross country coach at East Rowan, credits Neely with much of his success.

“I was coaching cross country and our principal asked me if I’d coach track in the spring,” Roseman said. “You know how it is — when the school year is just starting out, spring seems a long way off. It’s no big deal. But then spring arrived, and I realized that while I knew distance running, there were a lot of track events I knew absolutely nothing about. I went to talk to Aaron Neely.”

Neely patiently provided Roseman with hours worth of priceless advice. Roseman took along one of his distance runners, AJ Pearson, because Roseman knew he wouldn’t be able to remember all of that verbal wisdom. Neely also generously handed over his famed workout boxes that contained specific practice instructions for every event.

With those workout boxes, Roseman suddenly became an expert on everything from the shot put to the high jump.

“Coach Neely was one of the greatest coaches and nicest men I have ever met,” Roseman said. “I could have never made it as a track coach without his input. I will always appreciate and love Coach Neely. It’s sad to lose someone so special. God bless him and his family.”

In 2012, Salisbury recognized 11 coaching legends, honoring them boldly and forever on the fencing at Ludwig Stadium. Neely was one of the first 11.

In 2014, Neely was honored with election into the Salisbury-Rowan Hall of Fame.

“I was very fortunate,” he said modestly on the day of his induction. “We had a lot of athletes who put their heart and soul into it on the track and the football field.”

There’s no doubt he made an impact on all of them.