Lamar Honors 1974 Lady Warriors
by Janice Penix
Fifty years after their mothers petitioned the school board to restart girls basketball at Lamar, Michele Brown and Donna Stillwell joined their teammates at center court in Warrior Gymnasium for a special recognition.
Lamar High School honored the 1974-75 Lady Warriors in a pregame ceremony on Thursday, Nov. 21, prior to the LHS-Providence Academy games.
Brown and Stillwell organized a reunion of their teammates to celebrate the 50-year anniversary of that inaugural season. Brett Sampley, Lamar athletic director, coordinated a reception prior to the game as well as the recognition of each player in attendance.
The team was honored for inspiring the female athletes who came after them and for building the foundation of the Lady Warriors basketball program.
“We celebrate every game, victory and lesson learned along the way. Thanks to you, the Lady Warriors have truly become a source of pride for our community,” a school spokesperson said.
Brown recalled her mother working diligently with other parents, including Stillwell’s mother, Sue Brown, and Catherine Nordin, mother of teammate Sue (Nordin) Ford, to formalize a request to the school’s board of education that girls basketball be included in the extracurricular offerings.
“I was in the 10th grade,” Brown said. “Title IX had gone into effect the year before, and so a group of parents went to the school board with the petitions we had gotten signed and asked them to start girls basketball.”
Title IX is a federal civil rights law that prohibits sex-based discrimination in any school or education program that receives funding from the federal government. It protects against discrimination in all aspects of education, including athletics.
By the time Lamar voted to approve a girls team, other schools in Johnson County already had teams organized, some for several years prior.
“Coal Hill, Hartman and Oark all had teams,” Brown said. “Clarksville had started the year before. We had a county tournament back then, so eventually we got to play all of those teams.”
Only one player on the first Lady Warriors team, Beverly Ellison, had any real experience with basketball. The senior helped Coach Marsha Rogers, who also was the school physical education teacher, instruct the other girls in the basics of the sport.
“We had played basketball in PE, and some of us had played with the boys, but no one had played organized basketball except for Beverly,” Brown said. “She was the only one of us who had actually played on a team, so she pretty much taught us what to do. Her and Coach Rogers.”
Ellison moved to Lamar her sophomore year from Jessieville, where she had been a member of the school team…To read the full story see the Nov. 27 edition of The Graphic, found online and in businesses throughout Johnson and Franklin counties.
1974 LAMAR LADY WARRIORS—Lamar High School recognized members of the 1974 girls basketball team in a pregame ceremony Thursday, Nov. 21. Team members who attended included (front row, from left) Becky Perren Wilburn, Tanya Davis McKinney, Teresa Watson Dalton, Toni Killough Gully, Tammy Jo Robinson Teltow, Michele Wadley Brown, Connie Page Holstein, Susie Robbins Crutchfield, Sue Nordin Ford, Ruby Belcher Campbell, Bonnie Childress Freeman, Donna Brown Stillwell; (back row) Edwina Miller Kettlehut, Cindy Higby, Joan Carey Cleveland, Terri Stumbaugh, Beverly Ellison and Karen Williams Shook.
–Photo courtesy Nicole McElhaney
