Longtime coach Vince Dooley talks about a ‘fighting bulldog’

While the Bulldog Nation rightfully exults over the possibility of a national championship, I have been talking to the man who delivered the last one in 1980, Vincent Joseph Dooley.

In addition to being a College Hall of Fame football coach, the winningest football coach in UGA history with 201 victories, including six SEC championships and a national championship, Vince Dooley is also an avid historian. (He got his master’s degree at Auburn) and currently serves as chairman of the board of curators of the Georgia Historical Society.

Therefore, our conversation was not just about the much-anticipated clash between No. 2 Oklahoma and the No. 3 Georgia Bulldogs in the Rose Bowl on Jan. 1, but also about his latest book, “The Legion’s Fighting Bulldog,” a collaboration between the coach and Samuel Norman Thomas Jr., curator of the T.R.R. Cobb House in Athens. Thomas Reade Rootes Cobb was a Southern statesman and Confederate soldier who formed Georgia’s Legion Cavalry at the beginning of the War Between the States and was killed in the Battle of Fredericksburg in 1862.

“The Legion’s Fighting Bulldog” is a compendium of correspondence between William Gaston Delony, a lieutenant colonel in Cobb’s Legion and his beloved wife, Rosa. Delony was a well-to-do attorney in his hometown of Athens, as well as a devoted husband and father. There are 167 letters between them, talking about everything from mundane household matters to experiences on the battlefield and his opinion of some of his commanders, i.e., “I am tired of being ordered around by jackasses.”

There are also some very intimate moments between the two. One reviewer said you feel at times like you are invading their privacy.

Delony’s bravery in battle earned him the sobriquet “a courageous bulldog,” from Gen. Wade Hampton and, thus, the title of the book. Will Delony was later mortally wounded in Virginia in 1863. His DICK YARBROUGH Longtime University of Georgia coach Vince Dooley signs a football for a fan at the Rome Kroger.

brave feats also brought him to the attention of Vince Dooley.

“Kent Masterson Brown, an attorney and historian in Lexington, Kentucky, wrote a wonderful book on the retreat from Gettysburg,” Dooley says, “and mentioned Delony, who had been slashed several times in a cavalry charge and wounded. He was placed in a 17-mile-long ambulance train along with about 7,000 other survivors. They were being harassed by Union troops and found themselves trying to cross a swollen Potomac River and the real possibility of being wiped out before they could.”

Instead, Dooley said, the injured Delony climbed out of his ambulance, rounded up 200 able-bodied comrades still able to fight and guarded the ambulance train until survivors could get across the river.

Dooley quips, “When I read that, I said ‘I like this guy.’” That led to five years of research, compilation and writing with curator Thomas. The result is a hit book. (The first edition sold out and a second edition is due on the bookshelves this week.)

I asked the coach/historian about the current effort of some groups to destroy all vestiges of Confederate history. “Unfortunately, it is the extremes on both ends that get all the attention,” he says. “They see things very myopically. I expect the day to come when reasonable people in the middle will sit down and work through the issues.” locked yourself out of your house, the coach who taught you the value of persistence, the beloved aunt of your childhood sweetheart …

I realize that nursing homes are outside the comfort zone of many of us (“The smells! The moaning!

The bodies that would no longer make the cover of ‘GQ’ or ‘Sports Illustrated’!”); but most of those patients went outside their own comfort zones many times — leaving familiar surroundings to find a good job, traveling halfway around the world to fight for freedom, raising stepchildren who clung to memories of their “real” father/mother, marching for civil rights, etc.

The Christ child we celebrate at Christmas certainly came outside his comfort zone. He left the right hand of God, endured the aches and sorrows of the Human Condition and was mocked and crucified. He set a high standard for us.

We cheat ourselves when we let our hectic schedules push nursing home visits way down our priority list. We rush home to watch a History Channel documentary when we could learn about the Great Depression or the Korean War or the Apollo program from someone who was there. We make a mad dash to the bookstore to grab the latest romance novel instead of listening to a real live senior citizen reminisce about the person who was the light of their life for 50 years. Staff graphic

Of the readers who responded to our most recent poll about whether UGA and Alabama will meet for the national title, 46 percent said Yes and UGA will win; 24 percent said Yes, and Alabama will win; and 30 percent said No, the teams won’t meet. Poll results reflect only the opinions of those who chose to participate. File / RN-T

Of course, this Bulldog couldn’t let the conversation end without some discussion of football and his reaction to the success of this year’s Bulldog team. He said, “You can’t help but love this team and the job the coaches have done. Also, the fact that four guys who could have gone to the pros came back for their senior year has made a great impact physically and spiritually.”

Both Dooley and wife, Barbara, will be in attendance at the Rose Bowl on Jan. 1, hoping the Dawgs will be coming back to Atlanta the following week to play for the national championship.

As we were about to hang up, I told him about a couple of yakkers on a sports radio show. One was marveling that Coach Kirby Smart has brought a different brand of football to Georgia. Not really, said the other. He is simply doing what Vince Dooley did in his heyday.

Dooley chuckled at the observation and said, “Well, we did run the ball some back then and we played some pretty good defense.” Did they ever. In addition to being a historian, prolific author and master gardener among other talents, don’t forget that Vince Dooley was a helluva football coach, too. Will Delony would have loved this guy.

Opportunities abound. True, some patients are staying for only six weeks of therapy after a knee replacement; but words of encouragement can speed their healing. Some patients are in the latter stages of dementia, but a smile or a kind word does not go unnoticed by our Father in heaven. Nurses and other staffers can always use a heartfelt “thank you.”

Certainly, the patients who suffer from glaucoma or osteoporosis or confinement to a wheelchair but who remain mentally alert are in need of reassurance, to handle the monotony, loneliness and challenges to their dignity. Even patients who have doting relatives will appreciate an extra visit.

Giving the gift of time to someone who can’t repay you in material things can be so much more rewarding than the obligatory ritual of handing a $20 Taco Bell gift card to the co-worker whom you know will reciprocate with a $20 Olive Garden gift card.

Nothing about this column is intended to limit your kindness to the holiday season. Trees and ornaments may be packed away, but the emotional needs remain.

I hope the holidays start you on a yearround program of tending to the vulnerable. It is a two-way gift that keeps on giving. 5,187 views 5,061 views 3,664 views 3,432 views 3,182 views 2,624 views 2,515 views 2,279 views 2,195 views 2,187 views

Judge: I know you, don’t I? Defendant: Uh, yes. Judge: Alright, tell me, how do I know you?

Defendant: Judge, do I have to tell you?

Judge: Of course, you might be obstructing justice not to tell me.

Defendant: bookie. OK, I was your

*** Lawyer: How do you feel about defense attorneys?

Juror: I think they should all be drowned at birth.

Lawyer: Well, then, you are obviously biased for the prosecution.

Juror: That’s not true. I think prosecutors should be drowned at birth too.

*** Judge: Is there any reason you could not serve as a juror in this case?

Juror: I don’t want to be away from my job that long.

Judge: Can’t they do without you at work?

Juror: Yes, but I don’t want them to know it.

*** Tell us about the

Lawyer: fight. Witness: I didn’t see no fight. Lawyer: Well, tell us what you did see.

Witness: I went to a dance at the Turner house, and as the men swung around and changed partners, they would slap each other, and one fellow hit harder than the other one liked, and so the other one hit back and somebody pulled a knife and someone else drew a six-shooter and another guy came up with a rifle that had been hiding under a bed, and the air was filled with yelling and smoke and bullets.

Lawyer: You, too, were shot in the fracas?

Witness: No, sir, I was shot midway between the fracas and the navel.

*** Defendant: Judge, I want you to appoint me another lawyer. Judge: And why is that? Defendant: Because the public defender isn’t interested in my case.

Judge (to public defender): Do you have any comments on the defendants’ motion?

Public Defender: I’m sorry, your honor. I wasn’t listening.

*** Defendant (after being sentenced to 90 days in jail): Can I address the court? Judge: Of course. Defendant: If I called you a son of a b **** , what would you do?

Judge: I’d hold you in contempt and assess an additional five days in jail.

Defendant: What if I thought you were a son of a b **** ?

Judge: I can’t do anything about that. There’s no law against thinking.

Defendant: In that case, I think you’re a son of a b **** .