Remembering the 1970 Marshall University football team plane crash
BROOKFIELD, Ohio - Forty-one years ago, most of the Marshall University football team was killed in the worst single air tragedy in NCAA sports history.
21 News co-anchor/reporter Leslie Barrett spoke with one of the four coaches who wasn't on the plane that day who now lives in Brookfield.
November 14, 1970 is a day ingrained into the hearts of many, especially former Marshall University assistant coach Carl Kokor.
He and another assistant coach, Mickey Jackson, were not at the Marshall and East Carolina game in Greenville, North Carolina because they were scouting Ohio University at Penn State.
"It came on the radio again and it said there was a fatal crash of an airplane and it gave the time the plane should have been landing and I turned to Mickey and said Mickey that's our plane," said Kokor.
The plane crashed on a rainy hill side about a mile from the Huntington airport killing everyone on board. Seventy-five people died; most of the players and coaches, crew and fans.
"I called my wife and I said Rose what happened and she was sort of crying and she kept repeating over and over. She kept repeating over and over, they're all dead oh my God they're all dead."
Carl and two of the other surviving coaches went on to coach the 1971 team but after that season he and his wife Rose Mary decided to bring their kids home to Brookfield to be close to their families.
He taught at Brookfield High and coached track and football there until 1976. He continued to teach there but went on to coach at Westminster College for 24 years until he retired in 2000.
When the movie "We Are Marshall" came out in 2006 about the 1971 team's come back after the tragedy, Carl started giving motivational speeches. Now he's also working on a book he's trying to get published.
"I talk quite a bit about how I got to Marshall University and then individual stories that were not in the movie because there were people who were on the manifest of the plane that crashed that were not on the manifest [of] the plane that flew down."
Art Harris, Jr.'s father, Art Harris, Sr. decided at the game to fly back with his son. "After the game, he said coach, I haven't seen my son in a long time, is it OK if I fly back with you so I can sit with my son?"
"Bob Harris, no relation, he was a backup quarterback and a third wide receiver. As he's coming off the field his dad was there and the family and they said Bob why don't you ride back with us and be with the family. He made a decision you don't think about at the time. He said dad I would rather stay with my friends on the plane."
Six players were never identified. They were buried in a cemetery overlooking Marshall.
"One of the boys, Barry Nash was one of the six. He had three or four brothers. They were all at the cemetery. At a moment of silence during the memorial service, one of Barry Nash's brothers jumped out of the crowd and began to hug every casket. Barry is this you? Barry is this you? And as I'm telling this story to a guy at a memorial of the crash three or four years ago. The guy next to me says my name is Nash and I was that kid."
Kokor saw the brother again at the ceremony this year, where family of the victims, surviving coaches, and the community gather at the fountain on campus in honor of the victims.
Forty-one years later, their memories live on.
"There's a reason why I'm being given the privilege of speaking because maybe I'm to be one of the voices for the people, who can't be a voice."
Kokor likes to end his speeches on a positive note with funny stories from the filming of "We Are Marshall" when he was on the sidelines as a sportswriter. He said his cameo appearance didn't make the film but actor Mike Moretti played Kokor in the motion picture. There is also a collage of photos at the end of the movie that Kokor is in.
"When they had us down to the filming of the game. The director took us in to this huge room full of clothes and I asked the director I said what is this? He said these are all 1970s clothes and I says heck I've got a closet at home and all you had to do was tell me and I would have brought them up."
"The tragedy was a terrible thing, I don't know if anything will be worse and then the movie brought a smile back to people I talked to and myself and things like that. I enjoy it for that."
