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THE BRUMSWICK^lStACON
THURSDAY. JANUARY 16, 1992
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Lineman, Coach, Golf Pro ? Jim Duncan Did It All
BY DOR I COSGROVK GURGANUS
Fooiball players haven't always been equipped
with face masks and protective padding, nor have
ihcy always been paid millions of dollars to play
the game.
"We were really just a bunch of bums," said James
(Jim) Duncan Sr. of Calabash about his years in the
National Football League.
From 1950 to 1955, Duncan played professional
football for the New York Giants, making about $4,250
per season. "And that was somewhere in the middle,"
he said, remembering that some players only earned
about S2.(KX).
Duncan began his fooiball career during high
school in his hometown of Reidsvillc. He joined the
Navy, serving from 1943-46, and then enrolled at Wake
Forest University.
He played college football for Wake Forest Iron)
1943 through 1949, participating in the North/South
Shrine Bowl Game in Miami, Fla., and the 1950 Senior
Row), then held in Jacksonville, Fla. He also was an
All-Conference player three times in his college career,
for which he was inducted into the Wake Forest Hall of
Fame in 1985.
In 1950 Duncan was drafted by the Cleveland
Browns, then traded to the Detroit Lions for training.
Finally, he was hired by the Giants to play linebacker
and end for Coach Steve Owen.
"The more positions you played, the better," said
Duncan of that era of fooiball. Players were able to play
offense as well as defense, and were used in games
more often.
That might have something to do with having only
32 members on a team, and only 12 teams in the NFL
at that time.
"Now players arc strictly offense or defense,"
Duncan said, adding that teams boast 47 to 50 players
these days.
And with fewer teams, he said, "You were real for
tunate if you made it."
Duncan lived in New York City during the train
ing/playing seasons, then would return to Reidsvillc for
the summer to work at painting houses, installing cabi
nets and working at golf courses to bring in extra mon
ey.
He married his wife. Lib, in 1951 and they rcnicd
an apartment in Manhattan for SI 15 a month, an un
heard-of price these days.
The loam would travel lo out-of-town games by
train instead of airplane, leaving the wives behind to
shop and "enjoy themselves for the weekend," Duncan
said.
After home games, he recalled, all the players and
wives would "hit the restaurants on 57th Street," behav
ing more as a club <">r group of friends than just people
who worked together.
"Now, the players scatter to different areas of the
country," Duncan said, "But we had a nice time, we
were all close."
He recalled hob-knobbing with show business
celebrities such as Jackie Glcason, Forrest Tucker and
Ray McKinlcy, bandleader of the Glenn Miller
Orchestra.
Other Giants who played alongside Duncan and
went on to achieve celebrity status were future Dallas
Cowboys coach Tom Landry and future television
sports reporter Frank Gifford.
At the Anchor and PJ. Clark's, Duncan said,
"Sunday nights were dead, arid we just really had a
good time. But we were really just a bunch of bums
hanging out."
" Players probably deserve
the money they make, but they
didn 't have anymore fun than
I did." ? Jim Duncan,
On his NFL years
"Players probably deserve the money ihey make to
day, but they didn't have anymore fun than I did," he
remembered.
Opposing teams also fraternized after games, and
rarely fought on the field under fear of SI 00 fines.
"Nobody was making enough money to get maimed
over it," he said, laughing.
Duncan went on to do well at football, being named
co-captain of the team along with Kyle Rote. He still
has newspaper clippings in a scrapbook made by Lib,
several that report Duncan's outstanding plays in partic
ular games.
One article quotes Coach Owen stating, "If every
man on this team was as good and played as hard as
Duncan, we would never lose a game."
He was also one of the original linebackers used to
introduce the 4-3 defense, now commonly practiced bv
the NFL.
By Duncan's final year, 1955, protective face bars
lUlii*" iJI? . M . ? *
STAFF PHOTO BY DO?l C GU?GANUS
NOW A RETIRED GOLF PRO, Jim Duncan poses with his wife of 40
years, Lib, a : their home in Calabash.
PHOTO CONTRIBUTED
DUNCAN, DURING EARLIER days with the NFL, in this publicity shot
for the New York (Hants.
were installed on football helmets, anil Jimmy Howell
was coaching the Giants.
"The game is still the same, just the players arc big
ger and faster now," Duncan said, discussing changes in
the popular sport.
He decided to quit playing due to knee injuries and
went to work at Wake Forest as executive director of
ihe Dcacon Club fot three years.
Appalachian Slate University in Boone hired
Duncan :ls assistant coach, then promoted him to coach
until 1965.
Of his players at Appalachian, he boasts that live
graduated with doctorate degrees and only two never
graduated at all.
PHOTO CONTRIBUTED
DUNCAN COACHED the Calgary Stampeders to win in the 1971 Gray Cup, a feat the team had not
accomplished in 25 years.
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"I'm proud of them, Duncan said. "I'll pul my
coaching graduation record up aeainst any coach."
In I960 or 1961 (Duncan isn't sure which), he was
voted Coach of the Year at Appalachian for helping the
Mountaineers finish at second place in the Northern
State Conference.
One of the players he coached was Bill Bradley,
brother of the late Fred Bradley, previous defensive co
ordinator for the West Brunswick High Schixil Trojans
football team.
Then Duncan moved on from American to
Canadian League football.
He was hired as assistant coach for the Regina
Roughriders in Saskatchewan, Canada, until 1969,
helping that team win two Gray Cups, the equivalent of
our Super Bowl Championship.
Duncan then was picked up as head coach of the
Calgary Stampeders for five years, leading them to win
the Gray Cup in 1971. Until then, he recalled, the
Alberta team hadn't won a Gray Cup in 25 years.
The former player and coach then lef t lootball, sell
ing sporting goods for a few years, and then giving golf
a try.
He attained PUA status ana became a golf pru in
Morchead City, working there until he retired in 1988.
He and Lib have lived in Calabash for two and a
half years, and have three grown children, two grand
sons and a granddaughter.
Their daughter Suzanne, 36, still lives in Calgary;
oldest son Jim Jr., 31, is tournament director ol the
Carolina PGA; and son Lee, 29, is a golf pro at the
Florence (S.C.) Country Club.
As for coaching football, Duncan said he wouldn't
want to do it ever again.
Offers from local schools to coach high school level
have been turned down by the former big leaguer, but
he still insists that coaching was one of the "most grati
fying parts" of his career.
He is happy these days, however, playing golf on an
average of "every day," according to Lib. Fortunately,
their backyard faccs one of Brunswick County's large
golf greens.
The irony of the Duncans' story is that Jim didn't
make the cover of Sports Illustrated during his football
career, but his wife did.
In an early 1950s photograph of the New York
Giants' wives. Lib hammed it up with the rest of the
ladies in a good-natured football pose.
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