Legendary Brookline High School football coach Ed Schluntz, who influenced thousands of student athletes’ lives across his decades-long career, died on Thanksgiving Day.
The namesake of the high school’s gymnasium was 99.
A star athlete at Franklin High School and Tufts University, Schluntz joined the BHS community in 1953 as a coach and English teacher. He served as head football coach from 1960 to 1982 and retired as athletic director in 1990 after 20 years in the role, according to The Boston Globe .
After his retirement, he served as Harvard University’s freshman football coach from 1990 to 1994.
Schluntz was honored in 1968 with The Boston Globe’s High School Football Coach of the Year Award and in 1980 as the Massachusetts Athletic Director of the Year, according to the National Football Foundation . He received in 1978 the Contribution to Amateur Football Award from the Eastern Massachusetts chapter of the NFF and Hall of Fame.
Schluntz also coached JV baseball and varsity basketball at BHS. He is an inductee of the BHS and Massachusetts High School Football Coaches Halls of Fame.
Joe Campagna, celebrated Brookline baseball coach and a former BHS Hall of Fame committee member with Schluntz, said Thanksgiving was Schluntz’s favorite holiday because of the annual rivalry games between Brookline and Newton North.
Campagna said Schluntz’s wife, Gloria, who died Nov. 4, once told him that in the 1960s the couple would drive to the Thanksgiving games, and they “had seven great rides down there, and three rides where not a word was broken.”
“I said, ‘That means Brookline won seven and lost three.’ She said, ‘Exactly,’” Campagna said with a laugh.
Schluntz was vice president of the Massachusetts High School Football Coaches Association in 1970 and chairman of the organization’s committee that collaborated with the former Massachusetts Secondary School Principals Association to establish the Massachusetts high school Super Bowl in 1972 .
“We are who we are, where we are, now because of him,” said MHSFCA executive board member Tom Lopez, who added that Schluntz would be on the “Mount Rushmore” of Massachusetts high school football.
For a time, Schluntz was the only high school coach in the United States to serve on the National Collegiate Athletic Association rules committee, Campagna said, adding it was a testament to how “highly respected” he was as a coach.
Joe Davis (BHS class of 1960), a former Northeastern football captain whose induction into the BHS Hall of Fame Schluntz sponsored, and other former BHS athletes worked with the Brookline Community Foundation to establish the Edward Schluntz Scholarship Fund in May, which Davis said will provide an annual scholarship to a BHS student athlete to “carry on his name.”
“He’s got a new legacy,” Davis said.
The first day Schluntz joined BHS football, Steve Forman (BHS ’59) was surprised the new assistant coach handling the linemen was doing the players’ calisthenic drills with them — and doing them better.
“He was someone you didn’t dare let up [in front of], because he was doing it at the same time,” Forman said.
Bob Hillson (BHS ’62) had a 71-year relationship with Schluntz — starting with a sixth-grade Hillson coached by Schluntz in baseball at the Edith C. Baker School and evolving into lunches every few months over the last 10 years. Hillson said one of Schluntz’s favorite sayings was, “Whatever you decide to do, be the best at it.”
“That kind of embodies Mr. Schluntz,” Hillson said, beginning to reminisce on his years playing football and basketball for Schluntz at BHS. “He was ruthlessly fair with every single one of his players. He did not have favorites, and he expected your best, whatever it was, in practice and in a game.”
Ahead of Schluntz’s 90th birthday in 2016, Hillson recalled some BHS alums beginning to plan a celebration consisting of 12 people. His reaction was, “Twelve? Are you serious?”
The celebration became a blowout tribute at the Newton Marriott hotel with 150 former BHS athletes in attendance.
A common thread among Schluntz’s former players is the self-confidence and discipline he instilled that allowed them to achieve on and off of Harry Downes Field and Schluntz Gym.
Michael Forbes (BHS ’68) said he and his teammates shared a “reverence” for Schluntz. Forbes added he is unsure whether he would have gone to college had it not been for the BHS athletic program and Schluntz’s coaching. He ended up playing football for four years at the University of Rhode Island.
“I was not someone who’s full of confidence, but he instilled that in me,” Forbes said. His voice breaking, he repeated what Schluntz had told him: “Mike, you can do this.”
Thomas Mahon (BHS ’70), a former baseball and football player who went on to play minor league baseball after graduation, called Schluntz a “class guy” who would do anything to help his players get into college and ensure “he was able to help you move on.”
During Forman’s junior year, he said, he wrecked his knee, and by his senior year the injury had worsened. However, Schluntz pushed Forman to take a few games off and garner his strength to play in the annual Thanksgiving Day game.
“It would happen to be the best game I ever played,” said Forman, who credits that game for securing him a football scholarship to the University of Massachusetts. “And if it wasn’t for Ed Schluntz, I wouldn’t have come back.”
A celebration of life for Ed and Gloria Schluntz is planned for May 28, according to the Globe. This date would have marked Schluntz’s 100th birthday.
This story is part of a partnership between Brookline.News and the Boston University Department of Journalism.