Community Corner

Former Football Coach, St. Pius Teacher Bill Conley Dies at 80

The former coach and mentor who also brought a state football championship to Lovett School in 1970 died Saturday at his Jasper home from idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, a lung disease.

Bill Conley, a former teacher, died in his Jasper home Saturday after a battle with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, a lung disease. He was 80.

Conley was most well-known for his 33 years at as a coach, teacher and administrator where he turned the school's floundering football team into a state champion in 1970.

But Conley taught at St. Pius before he left for Lovett in 1963, according to a Neighbor Newspapers report. A Bill Conley Memorial Page was created on Facebook this weekend, and remembrances have poured in from family, former students and friends since.Β 

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"My thoughts and prayers go out to the Conley family," Robbin Steed wrote Tuesday. "What a wonderful teacher, coach and person. Coach Conley will be missed. Memories of Coach calling out to all of us on the Softball Team... Sweetcakes, lets get a hit!"

Cati Conley, a relative, wrote about a discussion she once had with Bill Conley about what Heaven might look like.

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"He... looked at me for a second with that Bill Conley look and said, 'To tell you the truth I don't know. But I think it will be wonderful,'" Cati wrote. "He looks back at the T.V. and then he looked back at me and says, 'When I die, I want a celebration. Something like Mardi Gras without the beads, because beads like that aren't appropriate for church. Besides crying is for the girls.'"

His 1970 state championship team, with no player more than 190 pounds, outscored opponents 410-32 and won the state championship at home by leading 14-0 in the first quarter en route to a 14-6 victory, according to the 2008 Lovett football program, which was dedicated to him. Leading the football program from 1963 to 1976, he compiled a 96-45-5 record. See the accompanying PDFs for the program dedication message, tributes to Conley, and his year-by-year record.

His 1964 team, dubbed the β€œMighty Mites” by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, compiled an 11-3 record as both region and North Georgia champions. The 1968 Lions were 9-1 and ranked in the top 10, with its sophomore class laying the foundation for the state championship year.

The Conley Family will host a memorial service in tribute for Conley in Lovett's Alston Memorial Chapel on Saturday, Aug. 20, at 11am. This service will be followed by a reception.

His obituary was printed in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Patch editor Louis Mayeux contributed to this report.


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