Gene Gatwood dreamed of following in the footsteps of his older brother Jimmy and play quarterback for Coach Dobie Holden's Pearl River College Wildcats.
But Gatwood's rocket passing arm made famous his junior year at Petal High School didn't off set his flea-like 5-6, 125-pound frame and the legendary Wildcat football coach told him — three different times — "don't call me, I'll call you."
The fourth time clicked and after two seasons as a back-up to record-setting quarterback Bobby Weaver, a 1989 Pearl River Sports Hall of Fame inductee, Gatwood was Holden's No. 1 man in 1960. That year he guided PRCC to a 9-1 record, a co-state championship with Northwest, and a 50-20 victory over San Angelo, Texas, in the Hospitality Bowl in Gulfport.
Thirty-eight years later, Gatwood joins his brother, Jimmy, as 1998 inductees into the PRCC Sports Hall.
Admittedly, Gatwood was a "Holden reject" at first.
"I went down to Poplarville three different times before Coach Holden gave me a chance," Gatwood recalled from his Centerville, Ga., home. "The third trip resulted in a third rejection and I was absolutely crushed."
The Gatwood family grew up extremely poor — even working as sharecroppers for a brief period in the Mississippi Delta — but Gene knew an education was his roadway out of poverty.
"After being turned-down for the third time, I'd basically came to the decision to go to work, save my money, and then go to school at PRC," he continued. "But about a week after I reluctantly made that decision, I got a letter from Coach Holden telling me that he was in the process of changing over from a drive offense to a passing one. He knew I could throw and invited me down for a tryout.
"When I read that letter, I cried. My mother cried. I had to run down and tell my old high school coach. I was elated."
But when Gatwood arrived on the Poplarville campus as a high school senior, 75 prospects were vying for 33 scholarships on Holden's roster.
Eleven of those players were quarterbacks — including Bobby Weaver — and all were much larger than Gene.
"But I wasn't intimidated. I knew I had tremendous drive and could really hum a football. But after having a bad practice one day, I was worried and went back to my room ... I didn't even eat supper in the cafeteria...and hid under my bed," he said. "I thought 'if he (Holden) can't find me, he can't run me off.'
"James Ginn finally came to the room and found me, but every time I had what I thought was a bad practice, I'd run to the cafeteria, grab a biscuit, and run back to my room and hide. My worries were totally unfounded. I wound up earning a jersey," Gatwood said.
In his last football game he ever played — the 1960 Hospitality Bowl — Gatwood played in what was probably the most physical game he'd ever played, despite putting up a stellar performance.
"We beat those Texas boys good, but they nearly beat us to death physically," Gatwood recalled. "I was cold-cocked by one of them and Coach Holden woke me up on the sideline with smelling salts. It was a heckuva way to end a football career."
Retired Clarion-Ledger sportswriter Lee Baker covered that game.
"I can remember one of the San Angelo players in the backfield trying to sack him and tiny, little Gene grabbed the guy's facemask and must have run around for 20 yards holding on to the thing," Baker recollected. "And he finally got off the pass. In all my years covering football, I never saw anything like that."
The mite-sized Gatwood was a favorite with the fans and the media.
Said Baker in articles on the 1960 Hospitality Bowl: "Gatwood has to soak overnight to push the scales at 130."
"And the rest of the time, Dobie Holdon will have a scrawny li'l ole pygmy-sized quarterback named Gene Gatwood who will give San Angelo's Rams just all the entertaining they can stand."
San Angelo's Rams took a dreadful beating, all because of a quarterback so small that he might not even rate consideration for managerial status on some teams. But as he does most every time he steps upon a football field, 5-6, 130-pound Gene Gatwood proved that size isn't everything. As a matter of precise fact, where he's concerned, size isn't hardly anything at all for he is so tiny. But it was Gatwood pulling the trigger time after time to shoot the Rams from the high plains country of West Texas into utter submission, 50-20, for the wildest rout in the game's six-year history. Little Gene pitched for five touchdowns and a pair of two-point conversions. For good measure, he ran for both a touchdown and a two pointer."
"My last football game was probably the worst beating I ever took in my life," Gatwood said. "I'll never forget it as long as I live."
Holden would have Gatwood and Charles Amacker, a Poplarville resident who was similarly sized, run onto the field last because of their tiny statures.
"Against Hinds, I ran out last and fell flat on my face," Gatwood said. "The Hinds fans laughed their heads off, but I got even with them by throwing three touchdowns and three two-point conversions and we stomped 'em 24-6. That was the last regular season game of the year."
Here's a few of Gatwood's credentials at Pearl River:
His 20 touchdown passes in 1960 ranks at the third-highest total in school history.
After throwing an all-time high five interceptions against East Mississippi in the 1960 season opener — a 14-6 loss — he only threw three in the remaining nine games.
He was named to the 1960 All-State football team.
He was selected as Mississippi's junior college "Back of the Year" in 1960.
He was the recipient of the J.J. Holcomb Athletic Award for 1960.
Most senior college coaches felt Gatwood was too small for their squads, but that didn't tarnish his pursuit of an education.
"In 1961, they started the National Education Defense Loan program and I borrowed money to continue my education at Southern Mississippi (then Mississippi Southern College) and wound-up earning a degree in math," he said.
Offers to coach followed, but he opted to enter the U.S. Air Force because "I always wanted to learn to fly."
Even though Gatwood eventually rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel — ex-Wildcat teammate J.E. Loicano use to refer to Gatwood as "little lieutenant" — he failed the Air Force's hearing test and never achieved his goal of becoming a pilot, but his military service exposed him to the then-new world of computers through a communications school.
"I did so well in the school, the Air Force wanted me to become a computer programmer, back in the days when a computer was run by 30,000 vacuum tubes and took-up a four-story building," he said. "But that opened-up many doors for me. I wound-up creating a computer maintenance program for the Air Force, writing the course and teaching it. And you have to stay abreast of the computer world every day, because it changes every day."
During that time, he also earned a master's degree in guidance and counseling at Troy State University in Troy, Ala., then an Education Specialists degree from the University of Georgia, graduating with a perfect 4.0 grade-point average. Gatwood never pursued his doctorate, but has had many opportunities to enter education administration.
"I love being in the classroom and I will remain in the classroom," he said. "And I love Pearl River. Some of the fondest memories of my life were right there in Poplarville. Playing for Coach Holden had the most profound impact on my life. What a fine place to go to school."
Gatwood presently teaches mathematics and introduction to computers at a vocational-technical center in Warner Robins, Ga., adjacent to Centerville.
He has been married to Georgia Ann Jackson Gatwood of Coldwater since June 6, 1966, and they are the parents of two children. Stacy Leigh, age 28, is an Ole Miss graduate and works for the Chamber of Commerce in Atlanta, Ga., while Jubal Jackson (nicknamed "Stonewall" by his dad), age 25, earned a chemical engineering degree from Georgia Tech and works as a business manager in Atlanta.