Special to The Times
Six sports standouts, along with one of the community’s legendary football teams, will be enshrined at the 2024 Pierce County Sports Hall of Fame induction ceremony this month.
R.C. Cunningham, Paula Edwards LaCount, Bobbi Williams Johnson, Jimmy Bowen, Troy Mattox and Robert Williams will all formally be declared among Pierce County’s all-time sports royalty. The 1960 Patterson High football team will also be inducted.
The ceremony is set for Saturday, November 23 at the Okefenokee Country Club. Doors will open at 6 p.m., with a full-course dinner served at 6:30 p.m. The induction program begins at approximately 7 p.m.
Tickets, which are still available, are $30 per person and include dinner. Contact
to reserve your ticket.
“Another deserving class will be enshrined and some of these folks have been waiting a long time,” said John DuPont, one of the Pierce County Sports Hall of Fame’s directors. “We’re extremely happy to see them have their day.”
The Class of 2024 will expand membership to 48 individuals and nine teams. This is the eighth induction ceremony for the Pierce County Sports Hall of Fame since its inception in 2017.
Cunningham served as head football coach at Patterson High School for three seasons (1960 through 1962), leading the Eagles to the 1960 Region 1B crown. Directing the Eagles to the South Georgia championship game (lost 1413 on penetration to Jenkins County in Millen), he was named Region 1-B Coach of the Year.
Cunningham compiled an overall record of 19-12 as the Eagles’ head coach, making him the fourth-winningest coach in PHS history. He later served as a radio commentator, covering high school football for many years in Pierce County.
Patterson went 11-1 in 1960 winning the Region 1-B title 1-0 on penetration at home vs. Turner County. The Eagles became the first football team in county history to attain a ranking of No. 1 in both the Atlanta Constitution and Atlanta Journal after a 6-0 start.
The regular-season roster featured 26 players, several of whom are slated to attend the induction banquet.
LaCount, then known as Paula Edwards, was a basketball and track standout at Patterson High whose highlights include a 48-point game. A twotime MVP for PHS basketball, she received Class A all-state (honorable mention) honors, averaging 28 points per game as a senior.
As a track athlete, she helped lead the PHS 440-relay team to a region title, later placing at the state meet. She was named to the 1978-79 High School All-American Honor Program for Athletes.
Mrs. Johnson was a standout athlete at Lee Street High School, where she played basketball all four years under legendary coach and fellow Hall of Famer Thomas Miller and served as the Hornettes’ captain. She graduated from Lee Street as valedictorian in 1954.
Mrs. Johnson’s teaching and coaching career - which began in Pierce County - ultimately carried her to Talbotton and Hazlehurst, as well as Yorktown, Va., before returning home to Pierce County. Mrs. Johnson’s civic endeavors in the years since have included service at the Lee Street Resource Center, where her preservation efforts for the school’s archives have proven invaluable to entities such as the Pierce County Sports Hall of Fame.
Bowen led Blackshear High School in rushing with 1,273 yards in 1961 and scored 137 of the team’s 256 points. That season saw the Tigers post an 8-3 ledger and attain a No. 8 ranking in the state polls. Bowen helped lead his team to a 6-0 sub-region mark and the 1-B East crown before bowing 26-7 to Blakely-Union in the playoffs. He was named the Region 1-B Player of the Year and was a Class B First Team allstate selection by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Bowen signed a letter of intent to play football at the University of Georgia, but eventually played at Lenoir-Rhyne.
Mattox originally began his broadcasting career while still in high school. He was a co-owner of WKUB 105.1 when it signed on locally in 1979.
Mattox eventually became the station’s sole owner and later added two additional FM stations - 97.7 WWUF and 107.1 WSGT to the fold, all of which broadcast local, state and national sports. He served as play-by-play voice of the PCHS Bears from 1981-83, with Cunningham as his color commentator. In 2017, Mattox was inducted into the Georgia Association of Broadcasters Hall of Fame.
Williams, a native of Effingham County, purchased The Blackshear Times in 1970 at age 20. Having served as sports information director at Georgia Southern, his ties to the sports world helped engender a strong, rural base in his newly-adopted home of Pierce County. During Williams’ five decades of ownership, The Times established a standard for coverage of local sports, winning numerous awards through the years. Beginning with Williams’ tenure as publisher, The Blackshear Times has served as the official archive for the Pierce County Sports Hall of Fame.
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