INDIATLANTIC, Fla. – John Tuttle, who started a 40-year career in education in Ashland schools and was an assistant football coach for the Tomcats from 1975 to 1979, had a stadium in Florida named in his memory earlier this month.
Tuttle, who died at the age of 76 in July, had the Heritage High School football stadium renamed Tuttle Stadium at a ceremony earlier this month. His education career spanned more than four decades in Kentucky and Florida.
As a young man in his early 20s, Tuttle’s 40-year education journey started in the Ashland Independent School System. He coached football for seven years in the Ashland system, starting at Putnam Jr. High and advancing to the high school level in 1975 when the Tomcats beloved JAWS team went 14-1. He also was on the staff in 1976 during a 9-3 season and stayed on when Mike Holtzapfel took over the head coaching reins at Ashland from 1977-79.
He was also a highly respected high school basketball referee in Kentucky, many times partnering with Bill Burch.
John Tuttle is behind Coach Herb Conley who is giving the play to fullback Jim Johnson in 1975.
Tuttle was one of three assistant coaches during Herb Conley’s last two seasons at Ashland in 1975 and 1976. The other assistants were Bill Tom Ross and Holtzapfel.
Tuttle helped design and build Heritage High School in Florida, where he was principal when the first graduating class went through. He served in that role from 2009 to 2012.
Tuttle’s legacy is tied to Heritage Stadium, which serves as a symbol of his impact on education and athletics. His career was marked by dedication to student success, leadership in school administration and a passion for sports, making the stadium a fitting tribute to his contributions to the community.
If you are visiting Heritage Stadium, you can see it as a lasting monument to John Wayne Tuttle’s work in building and leading schools, as well as his role in shaping the athletic and academic environment for generations of students.
Before leading Heritage High School, he coached football, baseball and golf at Palm Bay High School, leading his 1985 baseball team to the state championship. He later served as Assistant Principal at Cocoa Beach High, Principal at Mila Elementary, Southwest Middle School and Bayside High.
The family of John Tuttle celebrated the renaming of Heritage Stadium to Tuttle Stadium earlier this month in Florida.
Brevard Public Schools officially dedicated the Heritage High School football stadium as Tuttle Stadium to honor his foundational leadership and impact.
Tuttle kept officiating basketball and appeared in several Florida state championship games as referee. Also, an avid golfer, he could shoot his age and shared a hole-in-one plaque with his son, Lance, and grandson, Cole, at Spessard Holland Golf Course.
He was from Winchester, Ky., and was married to his high school sweetheart, Karlene, for 55 years. Tuttle is survived by his wife and son and 10 grandchildren.
Tuttle was lured to Florida by friend John Thomas, a former star baseball player at Ashland, in 1980. Thomas was coaching in Florida and Tuttle followed him there to coach football and baseball at Palm Bay High.
He was also an assistant principal at Cocoa Beach High School and was a principal at Mila Elementary, Southwest Middle School and Bayside High. He was instrumental in designing Heritage High School before retiring after four decades in education.
Tuttle kept officiating basketball and appeared in several Florida state championship games as referee. Also, an avid golfer, he could shoot his age and share a hole-in-one plaque with his son, Lance, and grandson, Cole, at Spessard Holland Golf Course.
He was from Winchester, Ky., and was married to his high school sweetheart, Karlene, for 55 years. Tuttle is survived by his wife and son and 10 grandchildren.
Ashand’s 1975 coaching staff: Bill Tom Ross, Mike Holtzapfel, Herb Conley, John Tuttle.
One of the area’s best storytellers has penned another informative tale about 11 players who have stood the test of time, and one of the most cherished rosters in the rich Ashland football history.
Mark Maynard, former editor and longtime sportswriter for The Daily Independent and current managing editor of Kentucky Today, releases a new book next month titled “The Boys They Called JAWS.”
It’s a deeper, more detailed story about a beloved Tomcats team, a fierce defense and an unforgettable season.
Maynard believes a book can offer more than a well-crafted article or feature. The pages offer a rousing chance to reminisce and relive memories still talked about today.
“It’s not news, it’s reacting to something that’s happened,” Maynard said. “I think it’s important to give some of the background that people don’t know. I’ve only written one fiction book. Everything else has been about things people may already know, and generally they know that Ashland’s 1975 team was called JAWS. Why were they called JAWS? Not everybody knows that, and it has some other neat things that happened during that time.”
Maynard graduated from Ashland in 1975 and became great friends with many on the vaunted Ashland defense that dominated the gridiron the following fall. The Tomcats would win 14 games that season, tied for the most with the 1990 state champions.
The 1975 Cats earned the at-large state championship. Due to unfortunate timing, a thrilling road playoff win at Paducah did not come with a Class 3A title. In February of that year, the Board of Control for the Kentucky High School Athletic Association met and implemented a four-class system for football. The champion from the Louisville area would meet the at-large champion in a winner-take-all scenario.
It was the first season in which any Louisville school played a team from outside Jefferson County for a state title.
St. Xavier, a private school, wore down the Tomcats in the second half on its home field, using a massive roster and constant substitutions on both offense and defense. Ashland gave the Tigers their toughest test of the season. The Tomcats only trailed 6-0 at halftime before falling for the only time that year, 20-0.
“I grew up with those guys,” Maynard said. “I knew many of them very well. I have written a ton about them throughout my time at The Daily Independent. I interviewed (former coach) Herb Conley in podcasts, and I have a lot of fresh quotes from him that people have never heard. I went back and got more information from the newspapers and writers who covered them at the time.
“They know what happened, but people may not know everything about them,” he added. “I hope that they will pick this book up and go through it and see what an amazing season that was and how good they were.”
The JAWS nickname originated after Conley and family attended the famous JAWS movie over a summer vacation. Ashland was enjoying one of its most successful stretches during Conley’s tenure, and a defining description of his defense could add extra motivation and reignite the physicality of a team that didn’t make the playoffs the previous year.
“Herb knew they could be really good,” Maynard recalled. “The other coaches were into it. They talked to the team and told them they were thinking about it. The team wanted to do it. Of course, 18-year-olds would want that nickname. Herb told them that they need to live up to it. If you do this, you need to live up to it. They proved it early in the season. They didn’t give them the name until they upset No. 1 Bryan Station in the second week of the season. They did it with defense. After that, it took off. They just annihilated people. The offense was good too. It wasn’t solely built on defense.”
Maynard said the personal connection to the team was the main reason he wrote the book. He also knew the team’s connection to the community. The players bleed maroon. They grew up on their streets. They were friends with their kids. They called Ashland home.
“The team holds special memories for me,” Maynard said. “They were a bunch of fun guys. They weren’t prima donnas or anything like that at all. They were respected. They were all Ashland kids. There were no recruits or transfers that came in to help them. They were Ashland kids, and that made it more special. It’s why the community wrapped their arms around them. They loved them. They had the band play the JAWS theme when the defense came on the field. The place was packed every Friday night.”
The postseason included a long cross-state trip to Paducah for the at-large state championship. It would be a six-hour bus ride, but the town had other plans. The community raised money for a Southern Airways flight so they could arrive for the biggest game of the season in just 60 minutes.
Maynard has many of these stories inside the new book. It speaks highly of a group and a team that people are still talking about them a half century later.
“This team did a lot of firsts,” Maynard said. “It was a fun book to write, and it was fun to revisit those games again. I had been planning to write this book for 10 years. The team was adored in Ashland.
“I have thought so much about this book for so many years that the words just came out,” he added. “ I knew the games, and I knew what had happened. We have stats in the back of the book. The cover has the iconic picture of that team. I really enjoyed writing it. I have written so many stories, but books have a different excitement. You try to make it as perfect as can be.”
“The Boys They Call JAWS” will be released in late September. Readers can preorder a softback or hardback edition of the book.
Gary Wright was an accomplished man, although his humble nature kept many people from fully realizing just how much he had achieved.
He was a tremendous businessman and entrepreneur who, after obtaining his master’s degree from Xavier University in Cincinnati, established the Southwestern College of Business in the Cincinnati area. By the time he retired to St. Pete Beach, Florida, in 2004, the college had grown to five locations.
Gary was successful in family life, too. He was married to Jean for 54 years and cared deeply for his daughters, Christine and Holly. Family was of utmost importance to him.
He was also a two-sport star at Ashland High School, starting at second base as a freshman in 1957 through the 1960 spring season. He would walk from Coles Junior High to practice during an era when it was unheard of for freshman to even make the varsity team. Most sophomores never saw a spot on a varsity roster. Gary was invited to try out because he was that good.
Gary Wright, a former Ashland Tomcat baseball and basketball star, started the CP-1 movement with a donation to renovate the big diamond at Central Park in 2008. Through his generosity, hundreds were able to relive their baseball memories.
And then there was basketball. He played two years and helped coach Bob Wright’s first team at Ashland in 1960 win the 16th Region title and earn a berth in the Sweet Sixteen, where a first-round loss to Maysville ended the campaign. His teammates included Larry Conley, Harold Sargent, Gene Smith and the other stars from the 1961 state championship team.
He was instrumental in getting them to the Sweet Sixteen in 1960, scoring double figures in four of his final seven games and making the All-District team.
The two-sport athlete was good enough to earn a scholarship to Centre College, where he played both sports for four years while earning his undergraduate degree. Gary’s love of sports was paying off handsomely.
Among Gary’s many attributes was his love of family, friends and teammates. He also loved growing up in Ashland with his brothers, Robert and Tony, and with a mother (Geneva) and father (T.R.) who did what they could to help their boys succeed. All three brothers were good athletes, and that upbringing helped set Gary on a path that would serve him well.
He cherished his days in Ashland during the 1950s. Like many boys of that time, Central Park was his playground, a place where all worries went away, where skills were learned and then showcased on the big diamond they called CP-1. His father knew how important it was to get boys started young, putting together Pony League teams, taking them all over to play. He had a hand in bringing Babe Ruth baseball and American Legion baseball to town.
T.R. Wright coached his son — and many other boys — during the 1950s and helped lay the groundwork for a tremendous youth baseball program that brought state and even national acclaim to Ashland. He did it on the fields at Central Park, and the cathedral of them all was CP-1. It was called that because of the newspaper. When they ran the list of schedules for the week, they listed the fields as CP-1 and CP-2, which was later mostly used for softball and now soccer.
With Gary’s career established and retirement just beginning, he returned to Ashland in 2008 and visited that big diamond again. He ran onto the field, breathed in the air, ran his fingers through the sand, and the memories of those good days flooded his mind. He could picture scooping up the grounder – and a handful of sand – or delivering the game-winning hit with the crack of bat – not the ping we hear now. He could see how pleased his father was with all the boys as they practiced what he had preached.
Gary was overwhelmed by the emotions that came from his visit, and in true Gary Wright fashion, he did something about it. The field was badly in need of renovation, but talk wasn’t going to make that happen. He put $125,000 behind a renovation project that included a new press box named in his father’s honor.
That same day, when Gary visited his old playing grounds, he ran into his friend David Carter, who had similar experiences at CP-1. Together, they began what was coined the “CP-1 Movement,” and boy, did it ever move.
There were annual reunions for former players, coaches, umpires and fans who remembered playing on that diamond.
Carter, an entrepreneur himself, had the vision for a documentary. He put together “Ashland’s Field of Dreams,” and it aired on KET. It was so well done that it continues to air every year. Interviews with people who played at the park brought out raw emotion, and Carter, who passed away a couple of years ago, captured it brilliantly.
The reunions eventually evolved into the CP-1 Hall of Fame. That is when I became intimately involved, spearheading the event from 2015 through 2024, when 101 former players, coaches, umpires and one sportswriter were recognized each August.
It became a summer event that everybody looked forward to — a time for the reunion of teams and the reliving of days gone by. Treasured memories spilled out around that field again. There were tales of long home runs, bad hops in the sandy infield and the short right-field fence that gave us some cheap home runs.
You could almost see the kid come out in these men who may have played there decades earlier.
It never would have happened without Gary Wright’s compassion for what he had experienced there and his wildly generous donation that helped turn what had become a rundown baseball field into a showcase. When the old players came home, they could not believe their eyes.
This wasn’t the first time Gary’s generosity brought joy through baseball. His name adorns the baseball field at Centre College to this day.
But Gary was much more than a generous and kind man. He gave of himself — not just his money — to projects he cared deeply about helping. When I told him about a Christian ministry called Amy for Africa that was educating children in Uganda, he sent a large donation. Nobody asked him for it.
He simply wanted to make an impact wherever he could, and he had a soft spot for children.
You only get so many chances in life to make a difference, and it’s not always about finances. If you counted Gary Wright as a friend — and anybody who ever met him did — consider yourself fortunate.
His life had the kind of meaning everybody chases. He modeled a compassionate life in every way. How could he make his hometown — and, for that matter, the world — better? He did it with action, with thought and with confidence.
What he did by starting the CP-1 Movement brought joy to countless people. He stirred an abundance of memories and gave those who often thought they had been forgotten one more chance to be in the spotlight.
But not once did he want that spotlight on himself.
It was never about him.
It was always about others.
I loved calling him and talking about how the latest class of the CP-1 Hall of Fame reacted to the celebration — how some were overcome with emotion, choking back tears while giving their induction speeches.
“Chills!” he would say to me.
Gary died on August 20 at the age of 84 after a courageous battle with Parkinson’s. There will be no memorial service, per his wishes.
Gary Wright stayed humble to the end, but his impact will not be forgotten.
Rick Sang and I took a deeper dive on the photograph of Terry Fish’s reported 47-yard field goal in 1974 for the Ashland Tomcats.
If you look at the photo, the 40-yard marker painted on the wall is clearly shown behind the Bryan Station bench. So, it was probably kicked from about the 44. Greg Estep’s hold looks to be on or about that spot. BUT the reported distance doesn’t account for the extra 10 yards from the goal line to the back of the end zone. That would make it a 54-yard field goal, which would have been a state record and still would rank sixth all-time in Kentucky high school football history.
A newspaper story about the game reveals the line of scrimmage was the 32 and then there was a 5-yard penalty on the Tomcats pushing it back to the 37. The standard from the snap to holder is seven yards, putting the hold on the 44, and the photograph shows that to be true.
My best guess is that the ball was on the 37 and they added 10 yards for the goal line-to-end zone distance to make it a 47-yard kick. But that’s now how it should have been scored. Ten yards is added from the point of the kick, not the line of scrimmage, making it a 54-yard kick.
The photo also shows the perfect technique on display. His kick made it 3-0 and Wendell Fugitt returned a fumble for a touchdown for a 9-0 lead. The extra point was blocked, which again shows you how much had to go right for Fish to boom a field goal of that distance. It took a perfect snap, perfect hold, perfect blocking and perfect kick.
And if he kicked it from the 44, which sure looks like happened, it was a 54-yard kick. He would have had the record until 2004 when Taylor Long kicked a 55-yard field goal for Christian County. That would mean Fish had the state record for 30 years before it would have been broken. But it was never recognized as such.
Schools must turn in a verified account of records for the KHSAA to consider them. Ashland apparently did not do that – or even think to do it – in 1974. I’m not even sure when the KHSAA began accepting records to be quite honest.
Tyler Pack of Johnson Central holds the state record of a 60-yard field goal. It was interesting because it came on a free kick in a game the Golden Eagles’ won easily. On a punt or kickoff, you can make a fair catch, and the coach can send out the kicker for a free kick from that spot. No rush from the opponents; just tee it up and kick. It usually happens with not much time remaining in a quarter, half or game. A missed kick can be returned, and the opponent takes possession if the kick is missed. (Note to coaches: It’s an interesting play to consider if you have a good kicker and if you have somebody who can fair catch a ball on the opponents’ side of the field).
Pack also had a 58-yard field goal and his 89-yard punt is also a state record. He had some kind of leg.
Aaron Pettrey of Raceland had field goals of 58 yards in 2003 and 52 in 2002. He went on to kick for Ohio State and had a cameo with the Cincinnati Bengals.
But Terry Fish’s long kick between the uprights on scoreboard side of the field in a 9-6 win over Bryan Station at Putnam Stadium remains the Tomcat record, but belongs in the state record book as well.
I’m sure he would been proud to own the state record for so long.
MARK MY WORDS 2 