As a youngster growing up in Abbeville, Curt Barnes had plenty of family around him.
One, in particular, inspired him so much he followed the relative in a coaching path.
“I idolized my uncle (David Barnes) who came back to coach at Abbeville,” Barnes said. “About the fourth-fifth grade, I said I wanted to be a coach. It didn’t change.”
Curt Barnes would coach for 22 years at seven Wiregrass schools from 1973-95 before serving eight years as an assistant principal at Rehobeth then retiring after the 2002-03 academic year. He also spent 18 years as the softball supervisor for the city of Dothan.
Barnes also had a solid high school career as a three-sport athlete at Abbeville High School in football, basketball and baseball. As a senior, he earned honorable mention All-State in football and was also named to the Wiregrass Athletic Conference team in the sport.
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His work mostly as a coach, but also as an athlete and administrator, has helped him earn a spot in the Wiregrass Sports Hall of Fame. Barnes, along with five others, will be inducted in the hall’s 27th class on Saturday night.
He will become the fourth family member to be inducted, following his uncle David (1999), a cousin (Ronnie Joe Barnes, 2012) and sister-in-law Debbie Barnes (2018).
“It is quite an honor,” Barnes said. “When you come from an athletic family – and some of the people who are in there were very influential on my career -- to follow them is just a great honor. Being the fourth (family) member to be inducted into the Wiregrass Sports Hall of Fame is great.”
Barnes, though, was quick to credit the players he coached for his induction.
“I think it is a tribute to the young men and women that I had an opportunity to coach because they did the work,” Barnes said. “I was just there to help guide them.”
After attending Abbeville and Troy State, Barnes began his coaching career at his high school alma mater in 1973, leading the baseball team. After four years, he moved to Headland where he was an assistant football and junior high basketball coach for one season. He then led Slocomb’s baseball and boys basketball teams for three seasons.
The next two years (1981-83), he guided Houston Academy’s football and basketball teams before coaching the Ashford girls basketball team for two years (1983-85). While at Ashford, he directed a state runner-up team.
Barnes became head football, baseball and girls basketball coach at Wickburg for the 1985-86 academic year before finishing his coaching with nine years at Rehobeth, which included leading the football (3 years, 1989-91 seasons) and baseball programs.
In the fall of 1995, he became an assistant principal at Rehobeth, a role he held until the spring of 2003.
For Barnes, his athletic roots can be traced back to family.
“I had seven cousins that lived near me – not all of them were boys, but that didn’t make any difference either. We would play pickup basketball, pickup baseball,” Barnes said. “Even if we had only four, we would play two-on-two (basketball). It was always competitive. It was cousins against cousins.
“We were always taught that if it was worth playing, it was worth doing right and trying to win.”
Athletics were always a major part of his family’s history.
“My granddaddy had a farm and even if it was gathering season, if any of the kids were playing, he would shut everything down and everybody went to the ball game,” Barnes said. “It was a family supported activity.”
Barnes said football was always his favorite sport – both as a youngster and in coaching.
“Football was always my first love,” Barnes said. “You notice all the schools I coached, football was included in all of them. That is what I always wanted to coach. That is the reason I moved so much because I always wanted to be a head football coach.”
During his football coaching days, he guided Wicksburg to a 10-2 record and to the third round of the state playoffs in 1985. He also led Rehobeth to a 5-5 season in 1990.
His biggest success, though, came coaching girls basketball.
“When I was told I was going to coach girls basketball at Ashford, I thought, ‘Man, why am I being punished?” Barnes said. “But it turned out to be one of the greatest achievements of my career.
“We took a group of girls who didn’t really know anything about basketball except they loved to play and we went all the way to the state finals (lost to Deshler, 52-42).”
In fact, Barnes said that experience actually was good for his career.
“Coaching girls basketball actually made me a better coach because you learn not to take anything for granted. You teach them everything and they were eager to learn everything.”
Another coaching highlight for Barnes came during the 1979-80 basketball season at Slocomb.
“We were in the same area with Headland and Abbeville,” Barnes said. “Abbeville was like 30-1 and we played them in the first game of the area tournament and went to a four-corner stall to start with and actually beat them. Then we came back and beat Headland in the area finals to win the area tournament. We had only five kids that actually played.”
The other major coaching aspect Barnes was proud of was helping build up Rehobeth’s baseball program in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
“We were playing our games at Pitman Field in Dothan because we didn’t have a home field,” Barnes said. “When I was there, we built our field (in Rehobeth) and built our program.
“I remember the first year, we didn’t have nine matching uniforms. We had to have the team raise money to buy the uniforms. When I left, we had 40 matching uniforms, a baseball field and been in the state playoffs 10-11 years in a row. They are still building on that today.”
After coaching, he became Rehobeth’s assistant principal before retiring. It was a decision that was good and bad, said Barnes.
“The worst mistake I made was moving into administration, but it was also the best thing I ever did because I am getting paid in my retirement based off my administration,” Barnes said. “But I hated that you lose a lot of contacts with the kids as you deal more with the parents than the kids in administration.”
Though not a major financial means of employment, Barnes said he enjoyed coaching.
“When I started teaching in 1973, I coached football, basketball and baseball and taught six periods a day – you didn’t have a planning period back then – and I made $7,200 a year. That was about $600 a month. I thought I was rich,” Barnes said.
“I didn’t coach for the money, though. I kept up with it one year and it came out to less than 25 cents an hour (for the amount of time you put into it). I was doing it for the love of the kids and love of the game. It was something I always wanted to do and something that I always enjoyed.”