This column is exclusively for Beaverdam High School alumni. Tracy Steele provided The Icon with a copy of the Winter 2011 "Tattler." It's the newsletter of the Toledo Woodward High School Hall of Fame Association.
What does this have to do with Beaverdam? Keep reading. On April 9 the 29th annual induction celebration of Woodward's Hall of Fame takes place. One of the inductees is Lou Meszaros (posthumous), who was a science teacher and football coach at Woodward.
Here's the Beaverdam connection: Graduating from Holbrook College, "Little Lou," as he was affectionately known, started his coaching career at Beaverdam High School as head basketball coach.
He coached at Beaverdam for five seasons, then switched from basketball to football. He landed a football coaching job at Delta High School where he had a 46-6-3 record. From there he went to Whitmer (14-4) and went to Waite High School for three seasons. His 1956 team won the Toledo City League title.
After a year off Lou returned to coaching in 1958 at Woodward. Known for years as the doormat of the City League and eventually dropped from the league, Lou brought Woodward back into the fold by winning more games in 10 seaons than Woodward had won in its past 33 years of competition.
Lou became known as "Woodward Football." With a master's degree in education, earned while at Woodward, Lou was inducted into the Ohio High School Football Coaches' Hall of Fame with a career accomplishment of 109-80-8.
Other inductees this year are Jim Leininger, 1963; Roosevelt Grant, 1972; Judith Dr. Anne Babka Furlong, 1973; Francella Washington, 1976; and Jeanne Cranon Fuqua, 1977.
