TIFTON — Sept. 13, 1969 was 55 years ago Friday. The date itself does not seem memorable on the surface. But it was a big day for a group of high school football players at Tift County Stadium and a day that set a mark that still stands.
That day, Tifton’s Wilson High Tigers defeated Appling County Consolidated, 121-0. It is the modern record for margin of victory for Georgia high schools. For a few weeks of 1969, it was also the modern record for points scored.
In 1969, Sept. 13 was a Saturday. That is generally not thought of as a football day for high schools, but it was for Wilson High.
Wilson shared Tift County Stadium — now known as Brodie Field — with Tift County High. It was common for African American high schools sharing stadiums to get a date that wasn’t the popular Friday if the majority-white school played at home that week. On Sept. 12, Tift defeated Ware County at home, 12-0.
The Tigers had always been a good squad. As Tift County Industrial, they won Georgia Interscholastic Association (GIA) state championships in 1950 and 1952. Wilson was state runner-up to Trinity of Decatur in 1965. They also lit up the scoreboard on occasion, with 110 points against Eureka of Ashburn in 1955 and 112 against Liberty County in 1960.
R.L. Mack led the Tigers to their first state title. Arthur Mott took over in 1952 and was head coach at Wilson through the 1969-70 school year, its last as a high school.
Though scores and stats were not as broadcast then, especially for an African American school, the late Garland Ingram said he and Wilson teammates were certainly aware of those marks.
In a 2022 interview, Ingram said his group of Tigers intended to break the record of 112.
Appling County Consolidated offered the best chance of doing that.
Whereas Wilson’s football history was rich, that of the Rams was not.
Not much of Appling Consolidated’s history is known. Not to be confused with the current Appling County High, this school probably started football around 1961. Records of the Rams’ games are scarce. No wins have ever surfaced in newspaper archives and that of only one tie, in 1968. The four known games from 1969 were probably around half of what they actually played.
So, how does a team get to 121 points in 48 minutes? With a lot of offense and a lot of defense. Wilson had both against Appling.
The write-up said the Tigers recovered 15 fumbles and blocked three punts while accumulating 1,033 yards of offense, 793 on the ground and 240 more through the air.
It was 37-0 after the first quarter and 67-0 at halftime. The Tigers were nearly to 100, at 97 points, after three periods.
“We just broke them down from the beginning,” said Ingram. “They couldn’t hold on to the ball.”
The scoring summary reads like a novella:
1st
– (W) Richard Ross, 8 run (Garland Ingram kick)
– (W) Henry Earl Williams, 40 pass from Ingram (Ronald Dixon run)
– (W) Emery Bridgers recovers blocked punt in end zone (Andrew Foster run)
– (W) Dixon, 10 run (PAT failed)
– (W) Reginald Denson, 20 pass from Ingram (Ingram run)
2nd
– (W) Ingram, 15 pass from Ross (Ingram run)
– (W) Foster, 1 run (Foster run)
– (W) Neal Hester, 20 pass from Ingram (Hester pass from Ingram)
– (W) Foster, 22 pass from Ingram (PAT failed)
3rd
– (W) Ingram, 55 run (Dixon run)
– (W) Foster, 20 run (Foster run)
– (W) Foster, 10 run (Foster run)
– (W) Willie Brooks, 8 run (PAT failed)
4th
– (W) Ingram, 10 run (Williams run)
– (W) Dixon, 25 run (Williams run)
– (W) Williams, 30 run (Williams run)
Andrew Foster ran 22 times for 227 yards. Garland Ingram ran six times for 146 and was 10-of-10 passing for 146 more. Neal Hester rushed six times for 130 yards and Ronald Dixon was 12 for 101 on the ground.
Not surprisingly, Wilson was a GIA power in 1969. The Appling win was the second of a string of six victories to open the season. The number likely would have been higher but Howard of Monticello, Florida, canceled on the Tigers. Ingram said news of the 121-0 score made it across the state line and Howard wanted nothing to do with them.
The wins were not all blowouts. Liberty County (not to be confused with the current school of that name) was only a 24-18 win. Wilson beat Ralph Bunch of Woodbine, 16-8. Both were tough opponents. Liberty received funding from Fort Stewart, Ingram recalled in 2022. Pulpwood, rather than the military, was the main industry surrounding those at Ralph Bunche in the era.
Wilson’s Tigers did get to flash their might at Northside of Jesup, however. The 50-14 game saw Ingram credited with 285 receiving yards on a mere six catches while running for 304 on nine carries. Somehow, Ingram only scored three times.
The only blemish during the regular season was to Risley of Brunswick, 22-14.
The GIA’s playoff system pitted Wilson against Moultrie’s William Bryant for the region championship. The Tigers won, 17-14, the three-point differential because of the old penetration tiebreaker rule.
Wilson defeated R.L. Norris of Thomson in the semifinals, 16-2, advancing them to the state championship game against Houston County Training. Ingram still wasn’t sure what happened that night in Perry, but Houston won the AA title, 14-0.
The 1969 season was the last for the GIA. The number of students attending majority-white high schools rose with Freedom of Choice. The federal government pressured school systems to raise the rate of integration each year, leading to lower numbers of players available at the historic Black schools.
In additional, several GIA high schools either closed or joined the GHSA as membership had been offered to them in 1966. Both Valdosta’s Pinevale and Westside high schools closed in 1969. Black high schools in Macon, Atlanta, Savannah, Columbus and Athens were all among those playing in the GHSA.
In November 1969, the GIA quietly let its schools know that this would be its last season. A few, including Risley and William Bryant put in applications to join the GHSA. More would have followed, but the federal government ordered the end of the dual system in January 1970. Wilson was among the vast majority of remaining GIA schools to close as high schools at the end of the 1969-70 year. Neither Risley nor William Bryant ever competed as GHSA schools.
Wilson’s points scored record stood for less than a month, topped by the 126 scored by Quitman’s Washington Street High against Washington of Blakely. Washington scored 14, allowing Wilson to retain the margin of victory lead.
The Georgia High School Association began organizing football at a statewide level in 1948. No team has ever scored 100 points. With modern mercy rules, it is unlikely that one ever will now.
In the GIA, high-scoring games happened occasionally. No mercy rules and sometimes a huge disparity in talent and funding, even within the same classifications. GIA records are not complete and never will be, but Wilson possibly broke a record set by Washington Street in 1966, when it ran up 119 points against Holley of Sylvester. Washington Street also had a 116-point game in 1968.