GIA's 'Ghosts' brought to life in documentary

Jun. 18—"As If We Were Ghosts" debuted on Georgia Public Broadcasting Monday night. I hope it's only the beginning. There are so many stories to tell.

The documentary replays Sunday on GPB at 5 p.m. It is also available at asifwewereghosts.tv, which also has extra interview content.

My own appearance was brief, a little snippet talking about the quest to find missing champions. The original list, as appearing in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution in 2002, was very limited. Football had Class AA filled in, but little of anything else. I was already a bit of a microfilm enthusiast at that point. Finding a few of the winners and the good fortune of having few obligations, that set me up perfectly to go looking for more.

I said it took about eight years to find all the football champions. That was good luck. I lived in Athens in 2010 and the University of Georgia has a newspaper microfilm collection that spans an industrial basement. Football was easy enough, really. It only took eight years to complete that list. Twelve years of periodical research later, basketball still has crucial areas missing. In two of those years, we know which two teams played for the title, but not who won.

The best parts of "As If We Were Ghosts" were the interactions. Edith McGuire and Wyomia Tyus, Herb White and Leadus Bankston. The 1969 Houston High team who won the final GIA football title (over Wilson).

Kelly Dawsey, a member of that team, paid tribute to his coach, the late Elijah Weatherspoon. In retrospect, Dawsey realizes Houston wasn't the most talented team in the state, but Weatherspoon would not let them be second best.

"He put that team together," said Dawsey. He told some of his teammates at a table, "Nobody can ever take that away from you."

Weatherspoon probably knew that was their last shot at a GIA title. It was not mentioned in "As If We Were Ghosts," but the league had already informed coaches it would be shutting down in 1970.

Freedom of Choice and desegregation orders had chipped away badly in the last two years of the league. Then, as always, major metro schools were the largest in the GHSA. At this point of the GIA, schools located in Vienna and Darien were among the GIA's largest.

White's segment with Bankston had been one of the documentary's inspirations. White, who played at all-white Decatur, came to realize through these high school recreation department shootarounds that his Black compadres weren't receiving the same recognition.

The film mixed hometown heroes with those who made it even bigger. It was nice to see Miller Lee Rush standing outside the sign in Americus honoring his commitment to youth athletics. It was also wonderful to see Otis Sistrunk pay tribute to his high school coach Odis Spencer, who, appropriately enough, coached at Columbus' Spencer High.

Also poignant was the segment with Charles Freeman, whose high school home court in Eatonton was dirt.

There are many, many, many more stories to be told, about sports, about the bands, about the community spirit and the challenges. I'm hoping it inspires people around the state to look into their local history and learn a little bit about the heritage that shapes us.