ROBERT JAMES "RAB" CURRIE
(Elected 1967)

When one thinks of football in the Mid-Mon Valley, Rab Currie's name is synonymous with the game. In 36 seasons as head coach Monessen and Charleroi, his teams won 212 games, lost 106, and tied 10. His record is embellished by winning the conference championship outright five times (195156-57-59-62) and sharing it four times (1949-55-58-70).

Before becoming head football coach at Charleroi in 1947, Currie spent four years from 1943 to 1946 at Monessen High, where his teams posted a 289-1 record for a 74% winning average. At Charleroi, Rab's Cougars won 184, lost 97 and tied 9 for a winning percentage of 64%.

Currie proved his grit and coaching prowess in 1962, when he guided the Charleroi Cougars, with his right leg and torso encased in plaster of paris due to a car-truck accident. Despite a four-month hospital ordeal and a shattered hip, he led the Cougars to an 8-1-1 record and the conference title. He succeeded amazingly again in 1973 when the Cougars finished 5-4-0 after the entire 1972 season was wiped out by nine forfeits due to a prolonged teacher strike.

Currie's remarkable record is ennanced by the fact that he did not experience a losing season from 1943 when he began his head coaching career until 1971, when his Cougars finished 2-61 during a rebuilding year. His winning season streak was marred only in 1947, 1948, 1960, and 1965 when the Cougars posted identical 5-5-0 records.

Currie coached Charleroi teams that reached the Class AA WPIAL title playoffs twice. His 1956 outfit, led by Myron "Mo" Pottios who later starred at Notre Dame and for the Steelers, Rams, and Redskins in the NFL, lost to Jeannette 16-13 on a field goal by Jim Burzio in the final four seconds. In 1959, the Cougars upset Carl Aschman's heavily-favored Aliquippa 13-12 at Pitt Stadium. He was the first coach in the WPIAL to win over 200 games. He was named "Coach of the Year" in 1962 and 1977. He retired from coaching after the 1977 season.

Currie himself was an all-time great player in football and basketball at Monessen High School before he graduated in 1930. At Waynesburg College, Rab played for coach Frank Wolf. As a halfback, he scored the Yellowjackets' touchdown in a 6-0 win over Penn State. In 1935, he received a B.S. degree in secondary education in biology. He began teaching in the Monessen School District in 1937, becoming an assistant football coach under his previous high school coach Preston A. Ditty. Currie also served under Frank McKosky (1938-39-40) and Johnny Reed (1941-42).

Currie coached basketball on an interim basis at Monessen during World War II, winning a Mon Valley Section title in 1943. He also coached the floor sport at Charleroi, where his teams posted a 101-39 record and captured three sectional titles in six seasons (1948-53). At Charleroi, Currie also performed duties as athletic director and recreation coordinator.

Born on November 3, 1912, Rab was the son of Mr. and Mrs. James J. Currie. He died on December 28, 1996. Currie was wed to the former Mary Mildred "Sunny" Banks, his college sweetheart since 1937. They had two children. His nickname "Rab" came from his delivering baked goods as a youth with a Jewish Rabbi.