Choo Choo Justice: World War II Navy Phenom: Part II

For His Introduction and Information On

“Football! Navy! War!”: How Military “Lend-Lease” Players Saved the College Game and

Helped Win World War II,

and The Day I Lost President Ford: Memoir of a Born-and-Bred Carolina Tar Heel,

Click Here

With the first Charlie Justice column setting the stage, we’re tempted to dive into the media hyperbole accorded his wartime football days and begin exposing the promised Jeopardy trivia. After all, in my “Football! Navy! War!” book the chapter devoted entirely to him reads, “‘Shifty and Smart, Harder to Stop Than Superman’”: Charlie Justice, Glamor Prodigy.”

See what I mean? All that’s coming.

Justice graduated from Asheville’s Lee H. Edwards High School in 1943. As a single-wing quarterback and halfback, he led them to two undefeated seasons, outscoring opponents 487-7, both times earning All-Southern and All-State honors. Biographer Bob Terrell wrote of his desire to play football by overcoming boyhood physical difficulties and ill health. Justice later said he was destined to play football and be an athlete.

At Edwards, he and Sarah Hunter fell in love. “From that point on Charlie and his loves [football and Sarah] would not be separated,” wrote the Daily Tar Heel. Their 1943 marriage lasted 60 years.

America was at war. Otherwise, Justice would have accepted from among 12 scholarship offers. Drafted instead into the Navy, he headed for Bainbridge Naval Training Center as an 18-year old Seaman 2nd/Class. (His eventual rating was petty officer specialist [physical education instructor] second class, a wartime rating.) He taught physical education and “pushed boots” through recruit training, coincidentally while allowing football time.

*Link to Part I of this series

How’s this for breaking in? Justice and 98 others tried out for the 1943 team. The Commodores’ head coach, Lieutenant (j.g.) Joe Maniaci, had him shagging punts. One he booted back 65 yards wearing only sweat socks. “You kick like that all the time?” “I do it better when I’m wearing football shoes.” Two weeks later he got cleats and made the squad. Maniaci formed his team around well-known names and “a kid by the name of Charlie Justice who was voted the best high school back in the South last year.”

“I went out for football primarily for one reason, to get out of KP,” Justice told historian Ken Rappaport, but knew nothing about the array of professionals with whom he would compete and ultimately play alongside. He was “lost in this forest of talent,” but credited the Navy for bringing him “down to earth.”

Located northeast of Baltimore, Bainbridge opened in 1942 and closed in the 1970s. Maniaci, a Fordham All-America and Chicago Bears and Brooklyn [football] Dodgers running back, coached him both seasons. They played only military teams.

Bainbridge scrimmaged the Washington Redskins. Justice, “shifty Commodore back,” sparkled carrying the ball, intercepting two passes, making four tackles, averaging 5.0 yards per carry, and racing 45 yards for the only Bainbridge score. Hey, nice start.

Two weeks into the season, Football News tabbed Bainbridge a “wonder team.” The backfield: Harvey Johnson (William & Mary), Upan Cheatham (Auburn), Jim Gatewood (Georgia), Bill deCorrevont (Northwestern), and Don Durdan (Oregon State), MVP over Duke in 1942's Durham Rose Bowl game.

Teammates included: Bill Dutton (Pittsburgh All-America), Len Akin (Baylor, Chicago Bears), Win Siegfried (Duke All-America), Dick Kelleher (Cleveland Rams), Red Hickey (Arkansas, Pittsburgh Steelers), Rams), Elwood Gerber (Alabama, Philadelphia Eagles), Carl Mulleneaux (Utah State, Green Bay Packers), Phil Ragazzo (Western Reserve All-America, Rams, Eagles - the only officer), and Buster Ramsey (William & Mary All-America), hailed by popular sportswriter Grantland Rice as “the greatest lineman in college football.”

The Baltimore Sun surmised: “The team is good. Just how good, no one knows. The opposition hasn’t really extended the galaxy of former college and professional football stars. They’re playing for the fun of it. Pre-game tension was completely absent,” different from college football. “Since they were sailors occupied mostly with naval duties, football remained incidental. But there’s no doubt the players took it very seriously.”

The Commodores outscored all seven opponents 313-7, led the nation in three of five categories: passing, total defense, and rushing defense, and were second in total offense. Ranked No. 9 among the nation’s 15 unbeaten and untied teams, they led all teams except Iowa Pre-Flight in the prestigious Williamson military football rankings.

Before 12,000 at Camp Lee, Va., Justice was the “fleet 18-year old speedster” executing “the spectacular run of the day.” While mauling Curtis Bay Coast Guard, “the fleet-footed” guy made “the standout run of the day, bobbing and dancing his way.”

Authors Bob Quincy and Julian Scheer sized up the reaction: “A back with only a high school background had no right to out-point proven pro and college stars.” Yet....

Justice, 5-foot-10 and 170 pounds, caught fire, even if used sparingly. He never started. This smallish, baby faced, teenaged boy, lately of high school, through talent, determination and wise coaching, bolted onto the military football scene and soon became the war’s glamor football prodigy. Put him in, watch him go.

The pros quickly liked the kid citing a “great competitive flair, even and controlled temperament mixed with natural talents,” Terrell wrote. Realizing his place in the pecking order, he soon established himself with coaches and teammates, becoming a media “darling.” Great player, great copy, for his entire football career.

The station newspaper, The Mainsheet, grabbed the media baton. “He didn’t have a big college or pro reputation. He didn’t even have a press book full of clippings, but this high school kid is holding his own with the cream of the crop in the Commodores’ ball-carrying department.” And, they lauded, “You know he’s fast, shifty, and smart. Once he gets past the line of scrimmage, he’s harder to stop than Superman.”

A Mainsheet cartoon called Justice the “school boy destined to be one of the Commodores shining backs. Charlie is a scatback. He runs the 100 in 10 sec.”

The veteran players often freelanced in the huddle because it worked, and told Justice, “do what we say.” Maniaci eventually opened up opportunity, a “battlefield promotion,” and stated, “He’s got everything. He can run, tackle, block, and boot the ball a country mile,” while rotating him effectively. Justice told the Baltimore Sun he thanked the Navy “for his association with ‘such a flock of big boys.’ He confessed to thinking he was out of place when he first joined the team but his success in action and their acceptance had made him much more comfortable.”

Five members, including Justice, won berths on the AP 1943 Mid-Atlantic Service team, all considered brilliant college or pro players except for the “amazing football prodigy fresh out of Asheville (NC) High.” The AP named him Mid-Atlantic Rookie of the Year, but he was unknown nationally. “Justice seems to be the surprise package of ‘43. You’ll hear more of him.” And, “The Guy Doesn’t Do Justice to Himself, Leaving his foes / In clouds of dust is / Asheville’s pride / One Charlie Justice.”

So, how come the nickname Choo Choo? At one game a naval officer watching him reportedly said, “that Justice kid runs just like a choo-choo train.” Sportswriters immediately pounced and it stuck. Another officer said, “Look at that guy run. He looks like a runaway train. We ought to call him choo choo.” No kidding. At UNC, he received mail addressed to “Number 22, Chapel Hill NC,” or “Choo Choo, NC,” and had a street named Justice.

Coincidentally, his father worked for a railroad.

Tar Heel Illustrated introduces our guest columnist, Wilbur D. Jones, Jr., for his series on the World War II playing days of Carolina football immortal Charlie “Choo Choo” Justice, which begins today.

A Wilmington, N. C., native and resident, Jones is military historian and the nationally known award-winning author of 18 books, including seven on WWII. He has written or contributed to hundreds of pieces for the Wilmington StarNews and other periodicals, and leads the 12-year project seeking national designation of Wilmington as the first “American WWII Heritage City.”

He is a former assistant and advance representative to President Gerald Ford, a retired Navy Captain, and served the Department of Defense for 41 years.

He graduated from Carolina in 1955. His newest book, The Day I Lost President Ford: Memoir of a Born-and-Bred Carolina Tar Heel, will be published this summer and contains remembrances playing UNC varsity lacrosse and soccer and as Monogram Club president.

This Justice series is based on his book, “Football! Navy! War!”: How Military ‘Lend-Lease’ Players Saved the College Game and Helped Win World War II (Foreword by ESPN’s Beano Cook). See www.wilburjones.com.

Also, I’m proud to say he’s my father. - Andrew Jones