Remembering Mr. Gallagher

Editor's note: Longtime Storey County educator Hugh Gallagher, 85, died Tuesday.

Gallagher grew up on the Comstock, where he played basketball and where he devoted the better part of four decades to education as teacher, coach and administrator. Today, Hugh Gallagher Elementary School on South D Street stands as a tribute to the man who has meant so much to so many. This article first ran on June 30, 2002. The Nevada Appeal is running it again as a tribute to Gallagher.

Call him what you want ... educator ... basketball coach ... respected friend. In Virginia City, a community that glitters with history, Hugh Gallagher is a man who has risen to mythical proportions in his own lifetime.

Just ask longtime residents who grew up and went to school in Virginia City. They simply call him Mr. Gallagher.

At any given time until his retirement in 1979, Gallagher could be seen performing duties as superintendent, principal, coach, secretary, even janitor.

"He wore every hat at the school," said Tom Andreasen, who himself coached state championship basketball teams at Virginia City and Carson in the 1970s. "He could teach math, or anything else that needed to be taught, and he was as good a fundamentals coach as I've ever seen."

Those words were echoed by Lyle Damon, who coached Virginia City's teams of 1963-64 to 55 straight victories.

"Hugh Gallagher is the finest man I've ever known," Damon said. "He was the promoter of everything up there. He was principal ... superintendent ... he was the deal."

Gallagher graduated from Virginia City in 1938 and went on to receive his bachelor's of arts degree from the University of Nevada. After World War II, he returned to Virginia City in 1946 as a teacher and basketball coach.

"There were 13 students in the high school at that time," said Gallagher, in 2002. "I became principal the following year, but we were so small, I had to coach to keep the program going."

Gallagher compiled a 107-49 record as a varsity coach, and more important, laid the groundwork for the program's future success. One of his students was Mike Harper, a two-time state MVP for the Muckers in 1962 and '63.

"You can go back to Jake Lawlor (in the 1930s), but Mr. Gallagher was practically the inventor of Virginia City basketball," Harper said in a 1994 interview when Gallagher was inducted into the Nevada Interscholastic Activities Association Hall of Fame. "He literally coached us from first grade all the way through high school. Every fundamental aspect of basketball that we knew came from Mr. Gallagher."

Virginia High School has won 18 state basketball championships, more than any other school in Nevada. The Muckers won 93 straight games and five state championships between 1982 and '86, and before that, had a run of six state titles between 1962 and '67.

Those statistics take on even more meaning when you consider the school's enrollment numbered well below 100 students.

Gallagher believed the community's mining roots, dating back to the 1850s, made for a special environment. He should know. His own father, Hugh, was born in Gold Hill in 1880. His grandfather, Neil, was a Comstock miner earlier than that.

"You had families that worked in the mines, and that brought out in them a tremendous amount of respect ... to do everything they could to help their children," he said.

In an era when students from first grade through 12th all went to the same school, most of the boys played basketball. Gallagher was always ready to help out, whether it was conducting clinics for first graders on a Saturday morning or simply handing over keys to the gym.

"I was playing organized basketball under the direction of Mr. Gallagher when I was in first grade. He had us doing layup drills and shooting from spots, and at that age, you're throwing the ball up there, not shooting," Bob Rudnick said. "Every Saturday, we would do this up on the hill. You could go to the school and play basketball anytime you wanted. All you had to do was go over to his house, he would give you the keys to the gym and tell you, 'Just make sure and lock up when you're through.'"

Rudnick and Bob Gallagher - born two days apart in September 1954 - grew up together living just across the street from each other. They became known as the "Gold Dust Twins" and in 1972 were teammates on a state championship team.

Gallagher had three children with his wife, Lola: Hugh, a high school All-American in the mid-1960s who went on to play at the University of Nevada, and is now a Reno-based consultant; Bob, former coach and now athletic administrator for Elko County; and Barb, an elementary school principal in Winnemucca.

"Up in Virginia City at the time, that was a big thing," Bob Gallagher said. "You always had a ball in your hand and there was always a place to play. If you wanted to go in the gym, you'd go find my dad and he'd give you the keys. He always trusted the kids to make sure the facility would be taken care of and that it would be locked up afterward. Even if you couldn't find him, you could always find an open window where you could crawl inside, and the basketballs would always be out there."

Hugh Gallagher knew the key to establishing a successful high school program was to teach the fundamentals at an early age.

"We started them in first grade," he said. "I tried to develop a personal goal for these kids; that those first graders in 12 years would bring Virginia City its first state championship. That's how it worked out, too."

The Muckers came into 1958-59 with high expectations after winning the Northern B division zone the season before, but they had to play under a new varsity coach after Gallagher announced he was going to step down.

"We had seven or eight seniors so it looked like we were going to have a pretty good team," said Andreasen, a freshman on that first state championship team. "We would have loved to have had him as our coach, but he just turned the team over to Frank Jordan. That's the type of guy he is. He was never in it for the glory."

And, of course, the name is still Mr. Gallagher. Always.

"He never gets old, nor will anybody ever let him. That's not allowed. He's one of those guys you expect to be there for your kids and your grand kids," Rudnick said. "To this day, I still call him Mr. Gallagher. It's never been Hugh. Just Mr. Gallagher."