The word is slowly trickling out into open space like a Wing-T quarterback running a waggle that coach George Glenn died Aug. 24.

Personally, I met George first in 1992 and began a 34-year friendship. He was a Sallies guy who became a Cape guy. He was Cape’s coach 1993-96, all winning seasons. He coached my twin sons Tom and Jack.

My wife once said, "How come our twins can’t get a coach like you were for your track kids?” And then they got one – Brian Donahue was part of the package – and I gladly fell back to second place.

I read a poem at the end of the 1994 season after Cape went 7-3. “Glenn spent years at Sallies coaching players mostly white/but it took a Black man from Cape [Sean Bradham] to get Glenn down right.”

Sean’s impression was respectful and spot-on.

At one practice, Glenn was ragging on Juan Saez for not hustling in a drill. Juan said, “I don’t need to be on your dumb team,” and started to walk off the field.

Glenn told him, “Just take off equipment and leave it right here before you walk off.” Juan just got back in line and was a team leader the next two seasons.

George told me, “Discipline is not what you do to somebody; it’s what you do for somebody.”

My son Tom, Glenn's first Cape quarterback, died in October 2017. A day later, George was in the garage and brought a picture of him coaching Tom. George was there to be a comfort to the family but mostly talked to Susan – he was just smart like that. Before cellphones, on Saturday mornings after a Friday night game, George would call the house around 5 a.m. Susan would just pick up the phone and say, "It’s George," and hand it to me. And he would unravel. The language was colorful. I rarely got to say anything, and then he’d be gone.

Tom and Jack went on to UMBC and were playing Division I lacrosse for a guy who had won a national title at Hopkins. After one practice, the coach broke bad and started barking at the boys from Baltimore. Jack said to me, "Coach got all beastly like he was George Glenn or something." No one ever superseded the charisma of Glenn and that voice that could quietly cut through a steel door.

Coach D, Glenn and I formed a group, the Wild Dog Walking Club. We walked in Rehoboth at night. The conversations were hilarious. One crisp February night, we were coming from Dewey walking on the shoulder with Silver Lake on our right, a full moon and a thousand stars in a cloudless black night with the Hale-Bopp comet streaming across the sky. It was 1996. George looked straight ahead; he was deeply into his bulldog football personality woofing about something, the language providing the only color in the darkness. I suggested he look up and take in the cosmic moment. He bit my head off: “Who are you, Mr. Science? I don’t need to know that stuff. Doesn’t help me cover that guy out of the backfield in the weakside flat.”

There was a retirement dinner for Glenn at the Bay Center after he decided to move on as the director of football operations at Coastal Carolina. The Sallies section and the Cape crew jokingly argued as to which school could claim ownership.

There are a thousand George Glenn stories that will be shared over the coming weeks. I just keep hearing these words: “Hey, Mr. Official, let me ask you something.” Late in the fourth quarter, just the asking could draw a flag after so many humorous questions challenging the officals' judgement.

George Glenn was charismatic, stern, scary and smart; loyal like a lab, cute like a corgi and funny like a hairless cat. His players loved him.