- Date Of Birth: June 11, 1928
- Date Of Death: November 6, 2014
- State: Florida
Chet Cline, age 86, of Destin, FL went home to be with his Lord and Savior on Thursday, November 6, 2014. He passed away peacefully at home, surrounded by his adult children. He was preceded in death by his parents, Nora and Sherman Cline, and his sister Rebecca Holmes-Davis.
He is survived by the mother of his children, Margaret Bennett Cline, and four children, Kathy Cline Warwick, Kelly Cline (Jay) Turner, Bennett Keith Cline, and Keena Cline (Charles) Ledford; grandchildren, Taylor and Paige Turner, Kaleigh Warwick, Molly Ledford, and Bennett Cline.
He was born June 11, 1928 in Boaz, AL. He grew up in Gadsden, AL where he attended Etowah County High School. He was selected as an All-State tackle, and was later inducted into the Etowah Hall of Fame. He played guard on the 1948 and 1949 Auburn varsity teams. He was nicknamed “iron man” in 1949 playing 262 minutes at guard for Auburn. He missed only five plays at offensive guard during the entire 1949 season. He was one of the players who received high praise after Auburn’s 14-13 victory over Alabama that year.
Chet received his BS from Auburn in 1950 and coached the freshman line in the fall of that year as member of the Tiger Staff. He was about three-quarters of the way to his Master’s degree when he was snatched from his job as line coach to become a 2nd Lieutenant in the Army during the Korean War.
After two years in the Army, he turned once more to teaching and coaching, starting work five days after his discharge at Sylacauga (AL) High School. Meantime, during summers, he had completed the requirements for his Master’s Degree in Administration at Auburn University. In 1960, he and his wife and three oldest children moved to West Palm Beach, FL. Five years later he was asked by the superintendent of Okeechobee County to become the principal of the county’s one high school, The Lakeside Okeechobee High, and they move there in 1965 with their now four children and remained there until moving to Okaloosa County in 1968. He was the principal at Meigs Jr. High School until 1973 when he moved to Max Bruner Jr. Middle School where he retired in 1990. Chet loved to hunt and fish. During his days at Bruner, he would fish during the summer with Capt. Tommy Carter on the Bluerunner II. Winters were spent in the woods in Alabama hunting with his son Keith every weekend.
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