GIVE ‘EM HELL, PELL – PART VIII: Off-the-field impact
Charley Pell helps to found the Gator Clubs and meets "Mr. Ben Hill"

On the day after Charley Pell died in May 2001, Gainesville Sun reporter Robbie Andreau spoke to then-Athletic Director Jeremy Foley for his perspective on Pell’s time in Gainesville.

“There are probably two legacies,” said Foley, who was the UF ticket manager when Pell arrived. “There’s the negative one everyone wants to talk about and the troubles that we had. I don’t think you can judge his whole life based on that.

“He taught us how to work, he taught us what it would take to compete at this level in terms of having facilities and commitment and everybody pulling the same direction, and he talked about focus, passion and all those things. He certainly taught me all that. You’d like to think that would be his legacy.”

Part VIII of this series will cover the part that taught Florida what it would take to compete. John Underwood crafted a great picture of the time in his Sports Illustrated article from September 10, 1984:

The University of Florida is a handsome and distinguished enclave of high education. The rolling Gainesville campus, with its abundance of oaks, is situated in what would approximate, if you picture the Florida peninsula as an upright human, the solar plexus of the state. In many respects that’s what the school is—the guts of Florida. It’s an honored institution with a first-rate curriculum, impressive facilities and active, formidable alumni who dominate the state’s business and political interests. Yes, and it has one thing more: a very large ulcer caused by a massive, ongoing frustration over its beloved football team.

Bear Bryant used to say that the University of Florida should be the ideal to coach because, with all its other advantages, the state turns out legions of skilled high school players, the bulk of whom yearn to be Gators. But he didn’t want to coach there. He called it a matter of “class.” John McKay has said much the same thing, as has Frank Broyles. Historically, Florida coaches, good and bad, have ranked with the most beleaguered in college football. The last one to leave the job on his own free will was Charlie Bachman—in 1932. For his war-time efforts, which for the part were hapless, Tom Lieb got thrown into a lake by the students.

Underwood continued:

When Charley Pell departed Clemson to become Florida’s coach in December 1978, sports editor Tom McEwen of the Tampa Tribune told him to “be prepared” because the Florida job “is like no other.” McEwen said that Pell told him it “couldn’t be so.” A year or so ago, Pell changed his mind. “Tommy,” he said, “you were right. It is different.”¹

Florida alumni groups had differing levels of devotion throughout the mediocre Dickey years. Gator football of the 1970s wasn’t dramatically different than the Muschamp and McElwain eras that just passed, and supporters had competing visions of the program. But when Pell entered into the equation, competing visions were no longer welcome.

Based on conversations with former players and everything I’ve read about Charley Pell, a consistent image is painted of the man’s work persona. Pell was a hard-working, Type-A, all-business, no-BS Bear Bryant protégé who built consensus with his unmatched work ethic and confident demeanor. He was exactly what Florida needed.

I reached out to Phil Pharr, a center for both Dickey and Pell and the current executive director of Gator Boosters, Inc. to talk about Pell’s impact on the program.

“Coach Pell was a marketer,” said Pharr, “He was always looking for ways to rally the fanbase to get things going. He painted the stadium a different color when he got here [blue to orange]. When he’d get out on the road, he’d spend time with Ben Hill Griffin [Jr.], Alfred McKethan and Guy Bostick. He was willing to get out and get involved in the fundraising aspect because we needed it.

“We weren’t raising much money back then. Our facilities weren’t competitive back then. Coach Pell knew that if we didn’t make more of an effort in those areas, we weren’t going to be able to compete. And by the way, it’s the same thing in 2020.”

Pharr’s nod to the new $85 million James W. “Bill” Heavner Football Training Center, which is scheduled to open in December of 2021, shows just how effective the fundraising program has become since the early days of Pell.

“It is a multiple of ten today,” Pharr said, “but if you are not competitive with facilities, recruiting is very difficult. You’ve got to raise money, and to do that, you’ve got to have a fanbase and you’ve got to communicate with them.”

When Pell arrived in Gainesville, the UF athletic department was hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt. Buddy Martin’s book The Boys from Old Florida: Inside the Gator Nation—a great read for any Florida football fan—lays out the struggle Pell faced after leaving a comfortable situation at Clemson:

Pell showed up in Gainesville for the job sight unseen. After inspecting the tattered athletic dormitory, noting the absence of a first-class weight room and observing the early austere décor of the football offices, Pell actually became physically ill. The orange plastic sofa with duct tape plastered on it in his new office became a symbol of despair.

“What slum lord lives here?” Ward [Charley’s wife] quipped after seeing the sofa. “Well that,” Charley said in mock protest, “happens to be my office.”

“I almost left him,” said Ward. “I just looked at him and said, ‘You have got to be the dumbest man. I cannot believe I’m in love with a man so dumb. I guess that makes me the dumbest woman, so what are you going to do?’ It was just deplorable.”

Pell didn’t hold back that spring, at one point saying that he would rank the facilities at Florida 10th among the 10 SEC schools. “A player isn’t going to give us his best because we aren’t giving him our best.”

“He made very, very significant and lasting contributions to the football program at the University of Florida,” UF media relations director Norm Carlson said in Andreau’s article. “I’ve worked at Florida 40 years, and we’ve never had anybody who worked harder than Charley Pell at anything. He was a workaholic who was devoted to his players and coaching.”

And fundraising. One major adjustment Pell brought to Florida was how the team raised funds. His previous coaching stop had one of the most established fundraising programs in the sport. IPTAY (or “I Pay Ten A Year”) is an acronym-filled organization that is considered the “grandfather of intercollegiate athletics fundraising.” Clemson alum Dr. Rupert Fike formed IPTAY in 1934, and the group managed to raise $1,600 in its first year. It quickly grew in size, and the Tigers began to see more success on the field.

The organization behind Clemson funding likely impacted Pell’s thinking when he arrived at Florida. UF had a two-pronged approach toward solicit funding from alumni: local chapters of the UF Alumni Association, which raised money for academic endeavors, and Gator Boosters, which focused solely on funding athletics.

Former UF Alumni Association Executive Director Wayne McDaniel said that by the time Pell came into picture, it was clear UF needed to improve fundraising efforts if the Gators were going to be a force in the SEC. Pell and a group of influential decision makers around the program, including McDaniel and Athletic Director Bill Carr, sat down to formulate a plan that would merge the fundraising efforts of the UF Alumni Association and Gator Boosters by creating a new organization called Gator Clubs.

Gator Clubs allowed both groups to come together and open their doors to friends of the program in order to develop support for the University of Florida in both academics and athletics. The UF Alumni Association announced the formation of Gator Clubs in the Winter 1980 issue of its magazine.

Both the UF Alumni Association and Gator Boosters still exist as independent organizations. “Gator Boosters are the fundraising arm of the University Athletic Association,” Pharr clarified. “We’re a 501(c)3 and have been around for about 70 years. We raise money for all 21 sports, scholarships and capital improvements.

“Gator Clubs is actually managed by the Alumni Association, and that is a combination of athletic and academic fan groups in local areas around the world. Charley Pell did have a big influence on the formation of that whole concept.”

In 1980, there were 27 total Gator Clubs—21 in state and six out of state. Heading into the 2020 season, there are now 88 total Gator Clubs, with 38 in state and 49 out of state, according to the UF Alumni Association. A quick look at some of the best Gator Clubs logos shows the reach of the Gator Nation:

Pell hit the road with an aggressive fundraising approach, and the Gator Clubs were an instant success.  Pharr went to work for the Gator Boosters in 1981 and witnessed the boom. “It grew to a point where, when we started out the Gator Club tour in the summer, the most we did in one summer was 42 [Gator Club tour stops].

“You’d jump in a van on Monday morning, drive to Pensacola, work your way back [to Gainesville], get in on Saturday night, do your laundry, and get back out on Monday and do another week of functions, sometimes two a day.

“It was a great reach out because it combined alumni in the area with athletics support groups in the area. There was no social media, so if you wanted to hear what’s going on, you had to come to the meetings. You might have 2,000 people in Jacksonville or Orlando, 1,200 people in the Leesburg area, so you had these huge crowds that would come to hear about, specifically Gator football, but it gave us an opportunity to talk about all of our sports.”

Pat Dooley painted a clear picture of a Pell sell in the same May 2001 edition of the Gainesville Sun that I mentioned earlier:

He was always such a presence in the locker room and on the sidelines. But when I close my eyes and think of Charley Pell, he’ll be standing in a crowded room balancing a bourbon and a Vantage in one hand while slapping the other around the shoulders of a wealthy booster. He worked the room like nobody.

Dooley continued:

In the offseason, it would be a golf tournament followed by a party. During the season, it was the Saturday night social. Media, big boosters, celebrities. This was a high time to be involved with Florida football. Pell had Gainesville rocking like never before

Functions were a big part of the Pell Plan, a meticulous outline for success at Florida. He’d schmooze and glad-hand and fill potential contributors full of food, booze and stories until money would fall out of their pockets. (Unfortunately, some of it fell into the hands of Florida players.)

It was in a smoky room that Pell was at his best, for when you talk about what he did for the University of Florida instead of to UF, it starts with money.

Pell sold a clear blueprint, and one of the first sizable checks came from Wendy’s founder Dave Thomas.

The franchisee of the Gainesville Wendy’s locations knew Thomas and set up a meeting with Pell. Thomas, a Columbus, Ohio, native, must have walked away impressed because he ended up encouraging his daughter, Wendy, to visit Gainesville after Pell made his pitch. She ended up graduating from Florida in 1983, and Thomas cut Pell a $50,000 check that went toward the construction of a state-of-the-art weight room in the south end zone of Florida Field.

A generous 50K burger* from Thomas was a great start, but Pell would soon reel in a major gift from a citrus magnate that would change the face of Florida football.

Ben Hill Griffin Jr. (or “Mr. Ben Hill” as Pell called him) had built a vast $300 million fortune in citrus, phosphate and real estate from a 10-acre citrus grove his father had given to him as a wedding gift. The impression folks around the school gave to Pell was that Griffin Jr. was a good man, but he wasn’t looking to donate any more at that time.

At one point, Forbes recognized Griffin as one of the 400 richest Americans. When reached for comment, he was thoroughly unimpressed: “It doesn’t affect my ego a damn bit. There are people who would give $10,000 to get on that list. I wouldn’t give 2 cents. I wouldn’t give 1 cent.”

What people didn’t anticipate was how well Pell and Mr. Ben Hill would hit it off. As Buddy Martin wrote in The Boys from Old Florida:

They just hadn’t sent the right man yet. No cultural divide existed between Florida’s new football coach and one of Florida’s richest and most powerful citizens, Ben Hill Griffin Jr. He and Charley Pell understood each other immediately, like only two-small town country boys could. Both were fiercely independent thinkers, hard-driving businessmen, and workaholics. Each valued the concept of grassroots networking. And they understood the importance of money and the obligations that came with it. They also loved catfish, collard greens, black-eyed peas, cornbread, fried chicken, and sweet tea.

Pell only needed a couple visits with Griffin before the longtime Florida state senator and one-time candidate for governor offered to help.

While thanking Griffin for his donations to the University of Florida in 1983 ($600,000 for agricultural marketing), UF President Robert Marston said, “Once again Mr. Griffin has demonstrated his support for and loyalty to the University of Florida. He has within the past two years donated property that was converted to funding for the construction of an athletic training facility and a conference hall for citrus research and education.”

Griffin defined a major piece of the Charley Pell era. During Pell’s time in Gainesville, the Ben Griffin Jr. Athletic Training Center was constructed, the stadium underwent a major expansion project in the south end zone, and the first luxury skyboxes were built.

Griffin studied agriculture at UF from 1930 to 1933 and was a major benefactor for the UF Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences. He donated nearly $10 million before making a commitment for another $10 million in 1989, and at that point, the school decided to add his name to the football stadium. It was then known as Ben Hill Griffin Stadium at Florida Field. Several other campus buildings were also named after Griffin, but if he enjoyed the attention, he didn’t let it show.

“I don’t really take any special pride,” Griffin told Beth McLeod in a Gainesville Sun interview. “I wish I’d done something to be worthy of it. I’ve done a lot, but I haven’t done a great deal. If I’d been a big star football player, or if I’d been a highly scholastic person, or if I’d done well in any field like music or what have you, I’d appreciate it. But I don’t give a damn.”

The man with the hat and the pipe in the beginning of this article didn’t give a damn. If I were the King of Florida, I might well take the same stance.

When it was all said and done, the millions provided by the Griffin family supported building renovations including a health science center and a new training center, citrus research efforts at Lake Alfred, and scholarship endowments for men’s and women’s sports.

Mr. Ben Hill left one hell of a legacy, and Charley Pell was there by his side.

Ben Hill Griffin Jr. (as well as his son, Ben Hill Griffin III) and Charley Pell each have active scholarship funds set up in their name at the University of Florida.

Ben Hill Griffin Athletic Endowment (Click here)

The Griffin family, from Frostproof, Fla., made an exceptional contribution to establish this endowment to benefit deserving student-athletes in UF’s men’s and women’s programs. The Griffin name is synonymous with success and Gators.

Charley Pell Memorial Scholarship Fund (Click here)

Charley Pell was the head football coach at UF from 1979 until early in the 1984 season. He is credited with the many football successes that occurred after his departure.

When he began coaching, the UF football team was recovering from a 4-7 record, the football facilities were insufficient, the athletic department was about $700,000 in debt and fan support was dwindling. He toured the state and reached out to wealthy alumni, including citrus magnate Ben Hill Griffin Jr., transforming the football program via the financial support he gathered.

Called a workaholic as well as “hard, but fair” by his athletes, Pell continued to work on improving the football team. The 1980 season ended with a record of 8-4 and a victory in the Tangerine Bowl against Maryland.

Coach Pell passed away before his dream of establishing a scholarship for children of his former players could be realized. Through the tireless efforts of his wife, Ward, and the generosity of many UF fans, supporters and former players, this scholarship was established in 2001 and named in his honor.