Remembering FPD and Macon legend Philip McLeroy

Philip McLeroy last coached at the high school level in 2008.

The next few days will all but eliminate the time gap, from then to the present, as hundreds of Maconites mourn the loss of Coach Mac.

A man who spent pretty much his entire life in Middle Georgia and nearly all of his coaching career at FPD, Philip McLeroy died at the age of 86 on July 16 after a long illness related to complications after a fall.

FPD opened in 1970 and McLeroy joined the staff soon after, beginning what would be a “Viking for life” legacy.

“I think he started maybe a year or two after it opened,” FPD athletics director and former McLeroy assistant Greg Moore said. “I think Coach was one of the first (faculty).

“This place has always loved Coach Mac.”

So much so that more than a decade ago, the basketball court was named after him. And so much so, his celebration of life on July 27 — a day after the visitation at Macon Memorial Park — will take place on that court.

The father of two lost his wife of 41 years, Helon, in 2008 after a car accident. He commemorated her with a Facebook post each April, the month of her passing.

McLeroy celebrated his 86th birthday in March with family and a cake in Piedmont Hospital. But he remained active and interested in all of his hobbies as well as high school athletics until health issues prompted his retirement in 2025.

Moore visited him a few months ago at the hospital, during a stretch in which McLeroy was having trouble getting comfortable or sleeping. He was actually asleep the day of Moore’s visit.

“The nurse let me in the room, but when we opened the door, we realized he was asleep,” Moore said. “I asked her not to wake him up, but she gave me the opportunity to leave him a note, telling him that I stopped by.”

McLeroy lived on Lake Tobesofkee and was a hunter and fisherman.

Moore noted McLeroy’s focus on establishing relationships. Like with Lee Dawson, who played football under McLeroy at FPD, graduated, started working on the school’s grounds and is still the school’s maintenance director.

“And he still lives next door to Coach Mac,” Moore said. “There are connections like that all throughout his life.”

Lisa Spear joined the FPD coaching staff in the mid 1990s, and, for a time, shared an office with both McLeroy and Dawson.

“I didn’t know Coach Mac,” she said. “But he took me under his wing because I was a PE teacher.”  

McLeroy graduated from Crawford County, where he played basketball under state legend J.B. Hawkins. In 1969 he was the subject of a Macon Telegraph & News story: “See Phil Fly, Latest Local Hit.” He was an assistant football and basketball coach as well as driver’s education teacher at Lanier High School. He also was a race car driver.

He drove a Ford Falcon at Figure 8 Raceway between Macon and Gray, and at International City Speedway in Warner Robins, mixing it with one of his roles at Lanier.

“As a teacher, I hate for a boy to drop out of school, so I am happy that my course has helped to keep some of them in,” he said in the story. “Several of the boys in my classes have come out to the track to watch me race.

“I guess they want to see if I’m practicing what I preached.”

He took it seriously.

“I didn’t get to be taught driver’s ed by him like 90% of Macon,” Spear said. “(People) all talked about the patience he had, and the videos, the horrific videos he would show to scare you.” 

McLeroy also taught physical education at FPD, and unlike a fair number of his brethren in general, took it very seriously. Most anybody who played under or coached with McLeroy will attest to the latter.

“Oh, absolutely,” Moore said. “Those kids lined up information and he called role every day. Oh yeah. And they better have their socks pulled up high and if you had on footies, you’re in trouble.”

Spear laughed at the mere mention of PE.

“He would get so mad at me and Greg and Cater Pierce if we didn’t do PE like he wanted,” she said. “He would get serious. And he hated, hated, hated ankle socks. He hated those footies.

“And if you were not in a straight line when he blew that whistle, he would go berserk.”

McLeroy graduated from Georgia Southern and Georgia College, and started coaching at Lanier in the late 1960s.

According to information on the Georgia High School Football Historians Association website, McLeroy was FPD’s first head football coach, leading the new Vikings to a 5-3 record in 1973 and 10-0 in 1974, later returning to the staff as an assistant until the early 1990s.

He coached the FPD boys basketball team for about 20 years, giving way to Moore for the 1995-96
season.

“He was a pretty fiery guy as a head coach,” Moore said. “Some of my early days, it was a handful as his assistant trying to get him to sit down on the bench for a little while.”

He became an unofficial consultant for officemate Spear.

“He was never about getting too fancy,” she said. “‘Fundamentals and free throws will win you games, Coach.’

“‘And the 1-3-1 defense.’ He loves him a 1-3-1 defense.”

McLeroy then took over the girls program, succeeding Spear, and won a state title in 2008, his final season. Spear said after retiring, he worked to have a reunion dinner each year with the 2008 team.

The school’s athletics director when Moore joined the staff, he also coached golf at FPD.

He didn’t necessarily stay away from basketball after retiring. He  attended games regularly where, Moore said, “he sat over in the corner of the gym… He did a lot better as a spectator.”

McLeroy was inducted into the Macon Sports Hall of Fame in 2009 along with Edgar Hatcher, among others.

In 2018, FPD began the Coach Mac Classic basketball tournament.

“Coach Mac loved this place,” Moore said. “He loved the people here. I learned very quickly from him that relationships with the people you work with and the people that you coach and teach are really the most important thing.

“Coach Mac always had very good teams and his teams always played really hard. But his kids always knew that he really, really cared for and loved them.”

A racecar driver, outdoorsman, coach of many sports, and nearly 40 years at a place from which he didn’t graduate — there was plenty to McLeroy.

“Put together the world’s best fish fry, and loved it,” Moore said. “We would have 30, 40, 50 people at his fish fry. He had quite the network of family and friends here that he loved to go out to eat with and do things with on the weekend.

“I know it’s cliché, but they don’t make ‘em like that any more.”