Editor’s note: This is the second part in a series honoring black leaders in the history of the Wiregrass in honor of Black History Month.

Longtime Enterprise coach and administrator Alfred Peavy Jr. was known for his strong belief in discipline but his impact on the local community goes far deeper than that.

Peavy – a Clarke County native that graduated from Troy (State) University – started in the Wiregrass area as a longtime football, basketball and track coach at the all-black Coppinville High School in Enterprise during segregation.

Peavy’s football teams were known for their toughness and grit and during that time went 96-42, while his basketball teams went 200-75. Peavy helped a number of athletes earn scholarships during his coaching career but in 1970 after Enterprise City Schools were integrated he moved over to Enterprise Junior High. At EJHS he spent time as the head football and basketball coach before moving over to Enterprise High School as an assistant principal and assistant basketball coach. Those that were there say that Peavy was instrumental in helping ease the transition into integration at ECS.

“He and (longtime Enterprise Superintendent) Thad Morgan were right there together and they were like a tag team,” ECS Transportation Supervisor Ricky Britt said. “You had the white administrator and the black administrator and you couldn’t get anything over on them.

“I think that duo of he and Mr. Morgan together during those times was very beneficial to the integration process to make it a little smoother than it would have gone otherwise.”

Britt knew first hand what Peavy meant to the Enterprise community as he was one of several Enterprise youths that Peavy and his wife – Voncille – helped raise in the City of Progress. Peavy and his wife had no children together but nonetheless were able to call a number of young men and women their children because of their hearts.

“He helped raise me ever since I was about 12 years old,” Britt said. “He was everything to me. I was a little guy coming out of living in the projects with six other kids and my mom.

“(Peavy) came along and I helped him out a lot. He ran a little teen center on Coppinville Road and I would help him out there sweeping and stuff like that.”

Britt said that on many weekends Peavy’s wife would visit her family in Butler County and she preferred that her husband had company, so Britt started staying with him during those weekends.

“That evolved into me just staying there,” Britt said. “That was a lot of help for (my mom) because he took care of me and bought me clothes and fed me.”

Britt said that Peavy was there to buy him a 1962 Chevrolet when he was old enough to drive and helped him through school.

“He didn’t have to do that and I wasn’t the only one he helped like that,” Britt said. “He and his wife helped raise other young men and women in their household. They touched many lives.”

Britt would go on to become a teacher, assistant principal and then transportation supervisor at ECS, and many of Peavy’s other former players, students and friends would go on to become successes.

Jimmy Jones played football for Peavy at Coppinville and is a longtime Coffee County Commissioner. Mayor William Cooper was a neighbor for more than 40 years of Peavy and also worked with him at Coppinville and EHS. Cooper said Peavy also helped he and his wife raise their children.

“He was a great man, a great educator and a great community man,” Cooper said. “We were neighbors for 40 years or more and he and his wife helped raise my children. Everyone was crazy about Mr. Peavy. He really was a true jewel.”

A word that many people use to describe Peavy is “disciplinarian.” The former football coach was large in stature and didn’t allow disrespect.

“Mr. Peavy was a disciplinarian, he didn’t take any mess off anyone,” Cooper emphasized. “He was a big man and parents would call him to go over and paddle their children even at home when they would act up.”

Britt echoed those same sentiments.

“If parents had issues with their kids they would call him and he would come to their house and take care of it,” Britt said. “The parents had that kind of respect for him.

“He was a big guy, his size was intimidating but at the same time he had that demeanor where he was kind but when he needed to be he took care of business, too. He definitely believed in discipline. He wanted you to have fun but he wanted you to do right, too.”

Despite his reputation as a disciplinarian, it was his heart and his love for the community that stood out to those around him most.

“He had a heart of gold and there was nothing he wouldn’t do for kids,” Britt said. “He always had events and things for them to do and keep them active. He worked with the city and ran programs with the recreation department. He was very instrumental in the community.

“He meant the world to me and he meant the world to the community. There is no one like him, no one can replace him. He is a hallmark around here.”

His successes led to inductions into the Alabama High School Athletic Association Hall of Fame, the Wiregrass Sports Hall of Fame, and in 1986 Enterprise even named Peavy Park in his honor.

For years Peavy led children in the community on an Easter Egg Hunt and even after his death in 2001, Britt and others that Peavy helped in the community kept the hunt going. Britt said that the Alfred Peavy Easter Egg Hunt will resume this year at Peavy Park after being cancelled last year due to COVID-19.

Peavy’s longtime motto is one that describes the impact and legacy he had on the community: “If I can help somebody along the way, then my living shall not be in vain.”

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