Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Frank Shaut, Sr. - OHHS Hall of Fame

My dad has received many awards and much (deserved) recognition over the years. He will get to add another accolade to the list when he will be inducted into the Oak Hills High School Hall of Fame on Friday, January 30 around 7:00 p.m. While my brother and I agree this is WAY overdue, our whole family is so happy and proud of him. Here is the official press release from OHHS. In addition to being an outstanding wrestling coach at Oak Hills, he actually helped coach the University of Cincinnati team while he was on it, as the head coach, Glenn Sample, was pretty new to the sport. A collegue of mine found this UC Paper from March 22, 1962 online. See page 10 - viewer discretion is advised :-)! He is also in the UC Hall of Fame.

While he is appreciative of the recognition, he is very embarrassed by it and would probably prefer to not be recognized for the most part. Nevertheless, I love it and wish he'd get more. In fact, while he has had many sports-related accomplishments, I would love for him to get recognized for the stuff he's done since he stopped coaching in 1974. I'm not even talking about his time as a great assistant principal and principal, but rather his seemingly tireless love and service to his Lord.
He helped start a church in 1978 (New Covenant Christian, later changed name to Oak Hills Christian) with a team of people who, over time, left the church for whatever reason. There were times (years) when he was the only elder in the church and was soooo involved over the years. People kept giving up while both of my parents stuck it out and did whatever they could. There were times of great rejoicing as well as times of many tears and wonders of what God had planned for them and this small church (down to about 40 people at one point). After years of praying that God would send people to our church, we got up to about 100-150 or so and in 2004, we merged with another church of similar size (maybe a tad bigger) and changed our name to iMPACT. Combined we were about 250-300 each Sunday. We now have three services (one of which is on Saturday evening) and are getting consistently over 400 people each week (Note, they attend all three services each week, if possible). He's still praying for more (unsaved) people and now we have the good "problem" of trying to figure out where to put them! :-) Praise the Lord!

I hope I wasn't rambling. I didn't intend to go into all that (and there is PLENTY MORE), but it just seemed a natural progression from what I set out to do initially.

Dad, forgive me for posting this as I know on some level you don't like it, but you and Mom deserve so much recognition for stuff outside of sports. I hope you know MANY people love and appreciate you two for your love of Jesus and His church here at iMPACT. I happen to be one of them!

3 comments:

scott d said...

fantastic. i love it.

he is definitely someone to be proud of, and that has nothing to do with his athletic accomplishments. he is a man to admire.

Jennifer said...

I LOVE your parents! I so look forward to their hugs each Sunday. I admire them a great deal. That newspaper picture is crazy cool! I can't wait until Jason gets home and I can show him!!

Scott Arnett said...

I would like to thank Coach Frank Shaut for the tireless lessons he taught me and all Oak Hills wrestlers. Not just for the sport of wrestling, but for the lessons of life and being beyond a good man. I am a teacher and wrestling coach. Each year I show my senior yearbook the wrestlers. I mostly tell them "Frank Shaut was the greatest. On the mat and in life."
Thanks Coach.
Scott Arnett OHHS 1973