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Strock calls it a career after revitalizing Monogram Club

February 3, 2000
By Jimmy Robertson

This past week, the residents of Blacksburg broke out their shovels, arched their backs and scooped away the six to eight inches of fluffy white snow that covered their steps, sidewalks and driveways.

For many years, the Monogram Club at Virginia Tech was covered too. In fact, it was for all purposes buried under a sea of indifference.

But Tech AD Jim Weaver, having realized the benefits of such a club at his previous stops, handed the shovel to Terry Strock in 1998 and told the former Tech football player and coach to push aside the inactivity. In other words, clean it up and make it a club for former letterwinners to call their own.

Mission accomplished.

Strock retired Jan. 31 after spending the past 18 months reviving the Virginia Tech Monogram Club. But not before completing one of the biggest excavation jobs on this campus in a while.

"I was here in 1970 with Jerry Claiborne when they started the Monogram Club," Strock said. "And there's been some inconsistency with it.

"But I take a lot of pride in being the first full-time director of the Monogram Club and seeing it grow. Not just in terms of numbers either, but in interest. There's a lot of interest in it now."

Before Strock, though, interest waned. The club lacked a full-time leader to coordinate the collecting of dues and to oversee the everyday items that need attending. It lacked a person with the vision necessary to plan reunions and with the work ethic to keep in touch with former letterwinners in all sports. More importantly, it lacked the commitment and support from the athletic administration.

Weaver wanted to change all that. He saw the Monogram Club as a way to maintain the relationships between the athletic department and its athletes once they leave. Hopefully, the athletes in return will support the athletic program through financial donations.

But Weaver needed a man to provide all the things the club previously lacked. And in Strock, he found the perfect one. One who played and went to school with the older generation and who coached many of the younger generation. He's a salt-of-the-earth, moral, outgoing gentleman who gets along with everyone, making him the perfect person for the job.

So after hanging up his whistle, Strock went to work digging the Monogram Club out of its current state. He researched old media guides and browned documents, developing a list of former letterwinners. He started making calls and collecting addresses and coordinating reunions. He also got the executive order of the club together, and with the hard work and fine leadership of Dick Arnold, who serves as the club's president, that area has been taken care of for a while. In a nutshell, Strock has done everything necessary to build a foundation for the club's future.

And the numbers indicate that. There were 225 members enrolled in the club when Strock started. At the time of his retirement, he left with 716 members, including 88 three-year complimentary memberships handed out to the athletes who graduated last May.

"We set a goal of 1,000 by April, so we're a little short of that," Strock said. "But we're still getting some dues in every day.

"I knew it would be a slow process. As Jim said when I told him I'd take the job, 'You have to walk before you can run.'

"But we've created social functions, established a newsletter and had reunions. I feel good about where it's at right now, but I want to continue to see this thing grow and prosper."

For that reason, Strock plans on helping out on a part-time basis until his successor is named. In fact, he wants to help his successor upgrade the master list of the more than 3,400 letterwinners at Tech and he hopes to get half of them or more into the Monogram Club.

In addition, Strock plans on taking part in the club as an active letterman, attending the reunions and functions and renewing the bond with his former teammates.

"I'll be in the position as a consultant," he said. "I'm not going to interfere. But I will do everything I can to help whoever is hired to steer the club in the direction that person wants it to go. I still want to be a part of this."

But not on a full-time basis. Strock came to that realization recently after losing three of his good friends the past few years.

"All three worked and appeared to be in good shape, but you just never know," he said. "I'm in good shape now and I want to spend more time with my grandchildren. And I want to travel. Financially, I felt I was in position to retire.

"I've seen other guys work until they were 65 or 70 and they don't enjoy their retirement. I want to enjoy mine, so I guess all those things entered into the picture."

Plus, the extra free time will allow him to partake in his hobbies.

"I'm going to hunt, fish, golf and help my wife [Cindy] out and not necessarily in that order," Strock laughed. "My wife's got me helping her out with something later this week."

But for Strock, leaving Virginia Tech, albeit part-time, is no laughing matter. He dedicated more than 17 years of service to this university, including coaching stops under Jerry Claiborne and Frank Beamer in addition to attending school here and working as the director of the Monogram Club.

He's also working on a real estate venture which would increase his status significantly in the Hokie Club. The giving from Strock never seems to end.

"I'm going to miss the associations I had with the people in the department," he said. "And with the people who called. I'll stop by from time to time. I'll be around. I just won't draw a paycheck from here. That's all."

Which seems funny in a way. For a man who came to work every day, who performed every task asked of him and who gave so much to Virginia Tech and continues to do so, it almost seems that this school is still indebted to him.

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Jimmy Robertson is the editor of the Hokie Huddler at Virginia Tech. The Hokie Huddler is the athletics department newspaper that is printed 33 times a year - weekly during football and basketball seasons and bi-monthly during the spring.

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