Coaching Stories

Visit Woody Hayes' Cabin

Ten miles. Ten twisting miles winding down a wayward path devoid of visibility, with nary a streetlight nor stop sign to impede. The sights along the route are antiquated and unconventional, rural and unsophisticated. A collection of rusty, downtrodden cars, the ignitions long untapped, rest among weeds and tall, untamed grass. A tire covers the hood of a navy sedan parked in front of a patch of woods. A ceramics shop, a bar, and an inn sit atop dirt lots at various junctures along the trail. Farms line both sides of the road, with cows and horses roaming the giant pastures that keep plenty of distance between neighbors.

Ten miles of this, before ultimately reaching the hidden gem of Caldwell, Ohio. Ten miles to Woody Hayes' old cabin.

The pathway is easy to overlook. It peeks out just before a sharp left turn on the main road. The rusty gate, innocent yet inviting, hangs ajar, but blends in with the backdrop of leaves, trees, and earth. Up the steep hill lies the log fixture, sold multiple times since Woody died in 1987. The cabin and the quirky town surrounding it are where Woody rushed to escape from football, from work, and from life; where he reconnected with his extended family; where he chatted about school and jobs with the 12 children of Mary Hill, a widowed neighbor.

This, in essence, was home.

"He never forgot to come back," said Mabel Schott, Woody's second cousin.

No one in town had seen Woody Hayes since he punched that player and lost his job. Everyone was on the same page, though. No one wanted to prompt that uncomfortable conversation.

Gennie Saling knew her husband. She knew all too well of the lack of a filter between his brain and his mouth. So, Gennie warned Ed.

"Don't you say anything to him about that," she told him.

Woody always stopped by the Saling residence on his visits to Caldwell. Upon his arrival, the words flowed from Ed's mouth with reckless abandon. He approached Woody and asked: "What the hell can make a man do that?" Gennie shook her head. Of course he asked about it.

On Saturday afternoons during the summer, Woody walked up the street to the bar owned by his cousin and bought everyone drinks. Woody knew every patron at the three bars in town. Everyone in Caldwell knew Woody. Of course, unfamiliarity does not really exist in the small community.

"Everybody knows everybody and everybody knows everybody's business," said Schott, whose white front door bears an Ohio State adornment.

In Columbus, where he coached for 28 years, Woody was a daunting, directive dictator. Former Ohio State coach Earle Bruce, who succeeded Woody as the Buckeyes' boss, said Woody almost always drove places by himself. "But if he rode with you, it was his car and he took over the radio, took over the windows, took over the heat. He took over everything. He was always in control."

In reality, though, Woody was a recluse.

"He used to go mountain hiking all the time by himself," Bruce said. "He was always kind of a loner in that respect."

In Caldwell, Woody was a hallowed figure, revered for his five national championships but respected and beloved for his generosity. He stood out, sure, but at the same time, he fit in seamlessly with the small town's people.

"It was the complete opposite," said Melinda Antill, one of eight Saling children. "Nobody was intimidated by Woody Hayes around here."

Woody visited on weekends during the summer. In the winter, snow and ice blanketed the steep gravel path to his cabin, creating a nearly impossible trail to traverse. When he returned to Caldwell, he steered the conversation away from his own legacy.

"Never once did that man ever talk football," Gennie Saling said. "All he ever talked about was learning and working."

Once a year, Woody provided a set of tickets to the denizens of Caldwell. They filled a car or two and made the two-hour trek west to Columbus and sat in the front row to watch their hero lead Ohio State.

"My kids, they used to go to school and tell people they met Woody Hayes," Saling said. "Kids didn't want to believe them."

Here was this man, this imposing figure, the stirring face of one of college football's premier programs, a seemingly callous coach who was ultimately dismissed for striking an opposing player. Yet in Caldwell, where he spent his childhood summers on his grandparents' farm and his offseason weekends in his secluded log cabin, Woody conformed to a simple, innocent manner of life.

"I liked to talk to him," Schott said. "He was really understanding. He liked everybody."

No one appreciated Gennie Saling's work ethic more than Woody did. She plucked worms off of the tobacco on her family's farm and she threw the burrowing bodies into a can. She milked cows, tended to horses, did housework for neighbors, served at all three bars in town, and worked at a steel plant. She could operate every machine in that factory. Woody admired that.

He stopped in at the Saling residence on Sundays. He would bring a case of beer for the adults and a watermelon for everyone else and he would sit in a chair in the living room and preach about the value of education to the family's children, grandchildren, and the rest of the kids in the neighborhood. They had all heard tales about Woody making his players stay at his house under his watchful eye until they improved their grades.

"I was told that if they weren't making their grades, you did not want a teacher giving him a phone call," Antill said. "If he got a phone call, you were dead meat."

So, Woody spoke to the roomful of children each week and relayed the importance of studying and completing homework.

"He always told them: 'Get an education first,'" Antill said. "'It's not all about football. You have to have the education or the football ain't gonna get you nowhere.'"

In the early 1940s, Gennie — then 17 — married Ed, who worked for a local coal company that tore down old houses, which were really just log structures with siding. Ed had taken the logs and built two cabins on his farm. They caught Woody's eye.

Woody secured an acre of land atop a majestic hill and he hired Ed and Joe Schott — Mabel's husband — to build him a new abode. Years later, the complex still sits on the same grounds. The exterior looks like a faded American flag or a dual-flavored birthday cake. Layers of white- and brown-stained wood compose the framework. A cluster of barren wasp nests hangs from the track of the front door. Two wooden benches rest on the porch, one of them sporting a busted leg that prohibits any sitting. Woody often settled onto one of the seats and read or wrote. He penned a book about football, which Antill keeps in her home. He would read about world history and famous battles and anything that Ralph Waldo Emerson composed. The stone chimney started to reluctantly separate from the foundation of the cabin, as the old mortar in between pleads for its life. In the spring, Easter lilies blossom all throughout the surrounding woods. Antill says they spring up "everywhere" one looks.

Woody installed a red sink and...