Remembering the Legend: Ed Bare -Unaka Football Great

Published 11:47 pm Thursday, September 1, 2022

BY C.Y. Peters

Star Correspondent

Ed Bare played Unaka Ranger basketball, baseball and football and was a standout from 1950-1953. He saw the football program at Unaka start as a 6-man team, and evolve into an 11-man championship-caliber program. He is one of only three Unaka players to rush for at least 3,000 career yards and totaled close to 5,000 all-purpose yards during his time on the football field.

Bare scored 59 touchdowns in his three seasons on the 11-man Unaka football team, with 24 of those coming during his senior season, in just seven games. He led the Rangers in scoring and touchdowns during all three of his seasons and made the All-Watauga team during each of those years.

Bare manned the tailback position for the single wing offense of legendary Unaka coach Lynn Goddard. He found himself at Unaka, after spending most of his freshman season at Elizabethton High School, being forced to move to Stoney Creek after his father lost his job at a plant in Elizabethton. He arrived just in time to play in one game for the six-man Ranger squad, and be part of a win against Cloudland, which happened to be their first win in program history.  Bare scored four touchdowns with just over five minutes remaining in the first quarter; he then watched the rest of the game from the bench.

During the 1952 and 1953 seasons, Unaka claimed the outright championship with an overall record of 8-1 and 7-0 in the conference during each season. The lone loss came at the hands of a much larger Elizabethton High School.  Besides being the tailback, Bare also played left linebacker, returned punts and kickoffs, kicked kickoffs, and played snapper during punting downs.

Ed Bare was inducted into the Carter County Sports hall of Fame by his friend Doug Buckles in 2015.