Mimi Cook’s answer on what she looks forward to the most about her husband of 61 years, Crystal City coaching legend Dick Cook, getting inducted into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame next month came out like a fastball.
“Seeing Adam Wainwright in person,” she said to the delight of Dick, sitting nearby in their home in Crystal City.
Wainwright, the St. Louis Cardinals’ 200-win pitching star, retired as of Sunday, and will be enshrined in the HOF Nov. 19 along with Dick Cook, 17 other sports figures and four teams.
Cook, 85, taught and coached at Crystal City High School in parts of four decades and led the Hornet girls track and field team to six consecutive Class 2A state championships from 1984 through 1989. That team also will be enshrined in the ceremony at the Chase Park Plaza Hotel in St. Louis, along with the 1973 Washington High football team, the 1959-1973 St. Louis University men’s soccer teams and the 18-time state champion St. Joseph’s Academy girls tennis team.
“It is an honor I really can’t explain,” said Cook, who lives near the Crystal City High campus. “The reason why (the girls track championship run) happened was because there was so much interest in track and field in this area and so many good kids who wanted to participate. All of the high schools had good track teams and had been state champions in cross country, too.
“You have to have good coaching and the ability to get kids to come out. You take a chance on some kids and you hope what you’re doing is good enough for them. They have to be athletes with multi-talents.”
Cook graduated from Crystal City in 1956 and went to the University of Missouri in Columbia to play football and compete in track and field. He studied business administration for a year, but switched to physical education so he could pursue his desire to be a coach.
After graduating from Missouri, Cook began his coaching career at Poplar Bluff, where he coached Derland Moore, who went on to an All-American career at Oklahoma and 13 years in the National Football League. Cook then taught and coached football and track at Herculaneum, followed by a 34-year run at Crystal City, where he learned from another Hornet coaching legend, Arvel Popp, a 1990 HOF inductee.
“I am really proud of Crystal City and all of the fine athletes they have had,” Cook said. “They had All-Americans in basketball (Bill Bradley), and football with Danny LaRose. It was an opportunity to really get on the stage and do what you want.”
Cook also helped build the Jefferson County Jets summer track club that became a talent pipeline for local prep track and field programs, in particular those standout Hornet girls teams.
While Popp is most closely associated with national basketball hall-of-famer Bradley, Crystal’s most renowned athlete, Cook developed many standout athletes as well, including 1966 graduate Randy Cayce, who played football at Wichita State University, followed by a brief career in the National Football League. Post-football, Cayce started a flooring business in Denver that he still runs and also served for 40 years as a trainer for the Denver Fire Department.
“Dick was a great mentor and coach and we had winning teams,” Cayce said. “He’s been in my life ever since. I rarely tell this, but I used to work in a city program for Crystal and was chopping a tree down. I lost my grip on the axe and it cut my foot and they rushed me to the hospital. The first thing Coach asked was, ‘Will you still be able to play football?’ It wasn’t a life-changing situation, so I tease him all the time about that.
“He was just starting his career (in the mid-1960s) and he was young. He knew how to reach each player’s personality. He was a big part of me going to college. I couldn’t have asked for a better mentor or friend throughout the years. He followed my career and stayed in touch.”
Cayce said while it’s been years since he’s seen Cook in person, he plans on attending the ceremony.
Ken Jones will be there, too. He is the Hornet activities director and head coach of the girls cross country and basketball teams and is accustomed to spotting Cook in the stands at the girls’ games.
Not long after his girls won the state Class 1 cross country championship in 2015, Jones was watching his basketball team warm up for a game when Cook caught his eye.
“This particular night, he said, ‘Coach Jones, come here,’” Jones said. “And he had never said that before. I thought, ‘Oh dear God, what did we do?’ Did we take something down or do something wrong, because I never would want to disappoint him. He reached his hand up and said, ‘I want to welcome you to the (state championship) club.’ It moved me. This was my first year as AD.
“Then he didn’t let go of my hand. And he said, ‘If I find out you got a raise because of that state championship, you owe me a whole bunch.’
“I did not get a raise,” Jones said, smiling.
Jones said having a hall-of-famer around only makes him better as a coach.
“I’m a fan of coaches – not just high school,” Jones said. “I follow some teams because of the coach. I like coaching styles. Coach Cook has been around my entire 23 years here and been to many of my basketball games, and has been a huge supporter of the cross country program. I’m a Coach Cook fan.
“How many coaches have rolled off six straight state championships? You can get a nucleus of kids who can get it done and win (once), but he did it for six years. That means he knew what he was doing. We won five district championships in a row in cross country, and one of the things I was most proud of was the fifth one (because) it wasn’t the same five girls (as) when we started. He did that at the state level for six years.”
Not only will former players and colleagues be at the induction ceremony, but all four of the Cooks’ children, Mary Beth, Richie, Jill and Amy, will be there as well.
Cook hasn’t written his speech yet.
“I want a short speech,” he said. “I don’t have a lot of preaching to do, saying, ‘I did it.’ Or, ‘This is my advice to you.’ I don’t want to get involved with coaching somebody else’s kids.
“I’ve had a lot of friends contact me and tell me they’re going to be there. That’s an honor that they think enough of me to attend.”