FANNIN COUNTY SPORTS HALL OF FAME CLASS OF 2022
By Mike Harper
Webster defines a pioneer as “a person who is one of the first people to do something.” The name certainly fit Patty Callihan during her basketball career at West Fannin High School from 1971 through 1975.
Patty played basketball during the period of transition from half-court to full-court competition in Georgia High School girls’ basketball, and was one of the first girls in the county to play the game on a full-court basis.
As the turbulent 1960s came to a close, women, minorities and the disenfranchised in America were in the process of demanding equality with their white, male counterparts in all areas of life, including sports. The rules governing girls and womens basketball had long been the purview of male administrators and coaches who maintained that females lacked the strength and stamina to play the game according to the same rules as men and boys. But, as the decade of the 70s made its debut, the power was shifting to a progressive generation of decision-makers who felt that men and women should compete according to the same set of rules.
During Patty’s career, the state of Georgia athletic powers-that-be saw fit to add an intermediate step in the move to full-court competition for women. That step entailed the provision that each team could employ the use of a ‘rover’, or a player who could play the game from end to end, thus playing both offense and defense. At West Fannin, Coach T.J. Thompson entrusted Patty Callihan as his primary player to handle the role of rover.
Patty scored more than 900 points during her career. In addition to her offensive skills, she led her team in rebounding as a junior and senior. She was a tenacious defender. She was selected as her team’s Most Improved Player as a sophomore and as the Most Valuable Player as a junior and senior.
She was voted the school’s Most Athletic girl in the graduating class of 1975 and was named to Region 8A West All-Tournament Team in 1975.
During her four years of competition at West Fannin, the season records improved from 7-17 in 1972 to 16-9 in 1974-75.
Patty grew up in the Epworth/Colwell area of Fannin and was the youngest of the 13 Callihan children. In addition to an active outdoors life with her siblings, she enjoyed riding and caring for the horses on the family farm.
In 1975 few opportunities were available to women beyond high school in the world of athletics so Patty moved on to North Georgia College to prepare herself for a career in teaching. She graduated from North Georgia with honors and secured a position teaching science in the Fannin County School system. She was to begin her teaching duties in the fall of 1979 and, in April of that year, she was nearing the completion of her student teaching apprenticeship in Gilmer County when she and her mother found themselves motoring toward Fannin County after Patty had purchased a new car in Dalton. Patty had driven the car only 30 miles or so when she and her mother were both killed in a tragic automobile accident near Chatsworth. Patty was only 22 years old.
Patty was loved and respected by many friends, family members and co-workers who were shocked by the premature end to a life with so much promise. She is remembered as a Hall-of-Fame worthy basketball player but, more importantly, as a quality human being.
(Mike Harper is president of the Fannin County Sports Hall of Fame and a 1964 graduate of West Fannin High School).