Larry was the starter at every high school track meet at Preston High since we built the facility in 2004.

Former North Marion coach Conaway dies

By John Veasey
Times West Virginian

MANNINGTON — Last Friday was Larry Conaway’s last official day as a teacher at North Marion High School.

Conaway, who had been an assistant football coach at the school since it opened in 1979, went out as usual Monday morning on his daily walk that covered three or four miles. He stopped in front of friend Charley Kolb’s home to chat briefly and that was it.

He was sticken by a massive heart attack.

Larry Conaway would have been 59 years old next Sunday.

Lanham shocked

“Oh, my goodness. I couldn’t believe that happened,” said Fairmont State assistant coach Gary Lanham, who had both played under Conaway and also coached with him at North Marion. “After all, Larry was on the first coaching staff in the school’s history and stayed there until just several years ago. He was going for his daily walk and just collapsed. I think he walked three or four miles a day.

“I don’t think you could find a better physical specimen or a more healthy guy. He did 100 situps every day. He was a real physical specimen. He kept himself very physically fit.”

Lanham says he played at North Marion when Conaway was an assistant from 1981-84 and then joined the coaching staff after he graduated from Fairmont State. He is now on the Fairmont State coaching staff.

“He was very knowlegable of the game,” Lanham said. “He brought some toughness to us. A good all-around guy. Technique-wise he was a good teacher and an all-around good person. Pam is his wife. She’s a great lady. It’s hard just being a wife, let alone a football coach’s wife.”

Conaway also coached track and for several years the Husky track program did very well.

Duane Cochran also played for the Huskies when Conaway was on the coaching staff.“  He was always healthy and physically fit,” Cochran remembered about him.
  He had two sons who both played for North Marion and Fairmont State — young Larry, who everyone knew as “Smoke,” and Jason, whose nickname of “Snake” never caught on as Smoke’s did. They both had great careers at North.
  Cochran said he remembers an interview he did with Larry and his son Jason in 1997 after the Huskies had won the state’s Triple-A championship. “I wrote it from the father-son angle,” he said. “A father and son winning a state title together.”
  “Both sons played on West Virginia Conference championship teams at Fairmont State,” Cochran said.
  He said that Conaway had taught a number of different subjects at North Marion.
  Cochran believes Conaway began his teaching and coaching career at the old Monongah High School prior to the opening of North Marion.
  Conaway was a graduate of Barrackville High School where he won numerous honors playing for the Bisons.
  Cochran says that Conaway was the first track coach in North Marion’s history.
  “My son loved him,” he says of Quint Cochran, who will be a senior this fall at the school. “Quint had him for driver’s education.”
 Community shocked
 The Mannington community was shocked by Conaway’s death.
  After all, when a man teaches at a school for 30 years and coaches for most of that time, he’s well known.
  To show how quickly the word spread, Rocky Manchin had heard about Conaway’s death by noon. He’s down in Charleston, S.C.
  “Larry coached them all,” Manchin said. ”He coached my son in track. And to think he just retired. It’s really sad.”
 Touched many lives
  Lanham had difficulty realizing his friend was gone.
  “When you think of all the lives he has touched,” he said. “He has been at North Marion since the school opened. And the most influential people in children’s lives are your teachers.
  “He was only 58 years old. Just out walking and he stopped at Charlie Kolb’s house to talk and he collapsed. I still can’t believe it.
  “That just shows you have to take just one day at a time. One never knows from one day ’til the next what is going to happen. We’re losing a real fine man.
  “He would have been the last guy I would have expected this from,” Lanham said. “I just feel for his boys and his wife. He went to church and did all the right things.”
  Smoke Conaway lives in Mannington and Jason lives in Charleston. Both, as one might expect, are teachers