Charles “Chuck” H. Irwin was a lifelong Grand Rapids resident, went to Union High and coached football and basketball and served as athletic director at Central High before at age 56 becoming the first athletic director and member of the physical education staff at what is now Grand Valley State University.
He played center on the football team in the late 1920s at Union, then a powerhouse program, and attended Western Michigan University to study education.
He taught and coached at Central High from 1937 to 1959 and coached the 1947 football team that went 8-0 and allowed just 19 points scored against them during the season. Among his star players at Central was fellow Hall of Fame member Terry Barr, who went on to star for the Detroit Lions. Starting in 1959 Irwin served as athletic director at Central High until moving on to Grand Valley.
Known as the “father of Grand Valley athletics,” he took intramural programs and turned them into varsity sports laying the foundation for the current award-winning athletic program. He stayed at Grand Valley reaching full professor status and retired in 1974.
He is remembered for his vision of physical education providing an opportunity to build physical strength and strength of character as part of a comprehensive education.
“You try your best,” he said of competition. “You do your best with what you have. You should never put the whole emphasis on winning. Athletics should be a learning experience...not an exploitation of the players or the public."
He is a member of the Grand Valley Athletics Hall of Fame, and the scholarship and endowment funding for intercollegiate athletics at Grand Valley is named in his honor (Irwin Fund, or Charles H. and Florence Irwin Scholarship Endowment).
Irwin died in 1983. He was 74.