Meybohm Carries Discipline of Athletics into Successful Career

E.G. Meybohm (’64) rolled up some impressive numbers as an Eagle including a career 43.3 percent field goal average and 67.9 percent free throw average in basketball, and a 10-inning shutout pitched in the NAIA National Tournament for the baseball squad.

A four-year letterman, Meybohm played a key role in the Eagles’ athletics success from 1960-64 and had the opportunity to play for two of the legendary figures in the University’s athletics history: basketball coach J.B. Scearce and baseball coach J.I. Clements.

“They were two different personalities,” said Meybohm. “Coach Scearce was much more outgoing and demonstrative. Coach Clements was very quiet and didn’t say a lot, but he was demanding. They both worked us pretty hard.”

The basketball squad went to the NAIA national tournament twice during Meybohm’s career. “I remember my senior year we were in the national tournament and didn’t get back until mid-March,” said Meybohm. “I missed quite a bit of the early part of the baseball season. I was a pitcher and having to get in shape after playing basketball was always a problem for me. I would get out there and try to rush to get going as fast as I could and then get a sore arm. It was just always tough playing basketball all the way up into March.

“One of the highlights of my basketball career was being part of the night Fran Florian scored 60 points. He and I both came out of the game with about a minute to go. Everybody started chanting, ‘We want 60! We want 60!’ We had a play where he came across the head of the key and my job was to screen for him. Well, he came off the pick and got the basketball – it was in NBA three-point range today – and he just drained it for 60 points. Everybody just went crazy. It was a great experience for me. It was one that I recall very vividly.”

In 1962, the 16-man baseball squad was wrapping up a great season and had earned a bid to the NAIA tournament. On its way home from the final regular season game at Florida State, their bus was involved in an accident that injured a handful of players and critically hurt the driver, who they called “Seventeen” – their 17th man. Shorthanded and concerned about their driver, there was serious doubt about whether or not they should attempt to compete in the tournament. At a team meeting, the squad voted to play.

The Eagles won the first game of the double elimination playoff, but dropped the second. “We had to win three games the next day,” Meybohm said. “We won the first one in the morning, and then I pitched the second game. It was a 10-inning game and we scored a run on squeeze play in the bottom of the 10th to win 1-0. We won the next game and went on to the nationals and won out.

“That was an unreal situation, if you think of it. At the time we went on to the national tournament, Seventeen was in critical condition, and we didn’t know if he was going to survive,” said Meybohm. “After the tournament, we came back through St. Louis and were the guests of the St. Louis Cardinals and watched the baseball game. We got the message to Dizzy Dean and his folks that we had won this national championship for Seventeen because he was in real bad shape. It was one of those things you always think about – it must have been destiny.”

Meybohm taught and coached at his alma mater, Harlem High, for a few years, but with a young family to support, opted for a career change. He was hired by Southern Finance Corporation to sell real estate, and eventually purchased the real estate sales portion of the business, founding Meybohm Realtors.

His company generated more than three quarters of a billion dollars in sales last year and has six offices in the Augusta, Ga., area with about 300 agents.

Heavily involved in statewide professional and Augusta-area service, Meybohm has served as the National Director of the National Association of Realtors, President of the Georgia Association of Realtors, chairman of the Metro Augusta Chamber of Commerce, president of the Columbia County Chamber of Commerce, vice chairman and organizer of Georgia Bank and Trust Company, a past Realtor of the Year in Augusta and past president of the Augusta Y.M.C.A. The former Georgia Southern Alumnus of the Year and an Athletics Hall of Fame inductee also served as chairman of the board for Georgia Bank and Trust Company and as an insurance trustee for the Georgia Association of Realtors.