BENSONHURST — He was known as the “Miracle Man” of scholastic track and field.
Barney Hyman was a legendary New York City track and field coach, best known for his tenure at Brooklyn’s New Utrecht High School. He is a 2020 inductee into the National High School Track and Field Hall of Fame.
And for good reason – in fact, many wondered what took so long. He began his teaching career in 1921 and started coaching the following year.
“He built perhaps one of the most dominant high schools; track programs, not only in the city, but perhaps in the country,” Al Leibowitz, a member of the school’s Hall of Fame, told the Brooklyn Eagle. Leibowitz was an All-City football running back for the Green and White, and in 1958 led the city in scoring.
He later coached football at his alma mater, served as the school’s principal, and later Commissioner of the Public School Athletic League football program.
As for Hyman, check these results:
Championships: He led his teams to nine consecutive indoor track and field titles and 10 successive outdoor championships.
As a “scout” he “discovered” Otto Rosner, who broke interscholastic records under Hyman’s coaching.
“Quite simply,” Leibowitz recalled, “Barney was known as a ‘peer of high school track mentors’ and a genial, highly intelligent leader who turned out one championship team after another.”
According to Eagle records from Friday, Jan. 3, 1936, “In the 440-yard dash, Hyman can point in but one standout – Morris Teitlebaum, but for he is a kid who carried on to intercollegiate heights.When Teitelbaum first put in his bid for track recognition, he spent his first two years on the squad chasing three other fellows to the finish-Lione.
“He never scored – or really came near registering a single rally. In his third season, ’Teitz’ developed into a star relay man, and in his senior year he came through to win the PSAL crown – and set a record for the event.”
Barney Hyman. Photo: National High School Track & Field Hall of Fame ceremony
Teitelbaum matriculated at Ohio State and ran on the relay teams that set the Penn Relays afire for two years.
They still tell the story of Otto Rosner and his underwear, when track stars and Hyman get together for a chat about New Utrecht’s yesteryear in sport, the 1936 Eagle reported. How Hyman told Rosner to come out for practice and how the Englishman reported in his underwear. How he was kidded by the track team’s “big-shots” and how New Utrecht’s student-body would wait for him at school Monday mornings after Saturday night meets to give the blond-haired boy an ovation week after week because of his championship and heart-stirring performances.
“Few people thought that Rosner would ever reach the lofty heights that he did,” the Eagle reported. “His record for the half-mile will probably never be touched – or at least it won’t be for many more years to come. He now competes for the New York A.C.”
Today, according to Eagle records dated Jan. 3, 1936, “[Rosner] is fourth in the nation’s best in the running hop-step-jump. He represented the U.S. in the 1932 Olympic Games and scored.”
The Eagle report continued on that date: “In the one-mile run Victor Fitzmaurice is the Green and White’s shining light. Fitz started in cross country and romped to the PSAL diadem in the mile run.
“Vic Gannon, Sy Bloom, Willie Greensterin and Artis Kurtz were capable exponents of the hurdles. Mike Andursky was one of New Utrecht’s better broad jumpers, and also gained prominence at the University of Pennsylvania. Artie Byrnes is the best high jumper Hyman has ever had, and Carl Wolff is tops in pole vaulting.”
No coach can point to such achievements in one department of any sport as can Hyman in the shotput, was what appeared in the 1936 Eagle. “From 1925 until 1935 New Utrecht has boasted a strangle-hold on the weight tossing situation,” the article read.
“And now,” the 1936 Eagle concluded, “Hyman sits in his easy chair as principal of a New Utrecht annex and looks over his pleasant past. Of course it has been enjoyable. At times it has been tiresome – but it was well worth it. He’d do it all over again if life turned back its pages and started anew. It’s been lots of fun to him, and, ‘I got a kick out of it,’ is the way he describes his coaching career.
“The book is now about to be closed –and when it does it will finish the story regarding the career of a man who looked for little glory out of life but found that he was born to receive it in bountiful measures.”
In late 1935, Hyman resigned from his position at New Utrecht to dedicate more time to his personal life. Historical records suggest he lived until April 1975, passing away in Buffalo, New York.
A good teacher makes a good coach — Barney Hyman was both.
Andy Furman is a Fox Sports Radio national talk show host. Previously, he was a scholastic sports columnist for the Brooklyn Eagle. He may be reached at: [email protected] X: @AndyFurmanFSR
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