James Bland has been around courts most of his adult life. Though there have been two different types, the common theme is that he has been successful and influential in both.
Bland was a long-time basketball coach who was recently honored by the state’s high school association, and in recent years he has served as a court bailiff in Jones County.
Bland, soon to be 79, was the oldest of Henry and Josephine’s nine children. There were five girls and four boys, and he recalled that his mother tried to prepare her children for life after high school.
“She had me take all these SAT exams and stuff for college,” he said, noting that a lot of graduating young men were going into the armed forces, even with the Vietnam War looming.
“Being only 17 at the time, my mom wouldn’t sign for me to go in there. She gave me a choice. She said, ‘You either get a job and give me $5 a week, or you go to college.’ So,” he chuckled, “I went to college.
“All of my siblings went to college except the youngest two,” he said. “The next-to-theyoungest went to the Marines for 27 years. He’s working on his doctorate in Divinity now.”
The youngest of the sons went to work at Armstrong with their dad, but he was killed in an automobile accident.
Bland showed his interest and abilities in basketball in high school.
“We didn’t have but two sports at Maggie Califf, basketball and track,” he pointed out. “We went to state in both, but we didn’t win. I was pretty good in basketball, I guess. I made the varsity in the eighth grade. I was chosen to the All-Star game my senior year.”
Bland went to Fort Valley State College in 1964, and in 1966, he received an invitation. He knew the Middlebrooks family that lived nearby and played with Gloria Middlebrooks’ brothers often. She graduated two years behind him.
“I didn’t really know her that well,” Bland acknowledged. “I knew her brothers. But, she invited me to the prom.”
He shared that one of his sisters, who worked with Middlebrooks, would tell the future bride whenever James was home from college.
“We started talking a little,” he shared. “One thing led to another. We became involved … and it’s been 58 years.”
The couple was married March 3, 1967.
Bland obtained his BS degree in Education and went to Taliaferro County in January of 1969. He wasted no time in starting his coaching career.
“Taliaferro was a small school,” Bland noted. “The basketball coach had both the boys and girls, and he said, ‘I can give you one of these teams. You can handle the boys.’ I said ‘what’s the boys’ record?’ He said, ‘0-8.’” Worse than that was the new coach’s time to meet with his team before hitting the court.
“The day I came in, he said, ‘we got a game this week’. I said, ‘Okay, that’ll give me a couple of days to work with the boys.’ He said, ‘No, the game was Tuesday,’ and this was on Monday; they spanked us good.”
In two seasons, Bland compiled a 23-16 record, but a contract dispute regarding his supplement arose, leading to his resignation.
“When I left after the second year, I kept that contract for close to 10 years before I destroyed it,” Bland declared. “I wanted a constant reminder not to go back that way.”
The unemployed teacher and coach went job hunting and in short order took a job at Randolph County High.
“That was in 1977, and I told my wife I would be there for one year. I retired from there in 2009,” he laughed.
Bland was assigned several different sports early on before coaching the boys basketball squads for two years, finishing 23-21 then. It was just before Christmas of 1981 when the principal called him.
“The girls weren’t playing well,” Bland recalled. “As he talked, I could see what direction he was going in. When he finally expressed it to me, he called the present coach in.”
That coach had no problem with Bland taking over, and there was only one more game to play before Christmas. The departing coach called the team together.
“As soon as the girls came out, he told them to meet their new coach. I said, ‘I thought they said after Christmas.’ He said, ‘It’s your baby now.’ We got lucky; we won that game by one point.”
That one-point victory was the first of 562 Bland won with the Randolph-Clay girls basketball teams against only 122 losses in 26 years. His teams won two state championships and were runners-up twice. The Lady Red Devils advanced to the final four 11 times and the elite eight 11 teams under Bland, who was region coach of the year 11 times and coach of the year in the state twice. In 2000, he was the head coach of the Georgia All-Star team that defeated the Tennessee team.
Bland said it took seven years to win a region title, and his girls went 80-50 his first six campaigns. He decided to employ a new tool in practices.
“The (full-court) press was killing us,” he said. “So, I got me six boys and taught them to press. And, two or three times a week, my girls would work against that press. From that point on, we were very competitive. We turned it around.”
The successful coach attributes the team’s results to attitude, willingness to work, and trust.
“Not all of them were athletic and talented, but they were willing to work hard,” Bland stressed. “I always tell coaches when I talk to them now, children don’t care how much you know. They want to know how much you care, and if they know how much you care, they’ll jump over the moon for you.”
Bland also believes there is a higher power that young and old alike should respect.
“I went to church, to different churches, because I wanted them to see me in church,” he stated. “Because before every practice we prayed; after every practice we prayed. And I always told them that in everything you do, you put God first, family second, and everything else will fall in place.”
The Jones County native returned home in 2009. His dad was 83, and Bland recalled the reception.
“He said, ‘boy, what took you so long?’” Henry Bland died three years later.
It wasn’t long at all before the retiree went from the basketball court to the courtroom. He believes it was around 2010 when he became a court bailiff.
“I didn’t go to work the first year because I told them I came home to take care of my dad. But,” he added, “I received a 15-year pin last year.”
Bland recalled that when he started working at the courthouse, he was there as often as four days a week sometimes, in the Juvenile, Magistrate, and Probate courts as well as motion days.
“I didn’t mind the work,” he noted, “but I couldn’t tolerate the way parents were being treated by children, how they would abuse their parents. I was not raised that way. You respect your elders, especially your parents. I was ready to retire.”
Bland developed a somewhat different attitude with some of the adult inmates, particularly before the COVID-19 pandemic hit.
“We would bring them up to the small courtroom, and we would sit up there, and we would talk. And,” he continued, “I influenced a lot of those. They listened to what I was saying.
“They would talk to me, and I’ve had them come back. They got out of jail, and they came back to see me. ‘I appreciate you,’ they said. ‘You don’t remember me, but I appreciate that.’ And I felt good about that.”
Bland chose not to retire but now restricts his service to Thursday motion days.
Bland is a member of New Damascus Baptist Church, where he serves as a Deacon, and is active in the Maggie Califf Alumni Association and the Jones County Community Action Association.
More recently, the retired coach enjoyed being inducted into the Georgia High School Association (GHSA) Basketball Coaches Hall of Fame. Actually, the satisfaction was delayed one year, as Bland was nominated for the honor last year. An official had called to tell him he was on the list of possible inductees.
“When the guy called back, he said, ‘Bland, you missed by one vote.’ I said, ‘Well, I thank you. It was an honor to be on the list.’” Bland got another call later in 2024.
“He called me back and said, ‘You are on the list again.’” The nominee was appreciative, but, “knowing the situation from before, I wasn’t too concerned about it.”
When his phone rang this past February, the news was better.
“He called and said, ‘Bland, you are in.’ And all I could do was say ‘thank you, thank you, thank you.’” The induction ceremony was held March 22 in Atlanta, and a large contingent of Bland’s former team members were on hand.
“What does it mean to me? The Lord is good, the Lord is good.”
The new inductee shared a message he gave to one of his teams following a loss in the playoffs. The Lord loves everyone, he told them. It was just not their time that night.
“But I told them the other night, because I had a bunch of them there, ‘Tonight is our time. Tonight is our time for all that we have done.’”
