There are so many ways to describe what Bobby Douglas meant to the world of amateur wrestling.

Legend. Icon. Pioneer. Champion. All are true.

So it’s important to understand just what the amateur wrestling world and the Ohio Valley lost with Douglas passing at the age of 83.

Here’s a person who hitchhiked to West Liberty for classes and slept in a dorm attic because he couldn’t afford room and board, who became an NAIA national champion and NCAA national runner-up before becoming the first Black Olympic wrestler, an Olympic team captain, a collegiate coach who won an NCAA team title and three runner-up trophies and coached the greatest amateur wrestler ever in Cael Sanderson, leading him to four NCAA individual titles and gold in the 2004 Olympics.

Read that long sentence again. One man did all that.

“I guess one word you could say summed up Bobby was ‘perseverance,'” said Bill Welker, a longtime Ohio Valley wrestling coach and official who is in the National Wrestling Hall of Fame himself. “He didn’t let anything stop him from accomplishing what he wanted to accomplish.”

Through it all, he kept in him the Ohio Valley spirit of hard work, humility and a desire to help others. Former Buckeye Local wrestling standout David Bertolino was an All-American for Douglas at Iowa State and said his former coach influenced thousands of wrestlers worldwide during his career.

“He was just an amazing human,” Bertolino said. “He cared for people, his wrestlers, he cared about them deeply and wanted to see them succeed on and off the mat and did whatever he could.”

What a legacy to leave, one that will be remembered for so many years to come.