Dates

• Existence: 1905 - 1979

Biography

Luther Davis "Sandy" Sandlin, an athletic trainer for professional, collegiate, and high school teams, was born on 1905 January 08 to Hubert Arthur and Mary Sandlin in Huntsville, Alabama. During his childhood, his family moved to Chattanooga, Tennessee, where he attended Chattanooga City High School.

Sandy Sandlin began his career in physical training in 1935, working both with the Chattanooga Lookouts, a minor league baseball team in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and at the University of Chattanooga. In 1938, he was promoted to Chattanooga Lookouts’s lead trainer, at the same time that he was hired as the University of Chattanooga’s Head Athletic Trainer. Sandlin held these positions simultaneously, working with the Chattanooga Lookouts primarily during their summer seasons and with the University of Chattanooga football team, the Moccasins, during the academic year.

Between 1943 and 1945, Sandlin worked briefly as an athletic trainer at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, Georgia. With the United States’ involvement in World War II and not enough young men on campus to field a team, the University of Chattanooga temporarily suspended their football program in 1943 and 1944. Meanwhile, the Chattanooga Lookouts’ parent club at the time, the Washington Senators, moved the team to Montgomery, Alabama in 1943 to play as the Montgomery Rebels. The Lookouts’ move to Montgomery was short-lived, and the team returned to Chattanooga by the end of the year after a successful telegram-writing campaign by the team’s fans. After the war, Sandlin returned to Chattanooga, where he resumed both of his positions as athletic trainer for the UC Moccasins and the Chattanooga Lookouts.

In the early 1960s, the Chattanooga Lookouts waned in popularity. Unable to combat declining game attendance and flagging support for minor league baseball, the Lookouts francise was discontinued in 1965, ending Sandlin’s career with the team. Sandlin continued as athletic trainer at UC, now University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, until 1974, having held the role for nearly forty years. In the last four years of his life, Sandlin worked as the first athletic trainer at Baylor High School in Chattanooga. Sandlin died on 1979 July 10 at the age of 74 in Chattanooga, Tennessee and was buried at Chattanooga Memorial Park.

Sandlin received numerous honors and awards for his professional achievements. He was inducted into the Tennessee Sports Hall of Fame in 1973 and received the National Athletic Trainers’ Association (NATA) 25 Year Award in 1974. After his death, Sandlin was inducted posthumously into the NATA Hall of Fame in 1987, and in 1994, he was inducted into the Tennessee Athletic Trainers’ Society Hall of Fame, an organization that further honored him with the establishment of the Sandy Sandlin High School Athletic Trainer of the Year Award.

Citation:

“Class of 1994: L. David ‘Sandy’ Sandlin.” Tennessee Athletic Trainers' Society. Accessed October 18, 2023. https://www.tnata.org/bios-1/2020/4/26/class-of-1994-l-david-sandy-sandlin.

“Football is Resumed at University: Scrappy Turns Out 1st Team Since ‘42.” University Echo, September 28, 1945. University of Tennessee at Chattanooga Special Collections, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga Echo student newspapers. https://digital-collections.library.utc.edu/digital/collection/p16877coll9/id/3567/rec/517.

Gammon, Wirt. “Return of Lookouts is Definite; Griffith Pleased by Pledges.” Chattanooga Daily Times (Chattanooga, TN), December 5, 1943.

“Luther Davis ‘Sandy’ Sandlin.” Find a Grave. Last modified September 22, 2013. Accessed October 18, 2023. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/117504402/luther-davis-sandlin.

“Sandlin, Davis ‘Sandy.’” Tennessee Sports Hall of Fame. Accessed October 18, 2023. http://tshf.net/halloffame/sandlin-davis-sandy/.

Short, George. “Short Shots: ‘Sandy’, As in Handy and Dandy.” Chattanooga Daily Times (Chattanooga, TN), October 11, 1963.

Sprayberry, Noble. “Looking Back at the Lookouts.” CityScope Magazine, 2015. Accessed October 18, 2023. https://cityscopemag.com/city-scope/looking-back-at-the-lookouts/

“The ‘Lookouts’ Bite the Dust.” Nashville Tennessean (Nashville, TN), September 27, 1965.

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