SENIOR SPOTLIGHT Then and Now with TN Football Hall-of-Famer Bobby Majors STORY BY SHERI KAMP
On July 7, 1949 the youngest of Tennessee’s “First Family of Football” made his debut into the world. Born to parents Elizabeth and Shirley Majors in Lynchburg, Tennessee, Robert Owens Majors, or “Bobby” Majors, would one day make Tennessee Volunteer history as their best defensive back of all time. As a young boy, Bobby spent all of his spare time outside - in the yard or on a field - playing one sport or another. His father Shirley was a high school football coach for several years before going on to serve as Head Coach at the University of South (Sewanee) for 20 years. His four older brothers, Johnny, Bill, Larry and Joe all played football from the time “they could walk” through college. His sister, Shirley Ann, played basketball through high school, before college basketball was available to women.“The reason I don’t know how to swim and the reason I don’t like water is because I was always on dry land playing football, basketball, baseball, and golf,” Majors says. “I have pictures of me at 2 or 3 years old, throwing and kicking a football. That was just it. That was how we were raised.” Bobby gives his family the credit for his early and outstanding development of skills, ““Basically, if I made a mistake I faced quick correction, given I always had five or six people watching me,” says Majors. “And off the field as well, my family trained me in how to get through life, manage people and they encouraged me in my goals and achievements.” 13
