Longtime Bakersfield College Football coach Carl Bowser dies

BC long time football team coach, Carl Bowser, died earlier this week. After his death 23ABC interviewed the local people and former players to find out more about him as a person.

This led the Kern County Sports Hall of Fame to state that Bowser’s record at BC was 83-31-3 in the eleven seasons and a national championship triumph over Fullerton College in 1988.

Bowser was formally interviewed in this show by 23ABC with former players such as Stan Greene who played for Renegades from ’87 to ’88, and Ken Calvin who played for the team from ’94 to ’95 season and former Bakerfield Californian photographer John Harte. From a number of positive things that were said about him through the several interviews done, one was left in no doubt that Bowser had transformed the lives of many people for the better.

BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT:

Bakersfield local personality is probably familiar with Carl Bowser who dominated Bakersfield television for decades Carl Bowser, this is Sam Hoyle, your Shafter’s own neighborhood reporter. Robert Bowser recommended by Kern County Sports Hall of Fame states that he gained record 83-31-3 in 11 years at Bakersfield College, in which he realized national championship in 1988, six times WIN in Western State Conference and participation in 7 Potato Bowl.

But while that is the most widely known aspect of the man, his career in coaching started somewhere else in Kern County. An article posted by Cal Poly San Luis Obispo’s athletic Department interviewing Bowser reveal that he started in the high school realm at the Burroughs High School, in Ridgecrest until he arrived in Shafter California to coach the Shafter high School Generals for one year in 1966. A season later Bowser accepted an assistant s position at Bakersfield College under Gerry Collis and from there was the Bowser phenomenon.

In interviewing some of members of the community and some of the players of the Renegades during Bowser’s time as an assistant as well as as a head coach, one can see the changes that he brought to the community. However, the scope as per the opinion of the ex-footballer and a former quarterback, Stan Greene was colossal.

You would like to be able to say that he touched my life and the truth is he did, but he did it to everybody at our 30th year reunion and players approaching him and the things they said to him and I’m like, “I thought Iwas the special one?” you know? but that’s exactly the point of what made him so great, is ever every single person was special, that is what was so special about him said Greene.

Ken Calvin who played for BC in 1994 and 1995 said that although he only played for bowser for one season, he is who he is today because of the influence of bowser.

“He was a molder of men, I get goosebumps as I say it because I have older friends and people that I look up to and he changed their lives,” said Calvin. Used in this context, this phrase could mean that one would not be the person they are today were it not for the presence of the other individual.

And it wasn’t just his players it was that true everybody, John Harte worked as a photographer for the Bakersfield Californian from 1981 to 2009, the majority of Bowser’s time. The observer, Harte for instance observed that during his time on the bench, he saw that Bowser among other things was easily among the great people in the game.

“Knowing the nature of some coaches, Carl Bowser was just a delight, he was just a really, really nice man,” Harte.

Whether or not BC has plans to honor Bowser during the latter season, the details of which begin to trickle in, will be revealed as we gather more information to this story.