You know someone lived a special life when he won 76 percent of his games as a high school football coach in Texas, yet after he died, people talked more about his other assets.

Such was the life of Melvin Burns, who died in August at age 70 after spending most of a 36-year coaching and teaching career at Mason.

"He was undoubtedly the best man I've ever known," said former Mason principal Lee Graham, who worked with Burns for 25 years and was his friend for 40 years. "He was the best I've known at handling kids - how he treated them and respected them and loved them. And they, in turn, loved him."

Burns, who also coached briefly at Menard and Reagan County, put up a 101-32-1 record in 12 seasons as Mason's head football coach, including eight playoff berths. In 1972, he ended Mason's seven-year losing skid against Sonora during an era when the Broncos won or shared four state championships. Burns eventually guided Mason to the state quarterfinals in '72 - one of three times he took the Punchers three rounds into the postseason.

Such lofty football accomplishments would define most men, but they were only part of Burns' life as a teacher of history, a coach of multiple boys' and girls' sports, and a multi-tasking administrative assistant. Not to mention a schoolmate of Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Roy Orbison in Wink during the 1950s.

"Coach Burns used to come and sit in my office," Graham said, "and talk about kids that were good kids, but just didn't have the talent to play much. He'd have tears in his eyes. He never cut a kid from his team because of a lack of ability."

On the practice field, Burns used a deep supply of folksy sayings that got the point across to the intended party without embarrassing the athlete in front of his or her peers. When he was coaching receivers to fake one way and run their pass route the other way, Burns often said: "I want you to run at that defensive back, and I want snot to go one way and you to go the other way."

Other favorites included: "You're standing around just killing grass." And, "You're standing there watching, just looking like a tree full of owls."

"But," Graham said, "I never heard him belittle a kid. He might bust their tails if they needed it, but he would never break their spirit or self-esteem. With Coach Burns, it was always pump up kids, pump up kids."

Kevin Burns, one of Melvin's four sons, has picked up many of his dad's sayings while serving as head football coach at Wall and now at Bronte.

"He's the reason I do what I do and I am what I am," Kevin Burns said of his dad. "When I was a kid on the sideline watching him coach, I gained respect for him as a parent and a coach. He was the same person when he was coaching other kids as he was at home with us."

Graham called Melvin Burns a "master" teacher of history. His students often talked of how he could paint pictures with his words and make them feel as if they were back in time during his lectures. As an administrative assistant, Burns ordered textbooks and janitorial supplies, and oversaw the scheduling and maintenance of school buses. He also got up early on icy mornings and drove around Mason County to determine if the roads were safe enough to have school.

He was as passionate about coaching boys or girls in track or golf or subvarsity basketball as he was about coaching football. He once spent 20 minutes at Mason's All-Sports Banquet telling of Fran Frey's winning buzzer-beater basket at a junior varsity girls' basketball game. "You'd have thought those girls had won the NCAA championship," Graham said.

Kevin Burns remembers not losing a game while playing for his dad on the Reagan County freshman boys' basketball team in 1980. "He made us feel like we were UCLA," Kevin said.

More than anything, Kevin Burns remembers the postgame discussions with his dad - both as a player and later when Melvin watched Kevin coach. They weren't the typical father-son discussions you often hear about. The son said the dad was a great listener.

"He never spoke a critical word about me," Kevin Burns said. "We'd be shooting the bull, but you would pick up three or four things you needed to work on, without him telling you that you needed to work on them. I was one of the lucky ones because he was my coach, my friend, my dad."

Melvin Burns died Aug. 29 after watching his youngest son, Kade, coach in his first game as a head coach for Thorndale in central Texas. Melvin had a bad heart and hadn't been able to stand on the sideline at one of his sons' games in three years.

"Somehow, dad was given enough strength to travel to Kade's first game and stand on the sideline," Kevin Burns said. "Kade got the last pep talk. The last 'Attaboy.' The last 'I'm proud of you.' The last 'keep up the hard work.'"