Livingston Academy Baseball Field To Be Named In Honor Of Pat Swallows

Overton County School Board has approved naming Livingston Academy’s Baseball Field after long-time coach Pat Swallows.

In addition to coaching, Swallows served as a guidance counselor for LA for 41 years. He began the program in 1969.

“I spent a lot of my life on that baseball field and I had the opportunity to have some great kids come through,” Swallows said. “The fun thing about it is that I got see them come in as freshmen and grow up not only as a baseball player but as a young man.”

Swallows also founded the Tennessee Baseball Coaches Association in 1991. He was inducted into its Hall of Fame in 2006. Swallows ended his coaching career with a 533-310 record.

Director of Schools Donnie Holman said that one of the things that impressed him the most was the sheer amount of people who wanted to name the stadium after Swallows. He said that he had numerous calls, emails, and messages from people who respect Swallows and wanted to honor him.

“Over the many years he worked in our school system,” Holman said. “Not only were there positive comments about him and his hard work and dedication to baseball, but also about his job at the high school as a guidance counselor for all those years. So there are just a lot of people who have a lot of respect for him and his family so we just wanted to show him we appreciate all that he’s done over all these years.”

In other business, the school board also approved a new salary schedule for licensed instructional personnel and support staff pay schedule. The new licensed personnel salary schedule gives each employee an additional $2,000 annually.

Support staff pay receives an increase of $1 per hour across the board. The school also increased bus drivers’ daily rates from $65 to $70.