Ralph McElhaney has always been a teacher. Not a teacher in the conventional way. Not in a classroom, but on a football field.

From a young age, he learned from other mentors and feels fortunate enough to pass that along.

As a Butler High School defender and linebacker, McElhaney spent three years playing under coach Art Bernardi. The lessons started there.

“You had a sense of responsibility of being a teammate. That's what we were taught,” said McElhaney, 55. “Art Bernardi taught us to be proud, to represent the community and your teammates and your family.”

McElhaney of Fenelton graduated from Butler in 1976 but would meet up again with Bernardi. After one year at Edinboro University, where he played football, he left school.

“I joined the workforce and got a job,” McElhaney said. “My first job was as a backhoe operator, then I worked at Goettler's Beer Distributors, then Armco (AK Steel).

“I started there in 1981 and worked the production line in the hot mill, and I've driven a truck there the last 13 years. Everything is within the plant so I just transport it around,” McElhaney added.

Two years before he started at Armco, Bob Conklin, who had been McElhaney's Butler Area Midget Football League coach, asked if he'd be interested in helping him coach the Penn Street Cardinals.

“I was only 21 years old,” laughed McElhaney.

In 1981, Conklin accepted the Moniteau High School head coaching position and brought McElhaney along.

“I had a great background with everything I experienced at Butler,” McElhaney noted. “At Moniteau, I just shared my experiences.

“The midget players were jumping to high school, the sophomores and juniors in high school. It might have been intimidating, just being a young person, but you got to see players develop.

“Lewis Stoughton, the district judge, was a defensive end on that team,” McElhaney added.

From all that Conklin taught McElhaney, he came to a coaching crossroads.

“Art offered me a coaching job at Butler,” McElhaney said. “It was a tough time for me. I felt loyal to Bob. I tossed and turned on that for a long time.

“I ended up going to my old high school. Bob was mad at me for a little while.”

McElhaney worked with the freshman team for about eight seasons, then moved up to junior varsity, then varsity.

“I was there about four years when Mark Farabee was coach, then I stepped down. At the influence of my brother-in-law, I went back to coach East Butler for the 1999 season,” he said.

McElhaney stayed on through the 2003 season before rejoining the Butler High program under Garry Cathell.

When Cathell left after the 2006 season, McElhaney went to coach the ninth graders.

He then returned to the midget league program when he coached the East Butler midget team this past fall.

McElhaney recalls hearing a Penn State coach say it didn't matter what ages the players are, just as long as you like coaching.

“The midgets were in need of leadership,” McElhaney said. “My friend and I went back — back to our roots.”

No matter the level of football, no matter the team, McElhaney has always looked to teach what he learned to the next generation of players.

“I think the things they taught me were important for young men,” McElhaney said. “To build self-esteem, a work ethic, to put a lot of time in and get better each day. You have kids willing to learn and work.”

McElhaney also played a key role in coordinating an alumni football game in 1979, pitting Butler teams from 1975-76 against the 1977-78 teams. The game, which McElhaney's squad won 12-0, raised $7,000 to benefit Butler Memorial Hospital's renovations.

McElhaney also had his hand in the Greater Pittsburgh Football League semi-pro squad that played at Karns City. He served for two years as Bob Conklin's defensive coordinator from 1986-87.

In 1999, he also was on the coaching staff of the team then-Karns City coach Lon Hazlet took to compete in the Down Under Bowl in Australia.

McElhaney says he draws a lot of himself from his father, Don, who just turned 80.

“My dad was someone who was involved in Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts, a father who we could count on,” McElhaney said. “My dad's a very giving person. He's a great father, neighbor and husband. If someone needed something, he was there.”

McElhaney has two daughters, Brittany Morrow, 27, a nurse in the transplant department of Children's Hospital in Pittsburgh, and Taylor Green, who is a junior at Temple University

McElhaney, who built his home on 100 acres he owns in Fenelton, also has another project dear to his heart.

He's a committee member of the Butler High School Hometown Heroes, which honors contributors to the Golden Tornado football program.

“It's a great committee and a good program that recognizes people committed to the Butler football program, whether it honors a volunteer or a financial supporter,” McElhaney said.

“It's a chance to acknowledge and recognize. These inductees are extremely humbled by it.”

<B>Age:</B> 55<B>Address:</B> Fenelton<B>Family: </B>Two daughters, Brittany Morrow and Taylor Green; and one grandson, Roman<B>Job title:</B> Truck driver<B>Company: </B>AK Steel Corp.<B>Company address: </B>One Armco Drive, Butler<B>LEADERSHIP IS:</B>“Personally, it’s someone who is responsible, with the courage to do right. They do something with 100 percent commitment.”<B>INSPIRATION:</B>“There are different leaders for different things, and if you ask me, Hank Leyland exemplifies everything a leader is. He’s a true leader, no matter the situation as a father, a friend or on the football field. His daughter Emily has been a leukemia and cancer patient the past three years. He’s dealing with it with courage. He deals with it head on.”