They were tireless, loyal, loved to teach — and they all were winners.

Those attributes helped longtime assistant coaches Mark Farabee, Jim Kamerer, Jack Lehew, Jim Love, Gary Milanovich, Tim Nunes, Bill Tack and Harold "Bo"Voelker to become the 2007 Butler Football Hometown Heroes.

The group will be honored on the field before the Golden Tornado's season opener Friday night at Art Bernardi Stadium. Festivities continue Saturday with a golf outing at Lake Arthur Country Club and an induction dinner that night at St. Michael's Hall.

These eight men combined to coach Butler football more than five decades — ranging from 1959 through 2001 — and totaled 193 years of coaching with the Tornado.

"We were all very knowledgeable as to what we were coaching and we had a really good group of kids to work with,"Milanovich said.

Together, those coaches and players — led by head coach Art Bernardi — continually posted winning seasons and appeared in a few WPIALchampionship games.

Nunes and Farabee went on to become head football coaches at Butler. Milanovich became the athletic director.

The others never became head coaches and never aspired to do so.

"I knew my place,"Love said. "It was a fun job working with kids. I never wanted to take it beyond that."

"My skin's a little too thin for that,"Tack said of being a head coach. "I would cringe over the public relations aspect of that job. I was always content being a cog in the wheel."

Kamerer said the head coach had to put in a little bit too much time.

"Awful lot of work, awful lot of time," he said. "Besides, we had success and we were a good staff. There wasn't much talk about any of us leaving.

"All of us were teachers, so we were entrenched in our careers at Butler. We were around the kids all the time in school and that helped, too."

Many from that era taught so that they could coach. Farabee was among them.

When he was embarking upon a career in education, he turned down an offer to become an elementary teacher in Hampton because he wouldn't be able to coach there.

"They had a rule that elementary school teachers weren't permitted to coach any sports,"Farabee said. "When they told me that, I wasn't interested. I student taught with Rudy Corona and wound up in Butler.

"Another common denominator among this group of coaches was that we were all excellent college players. This group knew football."

Nunes, Tack and Farabee were teammates at Slippery Rock and won a state championship there. Milanovich is on Indiana (Pa.) University's all-time team as a receiver. Love was an all-conference player at Grove City College.

Love was an offensive guard in college and coached defense his entire career. Tack, who was a linebacker in high school and a strong safety in college, wound up coaching offense.

"When you play on one side of the ball for a long time, it gives you a unique perspective of the other side,"Tack said. "That helps in developing coaching skills."

Besides Voelker, who is deceased, Nunes is the only one of these coaches to leave the area. He now lives in Hilton Head Island, S.C.

"The longer we stayed together, the more we got to know each other,"Nunes said. "Our families became close and we attended functions together.

"I probably talk to some of these guys two or three times a week. We're very close friends."

Bernardi and a few of his assistant coaches — including Nunes and Voelker — already have been inducted into the Butler Area Sports Hall of Fame.

"This honor is like that one — it's attributable to the kids,"Nunes said. "Those boys gave us everything they had. Back then, it was like coaching small college football. That's how intense it was."

Lehew's coaching career at Butler spanned 30 years. He coached Love, Kamerer and Tack when they were in junior high and later coached alongside them.

"There were two of us coaching the junior high team and we had somewhere around 100 kids,"Lehew recalled. "When those kids include guys like Mike Kelly, the Saul brothers, Terry Hanratty ... it's something special.

"Football was just my kind of game. Even when I was playing, I always knew I'd wind up in coaching. I never wanted to leave it."

The Tack family has been a part of Butler High football for generations.

Bill Tack's grandfather played football for Butler in 1914. Tack's father played for the Tornado, as did his two brothers. His uncle played for Butler in the 1940s.

Tack played Butler football and later coached his three sons with the Tornado.

"That history, that uniform — this means a lot to us,"Tack said. "This means a lot to all of us."

Openings remain for the Hometown Heroes golf outing and/or induction dinner. The four-player scramble golf event begins at 9 a.m. and the fee is $55 per golfer.

The dinner begins at 6:30 p.m. and costs $10. To make reservations for either, call Kevin or Joni Vogel at 724-282-2543. The organizers are encouraging participants to finalize their reservations by Wednesday.