LORETTO, Pa. - St. Francis University has announced Bob Moore's induction into the athletics hall of fame will take place in a special invitation-only ceremony Aug. 17.
"It is a great honor to welcome Bob Moore into the St. Francis hall of fame on Aug. 17," St. Francis University President Very Rev. Father Malachi Van Tassell said. "Bob has demonstrated a lifelong commitment to St. Francis and a deep passion for athletics at our university. His love for the golden era of basketball has enriched our community's understanding of Maurice Stokes and one of the most remarkable periods in St. Francis' history. While Bob is being inducted into the hall of fame for his contributions to St. Francis, we also celebrate his professional achievements in the USFL and the NFL. We are proud that St. Francis played a role in his journey to success and in his efforts to 'become that someone.' "
Moore is being inducted into the hall of fame for his contributions to the St. Francis community as a student-athlete and alumnus. Moore was a member of the St. Francis men's tennis team, one of the first sports information directors in school history, the architect of the "Golden Era" wing of the Athletics Hall of Fame, a longtime member of the athletics hall of fame member and an emcee of the hall of fame ceremony.
"You have to start somewhere, and this is where it started," Moore said. "It's only natural that is where I end my career and get in the hall of fame for the accumulation of everything that has happened in my career."
Moore, who would enjoy a career in professional public relations, mainly with the Kansas City Chiefs, grew up in Altoona. He vaguely remembers seeing St. Francis legend and Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame member Maurice Stokes playing at the Jaffe Mosque in Altoona. Still, he will tell you that he got his first taste of St. Francis by selling popcorn at the Jaffe Mosque when the likes of Ed Winters and Calvin Fowler, two members of the St. Francis "golden era" hall of fame, were playing for the Red Flash. His mother was also the dental hygienist for St. Francis men's basketball coach Dr. William (Skip) Hughes, but Moore states his time selling popcorn was his first real connection to St. Francis and the reason he would enroll at the college.
A 1969 graduate of St. Francis, Moore was a three-year letterwinner on the men's tennis team. His roommate was men's basketball player Dave Magarity, who would later serve as an assistant coach and coach at St. Francis before having an outstanding head coaching career with the Marist men's basketball team and the Army women's basketball team.
"I knew that my only chance at a career in sports was the press box or the sideline," Moore said. "St. Francis gave me a chance to do some early work, and I was able to expand on that from there. You have to start somewhere, and that is where it began."
After graduating, Moore stayed connected with the men's basketball team as the public address announcer. With the urging of Magarity, Moore would begin his long and illustrious career in public relations as unofficially one of the first sports information directors in school history at St. Francis, focusing on the men's basketball program from 1976-78.
Moore reconnected with his alma mater again after Norm Van Lier's jersey retirement ceremony after his passing in 2010. At this time, the blue prints for Moore becoming the architect of the "golden era" for men's basketball were formed. At the request of the university president, Moore became the committee chair for the "golden era" hall of fame wing with induction ceremonies in 2012 and 2013. With some of the members of that era already in the athletics hall of fame, Moore helped bring the total to 18 members from that era, considered the winningest time in St. Francis men's basketball history.
"I am greatly honored to be a part of the hall of fame with golden era members because they were what got me interested in college sports growing up," Moore said "Being at St. Francis in the 1960s when Van Lier and those players were here was a great time to go to college. You knew them, you knew who they were, they were your friends and you had a relationship with them because of the size of the school."
Despite the last golden era hall of fame ceremony taking place in 2013, Moore remains involved with the St. Francis Athletics Hall of Fame as a committee member and emcee of the ceremony.
In addition, Moore has made several donations to St. Francis in honor of the golden era. First, Moore and several St. Francis men's basketball alumni donated plaques of the three St. Francis players to have their jerseys retired (Stokes, Van Lier and Kevin Porter). These plaques currently hang in the men's basketball locker room. He then completed the golden era project by donating plaques of the 18 golden era members of the athletics hall of fame with a dedication ceremony before the game honoring Norm Van Lier and the golden era Feb. 15 against Wagner. The plaques hang on the wall heading into DeGol Arena.
While Moore's enshrinement into the St. Francis Athletics Hall of Fame is thanks to his university contributions, he has enjoyed an outstanding career outside his time dedicated to his alma mater. He took something he first learned at St. Francis into his professional career. It almost sounds like Frank Sinatra's song, "I Did It My Way."
"I had a great deal of independence when I started out at St. Francis, and I had to do many of these things myself," Moore said. "It gave me a lot of freedom to promote and develop the program as I saw fit. You create a style and a process to build interest for the team and I did that in the USFL and the NFL after leaving St. Francis."
After his tenure as the sports information director at St. Francis, Moore worked for the Gettysburg National Military Park Service from 1978-79. He served in various capacities, particularly with special events such as the historic Camp David Summit and the opening of the Eisenhower National Historic Site. Moore was a member of the national advisory board of trustees for the Civil War Preservation Trust, the largest nonprofit battlefield preservation organization in the United States.
Magarity, who helped him get his first look at sports public relations at St. Francis, aided Moore in landing a position as a sports information director at Drexel. Moore stayed with Drexel from 1979-82, assisting the university in transitioning from Division II to Division I.
Through a relationship created with Chuck Newman at the Philadelphia Inquirer at Drexel, Moore was contacted about a new professional football league (USFL) starting in Philadelphia. He worked for the new franchise for a month in the summer to see if he liked it. When it was time to return to Drexel, Moore was back at Drexel for a day and immediately asked to return because the Philadelphia/Baltimore Stars were bombarded with public relations requests.
He left Drexel and started his longstanding career in professional sports, starting with the Philadelphia/Baltimore Stars. The league only existed for three years, but the Stars made the championship game each season and won titles in Philadelphia in 1984 and in Baltimore in the final season of 1985. Baltimore is the only city to have an NFL, USFL and CFL title in the United States.
After the USFL folded, Moore joined The Patt Organization, a Pennsylvania-based real estate development firm, as vice president of marketing and corporate communications.
Your connections can significantly impact a person's life, which is no different for Moore. Magarity and Newman are two of the first to help Moore receive opportunities, but another connection made with the Stars finally gave Moore a home. Carl Peterson, who was the general manager of the Stars, had a chance to take over the operations of the Kansas City Chiefs in 1989. Moore reconnected with Peterson and would spend the next 21 years as the Chiefs' director of public relations before taking over as the team's historian for eight seasons and retired in 2015.
As director of public relations, Moore oversaw the club's public and media relations efforts, working closely with Chiefs ownership, management, coaching staff and players while acting as the team's official spokesperson. He was also heavily engaged in developing the franchise's Hall of Honor and the Founder's Plaza while renovating Kansas City's Arrowhead Stadium.
In his later role as historian, he oversaw the care and collection of Chiefs and American Football League artifacts. He maintained the club's archives and the papers of Lamar Hunt, the founder of the Chiefs and the AFL. He is the author of several monographs on the history of the Chiefs and was the producer of "Games," an NFL Films documentary on the life of Lamar Hunt, which he followed with a film on Hunt's groundbreaking professional World Championship Tennis enterprise, "WCT: The Road to Open Tennis," which premiered at the International Tennis Hall of Fame in Newport, Rhode Island.
Despite his retirement in 2015, he continues to serve as historian emeritus for the organization and contributes columns to the team's webpage.
With Moore's induction into the Athletics Hall of Fame, St. Francis has inducted 81 members and six teams.
