Neil and Roberta Crane raised their family to believe in the importance of giving back to their community. And in using the term “family,” that means not only their children but also the students Neil Crane instructed as a physical education teacher and men’s basketball coach for 15 years at Allen Community College.
Now, the community has an opportunity to recognize Neil Crane’s contributions. A fundraising campaign is underway to raise money to name the floor of Allen’s gymnasium in his honor.
The campaign is called the Coach Neil Crane Allen Community College Fund. From now until Dec. 15, donations to the fund will be matched, thanks to a program offered by Your Community Foundation and the Patterson Family Foundation.
In addition to naming the gym floor in Crane’s honor, donations will also go to making improvements to the facility. A ceremony in February will make it official and allow the community to congratulate Neil Crane in person.
Leslie Crane, daughter of Neil and Roberta and head coach for women’s basketball at Allen, said she’s honored to help the college and the community create a lasting legacy for her dad.
“He’s a big part of why I went into coaching, and he was a big part of the lives of young men that were here over the years. It’s the right thing to do to recognize the success he brought to Allen and how he helped those kids,” she said.
Erik Crane, the couple’s son who now lives in Springfield, Mo., said the lessons his dad imparted stretch far beyond the basketball court. Erik and his wife, Heidi, both grew up in Iola and now own CPI Technologies, an information technology and office equipment company. Better known as Copy Products Inc., they continue to operate an office in Iola.
“While I’m not a coach, I still try to bring the coaching philosophies I’ve learned to mentor people in our business,” he said. “That happened to a lot of young people my dad was in contact with. They learned not only how to play basketball but how to be a good human off the court.”
Leslie said the campaign to recognize her dad isn’t entirely a surprise but “we’ve kind of kept it somewhat under wraps.”
NEIL CRANE, now age 85, won 401 games as a college coach, including more than 300 at the helm of the Red Devils during his tenure from 1975 to 1990. He’s known as “the winningest coach in Allen’s history.”
In an article reflecting on his career to celebrate Allen’s centennial anniversary last year, Crane said the best years of his life were spent in Allen County.
In addition to Leslie and Erik, the couple has another son, Mitch, who is senior vice president of engineering and technology for Extract Production, an oil extraction company based in Tulsa.
Neil Crane grew up in Gridley, where he was a standout in basketball, football and baseball. He’d go on to play a combination of those sports at Butler County Community College and the College of Emporia, a small Presbyterian school. He then coached football and basketball at high schools at Ransom and Wakeeney. In 1967, he returned to coach at the College of Emporia, followed by a head basketball coaching gig at Highland Community College.
When a coaching spot opened at Allen in 1975, he saw it as an opportunity to join a college with a great academic reputation and a little closer to home, he told the Register.
Crane led the college to its greatest level of success in the 1980s. Son Erik called it “the heyday of athletic competition, especially in the Midwest.”
