After starring for the Saluki football team in the late 1960s, Carl Mauck ’69 embarked on a 13-year playing career with four teams in the National Football League. The SIU business management major then subsequently served more than 21 years as a NFL assistant coach.
Mauck’s exploits are well-documented in southern Illinois. The high school football field in his native McLeansboro is named in his honor, and last year he was honored as a member of SIU’s All-Century Football Team.
His contributions go beyond the football field, and he remains loyal to his roots.
“Southern Illinois is a wonderful place to grow up,” he says. “I have great memories of SIU. In addition to receiving a quality education, I’m still in touch with people that I met on campus. I couldn’t have asked for a better college experience.”
Mauck continues to pay it forward. He and his two younger brothers – George, a priest in Carlyle, Ill., and Walter ‘76, a dentist in Springboro, Ohio, have established a scholarship endowment in memory of their late parents. The Walter and Aurelia Mauck Scholarship will honor an SIU student from Hamilton County who maintains at least a 3.0 grade point average.
The Mauck brothers funded the scholarship through the sale of their parents’ farmland. Walter, Sr. was a World War II veteran and post office worker, while Aurelia served as an administrative school secretary for more than 20 years.
Mauck has made giving back to SIU a habit. He led efforts to establish a scholarship fund in memory of the late Saluki football player Billy Patrick to support student-athletes who need to return home due to hardship. Following his NFL coaching career, he came back to Southern as a volunteer tight ends coach under former Saluki coach Jerry Kill.
“I don’t know anyone with a bigger heart or more loyal than Carl Mauck. I know this through personal experience,” Kill says. “They will never make another Carl Mauck.”
The Saluki Hall-of-Famer continues his work with young people as a high school football coach in Texas. His Argyle Eagles advanced to the class 3A state championship last season.
“Carl has a heart of gold and loves Southern Illinois University,” says SIU Head Football Coach Dale Lennon. “He wants SIU to thrive and aspires to help others in the area become successful. When he does something, it is definitely genuine and there’s no other intention but to do good.”
Close friend Mike Reis ’78, SIU’s Hall of Fame broadcaster, agrees.
“SIU means the world to him, and gets mad when SIU fails – whether it’s from an academics or athletics standpoint,” Reis says. “Carl is not self-centered. If he can help SIU succeed, he just feels that it is what alumni are supposed to do.”
Reis says Mauck’s devotion to SIU and his hometown are further demonstrated through the establishment of this scholarship.
“It was important to Carl to reward a Hamilton County student who wanted to attend SIU, whether or not he or she is an athlete,” Reis says. “He hopes this creates SIU awareness among Hamilton County students, and that they will recruit others to enroll at the University.
“Carl will want to know about the winner, his or her family, and will probably follow and talk to them while attending SIU. He’ll want to know if he can be of any further assistance. He gets huge satisfaction from helping. We need so many more like him.”
If you are interested in establishing a scholarship endowment, please contact the Director of Development for Scholarships, Gary Bogue, at 618/453-4906 or garyb@foundation.siu.edu.