No athlete in the history of Fannin County sports, boy or girl, man or woman, was more accomplished in the art of scoring points in the game of basketball than Jackie Ledford Gilliam. Her amazing career accomplishments have landed Jackie a spot in the Fannin County Sports Hall of Fame Class of 2019.
Jackie grew up in McCaysville, the daughter of Wallace and Mildred Ledford. Mildred was the second youngest of the seven children of Burt and Nola Tipton. All seven children were outstanding athletes in their day in Fannin County and the Copper Basin area. Two of the boys, Earl and Joe, played professional baseball, Joe spending seven season in the Major Leagues with Cleveland, Philadelphia, Chicago and Washington. He played in the 1948 MLB World Series as a member of the World Champion Cleveland Indians. Dorothy, better known as Dot, was a terrific basketball player who led the McCaysville High School girls team to the 1943 Georgia District 9 Championship. Both Joe and Dot have been inducted into the Fannin County Sports Hall of Fame. So young Jackie had an exceptionally strong athletic gene pool to draw upon as she began playing basketball.
Jackie credits her aunt Dot with providing the inspiration for her to start her basketball career. She picked up a basketball for the first time as a fourth grader and Dot was there to encourage her to work hard and hone her skills.
Jackie Gilliam’s organized basketball journey began during her 6th grade year at McCaysville. She made the varsity squad that year under the tutelage of Coach Clyde Henry, another member of the Fannin County Sports Hall of Fame. She won a starting forward (or offensive player) position in the seventh grade and, during the next two seasons, scored a mind-boggling total of 670 points. She and her McCaysville teammates were undefeated during those two seasons and won two Fannin County Tournament Championships.
Her success carried over to her time at West Fannin High School where she made the varsity team as a freshman. She served her apprenticeship that season playing a supporting role behind three experienced upper-class forwards on the Yellow Jackets team. She was a starting forward as a sophomore and quickly became the go-to player on the offensive end of the court. It was a time when girls basketball games were contested between two 6-girl teams on the floor at any one time. Each team had three forwards and three guards on the respective ends of the court. The forwards and guards were limited to competition at one half of the court and were not permitted to cross the center line.
During her sophomore season, Jackie Gilliam averaged more than 18 points per game. Her team finished with a respectable 13-11 record and were denied a trip to the state tournament when they lost to Ringgold in triple overtime in the Region 7AA Tournament at Dalton. For her efforts, Jackie was named as the team Most Valuable Player and was selected as a member of the Chattanooga Times All Tri-State first team, an honor seldom bestowed upon a sophomore.
The Ledford family moved to Marietta, Georgia between Jackie’s sophomore and junior years due to her father’s job requirements. She joined the girls basketball team at Cobb County’s R.L. Osborne High School where she continued to post spectacular scoring numbers. As a junior she scored 706 points for a 30 points per game average. She won numerous awards at Osborne including MVP of the prestigious Cobb County Tournament and was named as the school’s Most Athletic girl student for the 1967-68 school year. A newspaper account of her exploits includes the following quote: “Miss Ledford, is acclaimed by many as the outstanding girls basketball player in Region 6AAA and possibly best all-around in the state”.
During the summer following her junior season, Jackie married Fannin-County native Frank Gilliam. Frank was a tackle for the West Fannin football team graduating in 1966. The marriage forced Jackie to take a detour in her basketball career because the Cobb County Board of Education had a ruling that prohibited married students from competing in athletics. A groundswell of public protest ensued but the rule remained in effect for another year. Cobb County finally rescinded the ruling a year later but that was too late for Jackie to continue playing basketball at Osborne.
It is often said that when one door closes another opens, and Jackie was recruited to play basketball at Cherokee County High School in Canton, a few miles up the road from Marietta. The Cherokee County girls had won two consecutive state Class AAA titles and returned all three forwards from the 1967-68 title team. Jackie was asked if she would consider a move to a guard position to avoid altering the ‘chemistry’ of the offense and she agreed. Jackie proved to be as accomplished on the defensive end of the court as she had been as an offensive threat and the Cherokee girls won a third consecutive state title. A sportswriter for the Atlanta Journal describes Jackie’s impact in the state title game vs R.E. Lee with the following tribute: “The pretty Miss (sic) Gilliam, who was a 30 point per game scorer for Osborne before transferring to Cherokee, was put at guard and was the prime reason Lee’s gunner, Phyllis Yates, was held to 16 points”. Jackie was named to the Class AAA All-State team for her performance in 1968-69. She was the Cherokee High leading rebounder with an average of 12 per game and was honored by having her number retired at the end of the season.
Jackie feels that Mary Robbins, her coach at R.L. Osborne, was the one person who really “taught me how to play basketball”. The two were very close and, ironically, after her graduation from high school Jackie was contacted by Coach Robbins with the news that she could arrange a basketball scholarship for Jackie at Mississippi State University if she wanted to continue her athletic career. By this time, however, Jackie and Frank Gilliam had settled into married life and she declined the offer.
Jackie and Frank were married until his untimely death in 2004 at the age of 54. The couple had just returned from a trip celebrating their 37th anniversary when Frank passed away. Their marriage produced two children, Frank Jr. and Nicholas who live nearby in Canton and Powder Springs, respectively. Jackie has four grandchildren. After many years in the medical field, as both a dental technician and a surgical technician, Jackie is now retired and lives in Blue Ridge with her puppy Snuggles.
