Jenna McEachern

A Taco Flats Love Story by Randy McEachern

The first time I met Jenna was in 1974, at a bar off of North Lamar called Hector’s Taco Flats. She was a Texas cheerleader, and I was a lowly freshman quarterback. Jenna saw me sitting in the corner, nursing a beer, and told the owner, Hector Alvarado, “That kid’s gonna get you arrested.  There’s no way he’s 18 years old.”

Six years later, in 1980, we were married. The daughter of a prominent high school football coach, Jenna was beautiful, smart, articulate, and she knew football.  She’d spent many hours at UT’s athletic offices, visiting with Coach Royal and Coach Ellington and working with Jones Ramsey and Bill Little in the Sports Information Department.

Almost two decades later, Bill tapped Jenna to edit One Heartbeat: A Philosophy of Teamwork, Life, and Leadership, One Heartbeat II, and several other books he’d written on Longhorn sports. In 2006, she and Bill compiled What it Means to be a Longhorn, a collection of stories of some of Texas’ best players from the 1930s through 2005. Just before the 2010 football season, Triumph Books asked Bill to write a book about Texas football. He replied that he was far too busy during the season to write a book and suggested that Triumph ask Jenna to write it. The resulting book was 100 Things Longhorn Fans Need to Know and Do Before They Die.

One sunny afternoon in 2009,  Jenna was reading on our front porch. Edith Royal drove into our driveway and walked up to the porch holding a folder full of the letters that kids had written Coach Royal during his twenty-year tenure as UT’s head football coach.  “I don’t know what we can do with these, but let’s do something with them.” Jenna and Edith’s collaboration resulted in the book that Jenna is most proud of:  DKR:  The Royal Scrapbook. Her love for The University, for Coach and Edith Royal, and for the history of Longhorn football is reflected in that labor of love.

Coach Ken Dabbs always told me I’d out-kicked my coverage when I married Jenna, and he was right. I’m awfully proud of her accomplishments as a wife, mother, and author.

Randy McEachern

The oral history as told through the Eyes of Texas Jenna McEachern is below

Jenna Hays McEachern grew up in the world of football. She is the daughter of a successful Texas high school football coach, and both of her brothers played on his teams while she cheered from the sidelines. She’s been a Longhorn fan since she was nine years old and made her first pilgrimage to Austin.

Jenna studied photojournalism at The University of Texas and also majored in being a UT cheerleader. She worked for Jones Ramsey and Bill Little as editor and go-fer in the Sports Information Department and later edited “One Heartbeat – A Philosophy of Teamwork, Life and Leadership” and “One Heartbeat II – The Road to the National Championship”, both written by Mack Brown and Bill Little.

Little and McEachern collaborated on “What It Means to be a Longhorn”, a collection of oral histories of some of Texas’ greatest players. Her second effort, “100 Things Longhorns Should Know and Do Before They Die,” was published by Triumph Books in 2008. “DKR: The Royal Scrapbook”, by McEachern and Edith Royal, was published by The University of Texas Press in August 2012.

McEachern was named one of 125 “Extraordinary Exes” during the Ex-Students’ Association’s 125th Anniversary. She is married to former Longhorn quarterback Randy McEachern. They still live in Austin, where they raised three near-flawless children: Bailey, Hays, and Lester Simmons.

Longhorn Nation; Texas Greatest Players Talk about Longhorns

Football

By Bill Little; Jenna Hays McEachern

Triumph Books; Copyright 2015

Longhorn Nation is a quick and entertaining introduction to University of Texas Football from a player’s perspective.  It covers a tremendous amount of territory from the 1930s to the 2005 National Championship.  Sandwiched in the accounts are transitions from one Coach to another, from war to peace, from I-formation to the Wishbone.  All of these events are told by the people (players) who were in the middle of them.

There are no two people better qualified to put this type of book together than Bill and Jenna. Bill is a longtime member of the Staff of the University of Texas Athletics Department. Jenna is an ex-University of Texas Cheerleader, an author of several books on University of Texas athletics, and the wife of an ex-University of Texas Quarterback, Randy McEachern.

What I find most interesting in this book are the hidden gems of information and the ways the game has changed over the years. For example, in the early years, there were no scholarship limits on schools such as UT, whereas now there are strict limits. As players recount their experiences, you can trace how these policy changes impacted the recruiting process and how they made their decisions to join the Longhorns.

Competition for specific recruits could be intense.  In some cases, recruits had made up their minds when they were six years old.  Others made their final decision literally in the final days.  Coaches (high school and college), parents, girlfriends, high school teammates, alumni, academics, and Austin culture all played a role in the final decision.  Indeed, the final decision was as much of a surprise to the player as it was to the recruiter or his parents.

The introductions by Darrell Royal and Mack Brown were particularly insightful and, in some cases, hilarious.  Mack Brown quoted Coach Royal as telling him when he first came to campus, “I’m too old for a regular job, but I’ll help you where I can.”  Being recently retired, I certainly can identify with that perspective.

I found Earl Campbell’s story the funniest and, in a way, the most genuine. He was truly flabbergasted by the entire recruiting process and hoopla surrounding him, the team, and the Heisman Trophy process.

Not surprisingly, what stands out in the stories told over the decades is the loyalty players have to specific Coaches (especially the ones who recruited them), Coach Royal in particular, and the influence Coaches have in their lives (for example, Coach Brown). Other staff members also had a profound impact on players, trainers, equipment managers, and one standout person, Sally Brown, Coach Brown’s wife.

It goes without saying that many of the players interviewed for this book have formed long, lasting relationships that have lasted years and, in some cases, decades based on deep, shared experiences.  You truly have to read this book to understand, as a non-player, the depth of the feelings players have for each other and their experiences.

As one might expect of a book of this type, it is focused primarily on the positive experiences the players had during their time at the University.  Some players had the opportunity to be critical of their experience or the University, but largely, they were able to place their feelings in the context of what they were able to build on from their time at the University to improve their lives and those around them.

DKR: The Royal Scrapbook

by Jenna McEachern with Edith Royal
September, 2012
University of Texas Press
ISBN: 978-0-292-70493-0

McEachern, Jenna Hays with Edith Royal. DKR The Royal Scrapbook University of Texas Press- Austin, Tx.- Front Cover courtesy Athletics Department  University of Oklahoma.  Book Designed by Derek George. The front flap is courtesy of the University of Texas Sports Photography Department, and the back flap is courtesy of Royal Family Archives.

Decades after his last game in 1976, Darrell K Royal remains “The Coach,” the winningest football coach in University of Texas history. Royal is still revered as “a coach who would rather lose a game than engage in unsportsmanlike tactics; who would neither make excuses for losing nor brag about winning…” in the words of the City of Austin’s “Darrell Royal Day” proclamation. DKR offers an intimate, insider’s view of the private life of the man behind the legend through an extraordinary collection of never-before-published photographs, letters, newspaper clippings, football ephemera, recollections, and “Royalisms” lovingly preserved by Edith, Royal’s wife of more than sixty-five years.

Preview the book at UT Press

 100 Things Longhorn Fans Should Know and Do Before They Die

by Jenna Hays McEachern
Triumph Books — July 1, 2008
ISBN-10: 160078108X
ISBN-13: 978-1600781087

The University of Texas was legislated to be great. The 1876 Constitution of the State of Texas directed the legislature to establish a “University of the first class…styled ‘The University of Texas.'”

That same legislature made the Agricultural and Mechanical College [Texas A&M] a branch of The University (then called the “Main University”).

Those are only two of the 100 Things a true Longhorn fan must commit to memory. From the history of The University to the details of our four national championships, “100 Things” is the ultimate bucket list of what’s important about the Horns.

“Without question, “100 THINGS” is THE definitive guide to acquiring the TRUE HEART, SOUL, and MIND of a great LONGHORNS FAN.”

McEachern, Jenna Hays. 100 Things Longhorns Fans Should Know & Do Before the Die.  Triumph Books, Chicago 2008

What It Means To Be A Longhorn

Edited by Bill Little and Jenna McEachern
Triumph Books, August 1, 2007
ISBN-10: 1572439513
ISBN-13: 978-1572439511

Forewords by Darrell K Royal and Mack Brown set the tone for this unprecedented collection of stories, thoughts, and memories of some of Texas’ best football players.

There is a common thread that runs through all of the stories. In choosing Texas, each of these “boys” had the courage to challenge himself to compete with the best and against the best. To a man, they were challenged and changed forever by this tradition, this place, this “University of the first class.”

From Howard Terry, who played in the 30s, to Earl Campbell, UT’s first Heisman Trophy winner, to Vince Young, commander of the 2005 National Championship team, these men tell compelling stories of the spirit of Texas, the expectations of excellence, the pride of having worn the burnt orange and white.

“Sit back and prepare to see how, over the years, The University of Texas has impacted lives. While the crux of this is supposed to be just about football players, you quickly realize that this book transcends football and really touches how U.T. Austin impacts lives.” – Jason Bronstad, Amazon.com Customer Reviews

One Heartbeat, edited by Jenna McEachern