Who was Nemo Herrera?
An alum and prominent Mexican-American in the history of sports in Texas who is not actively remembered today on campus
William Carson “Nemo” Herrera was a Mexican American athlete and Southwestern alum who spent his entire life immersed in sports. He was a man who not only made his mark on the court and field, but also impacted the lives of numerous young people through coaching, educating, and being a mentor. Given his prominence in the history of sports in Texas, you would think he would be actively remembered on campus, but this is not the case.
Rodolfo and Carolina Herrera had their son William Carson Herrera, on February 19, 1900. He resided in San Antonio, Texas, for the entirety of his childhood. At the age of 12, he started attending public school and immediately fell in love with playing organized sports. Soon after, his teammates bestowed upon him his lifelong nickname “Nemo,” which was derived from a combination of the main character in a popular comic strip Little Nemo and a spin on his family nickname Memo. At Breckenridge High School, he prevailed in both baseball as a second baseman, and basketball as forward. He was an outstanding athlete in his teenage years, so it was no surprise to those who knew him when he continued playing ball in college.
In 1918, he was recruited to play sports at Southwestern University. He lettered in baseball and basketball all years he attended Southwestern. He was a two-time member of the All-State college basketball team, a one time member of the All-State Baseball team. He also lettered one year in football while at Southwestern, but decided to not continue playing the rest of his time at SU after sustaining a serious leg injury.
Additionally during his college years, Nemo was a member of the Phi-Delta Theta Fraternity, and a part of the Student Army Training Corps. Although he did not graduate from Southwestern, he was still an outstanding and notable athlete during his time, and he would eventually earn his degree from Trinity University, in his home city. On breaks from school, he would play semi-professional baseball to help pay for university.
Herrera began his coaching career in 1923 at Beaumont High School soon after graduating, where he was an assistant coach on the basketball team for a short period of time, a time when he also helped guide his team to victory all the way to the district championships in 1924. During this year, he also continued to play on a semi-professional baseball team.
A year later he took a job with that Gulf Oil Company in Mexico, and continued playing there from 1924 to 1927. However, in 1927 he got seriously injured in a baseball game and was taken to an American hospital, where he met the love of his life and future wife, a nurse named Mary Leona Hatch. The young couple soon married and returned to San Antonio, where they settled down and had two boys, William and Charles.
In 1928 Herrera was hired to coach all sports at Sidney Lanier Junior High School, a school that was in one of San Antonio’s poor, mostly Mexican/Mexican American West side barrio. In his first year, he helped guide all three of the school’s teams to a district championship. In 1933 he became the first Mexican-American head coach of a major sports program in Texas when he was promoted to head coach. In the course of his time at Lanier, Herrera coached basketball, baseball, and sometimes football as well. On the side he would umpire in American minor leagues and the Mexican National League, and worked as a college basketball referee to supplement his income on breaks and weekends while coaching.
He changed up the strategy of the basketball team, and helped them use their small size and speed to their advantage. This strategy led them to much success from 1938 to 1945. Lanier won five district titles and made it to the final four of the state basketball playoffs four times, winning state in both 1943 and 1945.
In 1945 he turned down the opportunity to fill in as head basketball coach at Texas A&M while their usual coach took leave. He declined because he wanted a more permanent position, so he went to coach varsity basketball at Bowie High School in El Paso. He then led the Bowie baseball team to two back-to-back titles in their first two years. Further, he led the basketball team to four district titles, as well as an appearance in the final four for state playoffs in 1948.
In 1949, El Paso Bowie qualified for the first ever baseball championship tournament. They were the only entirely Hispanic team to compete. Although they were unable to find accommodations because of segregation, that did not stop Nemo and his boys. They slept under the bleachers at Texas Memorial Stadium for the entire duration of the tournament. Nonetheless they went on to win the Class AA state title, and 7 of his players were named to the All-State team. With this, Herrera became the third Texas high school coach to win a state championship in multiple sports. He remained at the school until 1960, during which time he would win three more baseball district titles.
Between 1960 and 1962, Herrera became the head baseball coach at Edgewood High School in San Antonio. He then returned to El Paso to coach at a newly built school, Coronado High School. Here he helped establish their first ever baseball team, a team who won their first district title in 1967. Throughout his time here, Herrera also organized summer baseball leagues and coached El Paso’s under-fifteen team.
Herrera retired from coaching in 1970 and returned to San Antonio at the age of 70. It is then when he began a new career as the director of civilian recreation at the Kelly Air Force Base, where he would work until 1981. A few years later, he passed in San Antonio on April 5, 1984, and was buried at San Jose Burial Park.
Herrera has received much recognition for his devotion to the games, as well as his guidance to others. Nemo Herrera was also the first Hispanic to be inducted into the Texas High School Coaches Association Hall of Fame in 1967. Additionally, he was inducted into the El Paso Athletic Hall of Fame in 1969, the El Paso Baseball hall of Fame in 1988, the San Antonio sports hall of fame in 1997, Texas High School Basketball Hall of Fame in 1999, and the San Antonio ISD hall of fame in 2016. Along with this, the gymnasium at San Antonio Lanier High School is named after him.
Herrera also was inducted into the Southwestern Athletic Hall of Fame in 1995, which is why we have located this pin near Robertson Center. But despite this and all the honorifics elsewhere, Nemo Herrera is not prominently remembered in the commemorative landscape of his first alma mater, Southwestern.
