48 point night tops Bernard Howard’s record that stood for over 75 years

by Al Gibson, Clinton County News Publisher
When Clinton County High School Lady Bulldog senior guard Landree Moons put up that short running shot last Thursday night against Wayne County with 2:03 showing on the fourth quarter game clock to score her 48th point that night, she became the school’s new record holder for most points scored in a single game – girls or boys.
With her 46th point against Wayne County, Moons became the leading girls’ single game scorer, topping a 45 point performance by Brittany Flowers in a game against Dawson Springs on December 22, 2009.
But when she made that next bucket late in the fourth quarter, she passed the record set 75 years ago to become the record holder for all players at Clinton County High School, topping the 47 point mark that had stood since 1948.
Moons slipped past the record that was set by a young player for Clinton County High School by the name of Bernard Howard.
All Clinton County High School basketball fans know who Landree Moons is.
Most remember the scoring prowess of Brittany Flowers in the late 2000s, but who was Bernard Howard who put together his 47 point night three-quarters of a century ago?
With high school basketball going into the post-season tournament stretch this week in Kentucky, and realizing how fitting it was that Moons accomplished her scoring feat in her final regular season game and the final game she will play on her home floor in The Castle, I decided it was a more than fitting time to try and learn a little more about the previous record holder, whose name I have heard all my life.
Who was
Bernard Howard?

The Clinton County News reached out to several sources for information about the center who played for Coach Raymond Reneau named Bernard Howard in an attempt to gain some insight into the individual and the player.
Reneau’s head coaching career began with the 1942-43 season, but he had to step away to serve his country in World War II early in the 1943 season, handing the coaching duties over to L.H. “Prof” Robinson.
Reneau returned to the head coaching position for the 1945-46 season and remained as the head coach through the 1949-50 campaign.
Howard was one of five children in the Howard family, and grew up in a different time than most of us have experienced.
The son of Ed and Roxie Howard, the family moved to Albany in 1941 from nearby Jamestown, Tennessee.
Playing basketball for Coach Reneau, the 6’ 4” center wasn’t even the tallest player on what was a very tall team for those times, especially for a small high school as Clinton County was in the 1940s.
Howard’s single game 47 point performance came on February 5, 1948, in a game against Breeding High School, a since closed and consolidated high school in the small Adair County community located south of Columbia, and north of Burkesville, .
Not only did Howard drop in 47 points against the Raiders, but he nearly doubled the score of  his opponents on that night.  Clinton County won the game 94-24, according to the Clinton County High School Basketball Record Book. Breeding High School closed in 1953, along with Columbia High School to form the consolidated Adair County High School.
Howard played on a Clinton County team that included teammates Louis Smith, Lyndell Lawless, David Winters and a forward who was even taller than Howard by the name of Ivan Jones, who made up the normal starting five for the Bulldogs.
Other teammates included Ned Sloan, Bill DeForest, Edward Lawrence and J.D. Dixon.
Tony Sloan, a CCHS Basketball Wall of Fame member, told the Clinton County News during a brief telephone interview, that he believed the player, David Winters, who is wearing jersey number 66 in a team photo, had moved to Albany with his family to work in either the oil boom that was experienced in Clinton County during the 1940s, or perhaps for work on the then under construction Wolf Creek Dam.
He added that Lawless was a minister’s son who was serving a church in Albany during that time.
Sloan, who played for head Coach Bill Kidd and was named to the All-District teams in 1954 and 1955 and All-Region in 1955, was younger than Howard and played on teams in the mid 1950s, but his older brother, Ned Sloan, was a member of that 1947-48 Bulldog squad.
Sloan noted that during that era, players could simply choose any two-digit number for their uniform.
Smith wore number 33, Jones 44, Howard wore 88, Winters’ uniform was number 66, while Lawless’ uniform sported the number 99.
In the photo obtained from Mike Smith, the son of Louis Smith, the 6’4” Howard can be seen standing next to Ivan Jones, who appears to be at least three inches taller than Howard, putting him at about 6’7”.
Still, even with that height on the floor, the Bulldogs didn’t have a stellar year in the 1947-48 season, finishing the season with a 19-7 record, but failing to reach the 5th Region tournament after losing to Gamaliel High School, 37-34, in second round action of the 20th District Tournament.
In the 20th District’s opening round play that year, Clinton County had downed Fountain Run High School, another community school located in Monroe County, by a score of 70-35, before falling to the Tigers of Gamaliel.
Despite not reaching the regional tournament level of post-season play in 1947-48, Howard’s reputation on the hardwood was obviously well known across the region, as  well as across the state.
Both Howard and Jones were named to the 20th District All-District team at the close of the 1947-48 season and Howard was named to the Third Team All State squad while his teammate, Ivan Jones, was named to the Honorable Mention All State squad from the 5th Region.
Another player with ties to Clinton County much later was also cited that same year for his talents on the basketball court.
Long-time head basketball coach at Clinton County Lindle Castle, who played for Clark County during his high school career, was named to the Honorable Mention All State squad in 1948.
Howard finished his high school career at Clinton County with 458 points, averaging 17.6 points in 26 games, and according to the Clinton County High School Basketball Record Book, only playing in that 1947-48 season.
Many might still remember one of Howard’s brothers, Johnny Howard, and many more will likely remember the son of Johnny Howard, known as Johnny Wayne Howard, who attended school in Clinton County in the 1960s.
The Howard family moved from Albany when the younger Howard was in the seventh grade here, but he was still able to provide some insight into who his uncle, Bernard, was.
Times were different in 1948 than they are now, still in the post World War II era, and most families were having a hard time just making ends meet.
The economic situation often caused families to uproot and move to other areas where employment was available, and most of the youth in a family, especially the boys, often left school before graduating to work and help support their families, putting food on the table.
That was the case with the Howard boys, according to Johnny Wayne, who told the Clinton County News that his father and uncle both had to quit school in order to work.
“They started a painting business together and were very successful,” Howard said.
An education leader in Clinton County, L.H. “Prof” Robinson, who served as Superintendent of Clinton County Schools during that era, hired them to paint his house and convinced them to return to school, according to Howard, noting that Robinson had told them they would soon “run out of houses to paint”.
Robinson also was a head coach for the Bulldogs, holding that position for three seasons during the World War II years of 1942-43 through the 1944-45 season.
Johnny Wayne Howard went on to note that his father, Johnny Howard, eventually graduated from Clinton County High School in the same class with his mother, desite having dropped out of high school for several years to pursue the painting business with his brother, Bernard. He was seven years older than Hohnny Wayne’s mother when they graduated in 1949.
Now living in Elizabethtown, the nephew of Bernard recalled his memories of his uncle, along with stories he had heard about him years ago.
“He was a very funny guy with a wonderful sense of humor,” Howard said last week. “He was very tall, 6’3 or 6’4” and he was a great musician with a rich baritone voice who could sing Johnny Cash and Merle Haggard songs.”
He added that his uncle often sang in “honky tonk” bars in and around Fairborn, Ohio, a suburb of Dayton, where he lived.
Howard also remembered stories he had been told about his uncle’s basketball talents, as well as the support he received for playing, especially from his mother, Johnny Wayne Howard’s grandmother.
“My grandmother, Bernard’s mother, was mostly Cherokee and she would holler real loud when Bernard scored,” Howard said last week.
After serving in the U.S. Navy, Howard settled in Fairborn, Ohio, as did many young men of that era, choosing to live and work where manufacturing jobs were aplenty as the United States was rebounding from having gone through the tough economic times during World War II.
After his career in the U.S. Navy, Howard returned to the painting profession for the remainder of his working life, and unlike the advice that Robinson had given him earlier in his life, in the Fairborn and Dayton, Ohio area, he never ran out of houses to paint.
“After retiring from the Navy he continued to paint,” Johnny Wayne Howard noted last week. “He painted housing units, apartments and office complexes.”
Howard died in 2018 at the age of 91, outliving all four of his siblings.

Other high game scorers for Clinton County
Before Landree Moons’ record setting scoring night last week, Howard was atop a list of game high scoring players that included, from the boys’ list, Charlie Hardin (45 points against Glasgow in 2004), Jackson Harlan (45 against South Oldham and 44 against Louisville Male in 2017) Jason Gibson (43 against Monticello in 2002), Brent Durham (43 versus Powell County in 2007), Kenneth Conner (42 against Liberty and 41 against Monticello in 1962 and 1961, respectively) Kay Flowers (41 versus McCreary County in 1963), and Daniel Latham (41 against Monticello and 40 against Warren Central, both in 2000).
On the girls’ side, Brittany Flowers was the leader prior to Moons’ record scoring performance with a 45 point game that came against Dawson Springs in 2009, Angela Brown (44 against Boone County in 2000), Ansley Stalcup (43 versus Cumberland County and 37 against Todd County Central, both in 2015), Carol Bertram (35 versus Glasgow in 1979), Melissa Shelton (35 against Laurel County in 1989), Amber Guffey (35 against Pickett County, Tennessee in 2003) Paige Guffey (25 against Warren Central in 2003) and Melissa Shelton (34 against Russell County in 1990).

With thanks to Johnny Wayne Howard, Tony Sloan, the late Ronnie Guffey and his early work on the Clinton County High School Basketball Record Book, and the Kentucky High School Basketball Encyclopedia.

When Lady Bulldog senior Landree Moons put in this shot, with 2:03 showing on the game clock in Clinton County’s overtime win against Wayne County last week, she became the all-time single game scorer for Clinton County High School, with 48 points.  It was Moons’ last game to be played on The Castle hardwood.

The “starting five” for the 1947-48 Clinton County High School boys’ basketball team are pictured above.  From left to right, Louis Smith, Ivan Jones, Bernard Howard, David Winters and Lyndell Lawless.  The team, coached by Raymond Reneau, finished the season with a 19-7 record.