The Incredible Impact of Coach Ed: Letters From a Grateful Community

In the days since the passing of longtime J.C. Booth Middle School science teacher and basketball coach Dave Edinger, the depth of the community’s grief has been matched only by the depth of its love. Our original coverage of his death, published last week on The Citizen, drew an extraordinary outpouring of responses from current and former students, parents, friends, and colleagues. Hundreds of them flooded the funeral home—“wrapped around the building three times,” Sandy Edinger said—to honor the man who spent more than two decades teaching, coaching, mentoring, and quietly lifting up Peachtree City.

The visitation was so large that some Mowell Funeral Home staff told Sandy they had never seen anything comparable. “The staffers I spoke with said the largest visitation they’d ever had before was probably a third of this,” she recalled. “People just kept coming.” The Mowell office confirmed to Sandy later that it was absolutely one of the biggest they had hosted.

But even more than the crowds, it has been the steady stream of small, intimate moments—encounters in grocery aisles, handwritten notes, tearful embraces from former students—that have reminded Sandy that she shared her husband with an entire community that loved him as deeply as she did.

Finding her footing, one hour at a time

Sandy is honest about where she is in this early stage of grief.

“Well, I’m no longer medicated,” she said. “So there we go—we’re walking in the right direction. Little things, you know? I’m still numb. It’s still confusing, imagining what the life ahead of me is going to be like, since I had already been able to imagine it for so many years prior to November 4.”

She has leaned heavily on wisdom she once learned in therapy: don’t make major decisions for six months after a life-changing event. “I can already diagnose—I’m not thinking clearly,” she said. “I can’t focus. Fortunately my boys are still in town…they have been a huge help.”

The community, too, has refused to let her walk alone. “My phone pings all day with people wanting to come by, bring something, visit. It’s wonderful. So I have no choice but to walk through it.”

One small outing became unexpectedly emotional. Sandy stopped by a jewelry store in Kedron Village to look at a St. Christopher medal for a friend.

“I told the girl behind the counter, ‘My husband was Coach Ed.’ And she burst into tears. She didn’t even have him as a teacher, but she grabbed me and hugged me and said, ‘I loved Coach Ed.’ She was shaking in my arms.”

At the pharmacy, the woman behind the counter recognized his name too. “She said, ‘When that man comes in here, he is so kind, and he always makes me laugh.’”

Sandy knows she will encounter many more moments like these. “Everywhere I go now, I know I’m going to run into people. And right now it’s still so raw.”

What helps, she has learned, are mental breaks—brief pockets of time where she can breathe again. A friend insisted she come play pickleball. Another asked her to run a simple errand. “For an hour and a half, I didn’t think about it,” Sandy said. “And that’s how I’m doing—an hour at a time.”

Her ex-husband, now also a widower, shared something she keeps repeating to herself: “You make it to Friday. Then you make it to the next Friday.”

The Booth family, grieving—and giving—together

One of the places Sandy feels most held is among the staff and students of J.C. Booth Middle School.

“I can’t say enough about our Booth family,” she said. “They are unbelievable. They’re hurting too, and for them to be hurting and at the same time doing so much for me…you can’t imagine.”

Groups of teachers have rotated through her home, cleaning, bringing food, folding laundry, delivering candles, leaving gifts, telling stories. “Some of the best times of our life were had together, working together,” Sandy said. “I’m not going to leave my kids. I miss my kids. I love them so much.”

She hopes to return to teaching the Monday after Thanksgiving. “I need some normalcy,” she said. “And right now the kids just need to be loved on.”

What the community wrote about him

More than a thousand notes and letters arrived for Sandy—so many personal tributes that she keeps them in bags around the house, reading as many as her heart can manage each morning.

While each note is different, the themes are strikingly consistent.

One came from longtime coach Jason Eisele:

“What I appreciated the most about Dave was his dedication to character education. As much as he knew about the game of basketball, he was intentional about teaching the young men and women under his care important life lessons…On a personal note, I am eternally grateful that all 3 of my own children were influenced by your husband.”

Another, from co-worker Lindsay Dalton, spoke of the way he showed up during her grief:

“Every year around the time of my dad’s passing he would come check to see if I was okay or if I needed anything. I am grateful for his love!”

Dozens of former students wrote about how he transformed their confidence. One tribute described a turning point in seventh grade:

“He told us the difference between ‘wanting’ to win and ‘doing’ what it takes to win. He told us we were special. On that night, we believed him.” — Dom D’Auria

Others wrote about his impact far beyond basketball:

“My youngest was desolate. He was the first teacher to inspire her love of science and interested her in becoming a Biochemist…He saw everybody, everybody, no matter who they are.”

Perhaps the most universal sentiment came from a student who wrote:

“You made me better as a person and a friend and teammate… I will always fight and work harder because of you.”

City leaders remember his quiet impact

The loss of Coach Ed reverberated far beyond the school walls. Peachtree City Mayor Kim Learnard spoke with deep respect for the educator who shaped generations of young residents.

“He was known as a teacher who treated every child with dignity and made them feel seen,” she said. “His kind of daily, invisible leadership is what actually holds a community together.”

Learnard said she felt “a shockwave through the schools” when she heard the news. “He made Peachtree City better through the kids he taught,” she added.

She also recalled, with emotion, that she kept a handwritten note of encouragement that Coach Ed once wrote her—a small act of kindness that stayed with her.

A son’s gratitude

Chad Pitts, Edinger’s stepson, grew up with Dave from the age of six. He spoke openly about the man who helped shaped him.

“I’ve been really blown away at the amount of support my mother and my whole family have received,” he said. “Growing up, Dave really taught me a lot about what it is to be a servant leader.”

Several memories surfaced for Chad as he reflected on their relationship. At the visitation, one moment in particular moved him deeply.

“One of the most moving people at the funeral was actually the custodian at Booth who just got his citizenship recently,” Chad said. “He and Dave would spend mornings together because Dave would get there so early. Seeing him waiting in that long line just to be there for my mom — that was super meaningful.”

Basketball had woven the two of them together from childhood to adulthood, from father-son camps to an unforgettable trip when Chad surprised Dave with tickets to the NBA Finals.

“In the year we won the NBA Finals, I was able to fly him out first class and take him to the game,” Chad said. “That was a really cool experience.”

He laughed remembering a childhood prank — the kind of mischievous moment that becomes family lore.

“There was this exotic peanut shop in Savannah,” he said. “He gave me one covered in wasabi and convinced me it was a gumball. I bit into it and then vomited in front of the whole team. He laughed. Even I was kind of laughing.”

But the most enduring part of their relationship is quieter, rooted in character rather than moments.

“For 24 years, there was someone in my corner who always had the answer to every problem without panicking or freaking out,” Chad said. “I would ask myself, ‘What would Dave do?’ I still do. I’ll never be the man he is, but I can hope to shoot for half that high.”

The questions that remain

Sandy does not shy away from the hardest part of this story.

“The reason I talked to you in the first place,” she said, “was because if you were going to tell the story, I wanted it to reflect the truth about who my husband was.”

She is clear about this: “He was not his actions. He was a human being. And he was a hell of a human being.”

There are questions she may never have answers for—questions about pain, medication, stress, physical decline, and what might have been happening in his final moments. “I know in the bottom of my soul that something was off,” she said. “He would have been the first person to talk someone off a ledge.”

But she also knows this: “He would protect me. If he was having those thoughts, he would not have wanted me to know. He was a protector.”

A legacy that will not fade

In her home, Sandy has kept a stack of tiny handwritten cards Dave collected—quotes he loved, jokes he told his students, reminders to himself about how to treat people. He high-fived kids in the hallway, wrote encouraging notes, remembered anniversaries of losses, checked in on grieving families, stopped to learn the life story of the seafood clerk at Fresh Market.

“He saw everybody,” Sandy said. “No matter who they are. That’s why I snapped him up,” she added with a small laugh. “He was single for seven years, then we only dated for two months. I knew what kind of man he was.”

Her goal now is simple: return to her classroom, return to her kids, return to the work she and Dave both loved.

And in the quiet moments—before the house wakes, before the next batch of letters—she lets herself cry, then stands up again.

“Fall down seven times, get up eight,” she said. “That was his favorite saying. And I keep telling myself that.”

If you or someone you know is struggling

If you are experiencing thoughts of self-harm or emotional crisis, help is available 24/7. Call or text 988 to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.