Sanford Chandler, beloved San Francisco speech and debate coach

Sanford Chandler, a longtime San Francisco teacher and indefatigable champion of the fine art of high school speech, has died.

In a 40-year career, spent mostly at George Washington High School, Mr. Chandler was a social studies teacher who was willing to do anything to get students interested in the speech and debate team, which meant delivering something closer to a dramatic performance than what politicians do.

A lot of people say, “NFL, ha-ha-ha,’” Mr. Chandler told The Chronicle in 1990.

The only credit they received were points toward a varsity letter, with the word “speech” embroidered across the block W, and sewn onto a letter jacket with leather sleeves.

“They are mental athletes,” said Mr. Chandler, noting that it took more courage to get up and speak in front of a crowd than to return a kickoff.

[...] he became the speech coach at Archbishop Riordan High School, where he was known for wearing a shirt that said, “Coach Chandler may be a dinosaur but he can still bite.”

When he returned from his morning walk, his mind was still going, so he’d write letters to the editor, banged out on a manual Underwood.

After serving in the Army, he attended Columbia University on the GI Bill and graduated from the Columbia Teachers College.

In addition to rekindling the speech team, he started an “Alumni Hall of Merit,” to honor outstanding Washington graduates like Ollie Matson, Phil Burton, Johnny Mathis, Lee Meriwether, and Danny Glover.

Mr. Chandler would sell them at his classroom door and then come home and work the phones in the evening.

Scholarship donations may be made to the Chandler Family Fund at the George Washington High School Alumni Association, 600 32nd Ave., San Francisco, CA 94121.