A native of Chattanooga, Tennessee, he attended City High School. He was highly recruited for football and chose Auburn University, where he was a member of the 1957 Auburn National Championship Football team and played in the Blue-Grey game and Senior Bowl.

Although drafted for professional football, he decided to be a coach/teacher. His undergraduate degree at Auburn in Education/Social Studies led to a Master’s Degree in Administration/Traffic Safety at the University of Montevallo. He was a coach at Tuskegee High School, T. R. Miller High School, E. B. Erwin High School, and Vestavia Hills High School.

He retired after 37 years in education in 2005. He was also was an instructor for the Court Referral Program and was the Director of Headquarters for 30 years at Alabama Boys State a member of St. Peter’s Catholic Church.

He was married to Inez Occhipinti Jeffrey for 49 years. He had four children (Millie Jeffrey Whitacre (Ron - husband), Jimmy Jeffrey (Celeste - wife), Jenni Jeffrey Dismukes (Jared - husband), and Jacki Jeffrey Lindsay (Brad - husband) and five grandchildren (Alex Whitacre, Holden Jeffrey, Brennan Jeffrey, Anne Claire Dismukes, and Ally Dismukes).

In leiu of flowers, donations can be made to Camp Bluebird (St. Vincent’s) and Alabama Boys State (c/o the American Legion). Funeral Mass was held Tuesday at 1 p.m. at St. Peter’s (2061 Patton Chapel Road, Hoover, Alabama).

Most everyone from the class of 1976 will remember Mike Clements, who played football for the Erwin Eagles. What everyone might not know is that he also went on to play for the Alabama Crimson Tide under legendary coach Paul “Bear” Bryant.

This video shows the famous goal line stand from the 1979 Sugar Bowl, when No. 2 ranked Alabama beat No. 1 Penn State for the National Championship.

I recently ran into Mike on Facebook, and found this video for the site. He was No. 43 in Alabama’s defensive secondary. I just remember he was a hard guy to tackle : )

He was also written up recently in the Birmingham News. Here’s the link to the article.

The other tackler: Barry Krauss’ Sugar Bowl stop in Alabama’s Goal-Line Stand will live forever, but time has obscured another defender