This is the last in a four-part series chronicling Warren Central’s football program as it celebrates its 40th birthday this season.

Many, many years ago, Lum Wright was cleaning out a desk in a dusty office in Mission, Texas. When he opened one of the drawers, he found an envelope with one sentence written upon it.

&#8220Eleven brothers are hard to beat.”

The motto was written by Tom Landry, who once coached in his hometown of Mission before becoming an NFL icon with the Dallas Cowboys.

Wright took the message to heart and carried it with him wherever he went in the coaching world. From Mission to Gilmer, Texas, and, eventually, to Warren Central.

Today, the message that once sat in an old desk drawer in Texas sits on a hand-painted wooden sign above a row of lockers in Warren Central’s fieldhouse. And, if you look hard enough, you might find it on a few old bumper stickers around Warren County, as well as in the hearts of every member of Viking Nation, past and present.

Warren Central has had plenty of slogans over the years, but few so perfectly wrap up what its program is all about.

From the trademark red pants to the disciplined, straightforward style of play, WC football is more than a game. It’s a way of life, a brotherhood that binds fathers and sons, uncles and nephews, cousins, brothers and friends across the generations.

&#8220I’ve been raised on Warren Central football and the tradition of Warren Central football,” said current WC quarterback Ryan Williams, whose father, Gary, and brother Neil both played for the Vikings. &#8220I want to be a part of it. It’s a good feeling to know I played with the coaches that they played with. It’s like another family out here.”

Warren Central’s success on the field has gone hand in hand with its success off it. Scores of players have gone on to enjoy college careers. A few have made it to the pros. But even more have had successful careers after football, away from the field.

It is those players that bring the biggest smiles to the faces of coaches who have been around the program for more than 30 years.

&#8220I’ve coached sheriffs, deputies, doctors, lawyers, and they’re outstanding people to this day,” said Robert Morgan, who served as the Vikings’ head coach from 1985-2003.

Morgan is part of a chain of coaches who have come to define Warren Central. He started his career as an assistant in 1968, two years before current head coach Curtis Brewer and three years before Wright arrived.

Wright gave WC a winning edge and an identity. Morgan, Brewer, and other longtime assistants like Larry Tyrone, Jim Taylor and Rick Graham, along with fieldhouse attendant Joe Jefferson, maintained and continued it.

Like the coaches, most of WC’s identity has stayed intact through the years. The team still runs the same basic offense and defense, with a few modern wrinkles, that Wright ran. A lot of the practice routines are the same, as is the approach to the game.

&#8220Robert Morgan had enough sense to know to keep on keeping on. And the best thing they ever did was to move Curtis Brewer up. They were both there before I was,” said Wright, who was WC’s head coach from 1971-84. &#8220Those that have been winners for 30 years, I think tradition plays a tremendous importance in that.”

The tradition extends to even before Wright’s tenure. In the six years before he arrived, Warren Central never had a winning record. Even though most of the players from those teams were gone by the time Wright took over, they still feel a strong connection to the teams that followed them.

&#8220I saw a guy wearing a Warren Central letter jacket the other day and I thought, ‘Man, those things still look cool,’” said Ron Anderson, a Warren Central lineman from 1968-70 who now manages three radio stations in Vicksburg. &#8220When you see somebody with that letter jacket, it’s like a secret society.”

When the next leader of that society comes along is open to question.

Morgan is already in semi-retirement, and Brewer and Tyrone may retire within the next decade. Brewer said he hopes that whoever succeeds the old guard keeps enough of the younger Viking coaches in place to continue what they have painstakingly built over the last four decades.

&#8220I would hope the transition is such that when we do (retire), that it carries on,” said Brewer, who is in his second season as WC’s head coach. &#8220We have coaches that are from Warren County, the majority of them.”

Whoever ushers in the next generation of Viking football – whether it’s in five years, 10 years or 15 years – will inherit not only a rich football tradition, but an abundance of fan support as well.

Thousands of old bumper stickers adorn cars in Warren County, proudly sporting slogans from years past and quietly marking their owners’ allegiance. Fathers take their sons to games as young children, then a few years later watch them play on the same field they grew up on.

And, years from now, more than a few members of this year’s team will certainly sit in the Viking Stadium bleachers and watch their own sons suit up in the red pants, leading their beloved Vikings to yet another victory on a warm autumn Friday night.

&#8220We have fans that have been following us for 25 or 30 years. They come up to you all the time,” Brewer said. &#8220And, thankfully, we add new fans every year.”