Traver Sutton graduated from Detroit, MI, Central High School in 1940. At Central High he was captain of both the football and basketball teams and was voted the most outstanding athlete of his Class of 1939. After graduation Traver enrolled at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio and played football under the tutelage of coaches Merlin Ditmer and Frank Wilton. During his sophomore year, a knee injury ended Traver’s football playing days. In 1943, prior to his graduation, Traver coached basketball and taught history at New Richmond Ohio High School. He graduated from Miami in 1944 and began teaching and coaching at Hamilton, Ohio, Fairfield High School until 1947. Traver and his wife, Marjorie, whom he met and married while at Miami, moved to Dayton, Ohio in 1947. While Traver coached football, cross country, basketball and track at Stivers, as well as teaching history and social studies, Marjorie was busy teaching at Emerson and Edison Elementary schools in Dayton.
Traver’s tenure in coaching (1947-1961) brought a resurgence of the Stivers athletic program, and again Stivers was a state power. Always professional and well-prepared, this true gentleman produced numerous Stivers Athletic Hall of Fame Members. Coach Sutton had an uncanny ability in connecting and relating to each student athlete, inspiring them and elevating their ambitions and efforts.
In 1961 the Suttons accepted an educational fellowship at Ball State University in Muncie, IN, where they both obtained Ph.D.s in Education. In 1965 Traver and Marjorie accepted teaching positions at Hillsdale College in Hillsdale, Michigan. Traver continued his coaching in cross-country for three more years. He enjoyed acting as a mentor to young people in both teaching and coaching. Traver retired in 1989 from Hillsdale College. He passed away in 2007 and is greatly missed by his family and all who knew him.
