Education
Kansas State University.
Kansas State University.
In 1960, Emporia State University named the football stadium Francis G. Welch Stadium to honor his legacy. Welch enrolled in Kansas State Normal School (now Emporia State University) in 1914. Head football coach Homer Woodson Hargiss put him at quarterback where he remained until graduation four years later.
He also displayed skill in baseball and basketball, earning 11 varsity letters before his graduation in 1918.
Football
Welch was the 13th head football coach for Emporia State University in Emporia, Kansas and he held that position for 24 seasons, from 1928 until 1954. Emporia State, like many schools, did not play football during World World War World War II His overall coaching record at Emporia State was 115 wins, 82 losses, and 15 ties.
Welch led his team to a victory in the Missouri-Kansas Bowl with a 34–20 victory over Missouri State University on December 4, 1948 in Kansas City, Missouri. lieutenant was the only year the bowl game was played.
lieutenant was Emporia"s first post-season football game.
Welch (along with Washburn University coach Dick Godlove) also coached an "all-star" team made up of Kansas players to play a similar squad from Missouri in the "Mo-Kan Bowl" all-star exhibition game. Track and field
Welch coached the track and field teams at Emporia as well. Fran developed three National Collegiate Athletic Association individual champions and 13 individual National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics champs.
In 1960, Welch was selected to coach field event participants of the United States Women"s Track and Field Team for the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome.
Welch was awarded a Bachelor of Science in education in 1918 form Kansas Normal, then completed requirements for a degree in agriculture at Kansas State University in Manhattan, Kansas. He served as a United States Army lieutenant in World War I and took a leave of absence from teaching to serve in World World War II as a captain and special services officer at Fort Riley.
He was of the first three coaches to be selected for the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics Track and Field Hall of Fame and is a member of the Kansas Sports Hall of Fame.