After giving almost 70 years of dedication to being the team doctor for the Bakersfield College football team, Dr. Romain Clerou died at the age of 98 on Nov. 20.
“Dr. Clerou was like a mentor to me,” said current team physician Dr. Michael Tivnon. “As far as I know he took care of the Renegades from the late ’40s on.”
Tivnon added that Clerou was an old-fashioned doctor.
“He delivered babies, did surgery and really did everything. He was just an all-around great guy. I remember when I came into town and needed to talk to him about a patient. I asked one of the nurses what is his office or exchange phone, and she told me he didn’t have one and told me just call his home phone. He’s probably the last doctor in Bakersfield to have his home phone in the phone book. He’s just a good guy. A really good guy, a man’s man and doctor’s doctor.”
Tivnon explained that the impact Clerou made to BC is the fact that he was the team doctor for so long.
“He took care of these guys for years and years and he did it without any help at all, until [William] Baker and I came into town to help him out,” he said. “He was home and away for about 30 years. He had a big impact on this team and the community. He gave a lot to Bakersfield College.”
Clerou played for the BC football team from 1934-35 and was awarded the all-conference guard honor in 1935. He went on to get his medical degree at UC Berkeley. After that, he joined the Navy and served during WWII. After completing his service with the military, he returned to BC to be the football team’s physician.
BC athletic director Ryan Beckwith commented on Clerou.
“For me, this only being my second year here, he’s more of a legend than anything,” he said. “I met him last year on the sideline and he was quiet, but he had this presence about him that you just know that he’s just forever edged in the Renegade lure. You get this feeling when you’re around him, that you know that he knows just about everything about it. He was just that legend that you hear so much about, and when you met him it was a very humbling experience.”
Beckwith explained that what he remembers the most about Clerou is that the doctor would be on the sidelines smoking a cigar.
“What I’ll remember the most is just his stoic nature of having a cigar on the sidelines,” he said. “You just knew it was Dr. Clerou. When you walked in, you just had the scent and knew Dr. Clerou was around. I think from now on every time I smell a cigar, I’ll think of Dr. Clerou.
“We always talk about the Renegade legacy and that doesn’t exist without people like Dr. Clerou. He’s been here since about the beginning. For a very, very long time he has been a part of our culture and has been a part of what the Bakersfield College Renegades culture is about. He is just one of those figures, that he is Bakersfield College athletics.”