Analysis of information sources in references of the Wikipedia article "John Christenbury" in English language version.
It was in 1942 when the U.S. government was drafting all young college boys that baseball as well as other sports began to decline. Many colleges dropped the most popular of all spring sports and Coach Christenbury could only draw up a 14-game schedule which saw only three college teams listed. The rest of the teams on the card were service teams which were loaded with professional material.
Lt. (jg) John Boyd Christenbury, former coach and physical education instructor at East Carolina Teachers college, was killed in the explosion of two navy ammunition ships at Port Chicago, California, on July 18 [sic],1944. Christenbury came to ECTC in 1940. He was commissioned in the navy in March, 1943, and was given leave of absence from the college for the duration. He was from Statesville. He worked at Brevard college before coming to ECTC. His work in Greenville was outstanding, and he was popular with college officials, the students and the public.
Coach Christenbury was able to find several teams which proved to make games of interest for the Pirates. By winning seven and losing seven the Teachers ended up with a .500 average.