(CNN) James "Radio" Kennedy, the mentally disabled man whose importance to a South Carolina football team inspired the Hollywood movie "Radio," died early Sunday at the age of 73, T.L. Hanna High School confirmed.

He passed away surrounded by his family after midnight Saturday into Sunday, Athletic Director John Cann said. Details for his funeral will be handled by McDougald Funeral Home in Anderson.

Kennedy earned the nickname "Radio" in the mid-1960s when he began to show up at Hanna's football field with a transistor radio, according to Sheila Hilton, the former principal at Hanna

"He became a fixture at football practices, standing passively and watching, until one day when he began to mimic the coaches' signals and tried his hand at yelling out commands," Hilton wrote. "At that point, he could have been labeled a distraction and sent away. But he was not. The coaches embraced him, and as coaches came and went, someone would always take over in caring for him."

Coaches, players, students and the community came to embrace Radio, who took on duties as assistant coach, cheerleader and halftime performer. Though he could not read or write, he took classes at the high school, forever a junior so that he would not graduate

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