While at Carlisle, Welch was the quarterback for the school’s football team, which featured Jim Thorpe and was coached by Pop Warner.

In 1917, he entered the American Expeditionary Force during World War I as a Second Lieutenant, 808th Pioneer Infantry, under John J. Pershing.

From 1935 until 1937, Welch served as the director of athletics and head football coach at Haskell Indian Nations University, located in Lawrence, Kansas.

From 1937 to 1938, he served as head football coach at American University where he compiled an overall record of two wins, ten losses and one tie.

In 1939, some of his land was condemned by the US Department of the Interior to extend the Blue Ridge Parkway, a seizure Welch fought vigorously.

The Welchs had no children but adopted a niece, Serena, who became the model for the figure portrayed on the canning labels of Pocahontas Foods.