John Heisman

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John William Heisman (October 23, 1869 – October 3, 1936) was a prominent American football player and college football coach in the early era of the sport and is the namesake of the Heisman Trophy awarded annually to the season's best college football player.

Contents 1 Early Life 2 Later Coaching Career 3 Legacy 4 References 5 See also 6 External links

[edit] Early Life

He was born in Cleveland, Ohio, but grew up in Titusville, Pennsylvania,^{[citation needed]} where he played football for Titusville High School, graduating in 1887. He went on to play football at Brown University 1887-1889 and at the University of Pennsylvania 1890-1891. He coached at Oberlin College in 1893, went to the University of Akron in 1894, and returned to Oberlin the next year. In 1895, he became the fifth coach at Auburn University, where he stayed for five years. With all these schools combined, he lost only five games.

[edit] Later Coaching Career

In 1900, he went to Clemson University, where he coached for four seasons before moving to Georgia Tech. He put together a spectacular 16 seasons there, including three undefeated seasons and a 32-game undefeated streak. He was coaching the Georgia Tech Engineers when they defeated the Cumberland College Bulldogs 222-0 in a game played in Atlanta in 1916, in the most one-sided college football game ever played, during which the Engineers scored with every possession of the ball.^{[citation needed]} Heisman's running up the score against a totally outmanned opponent was supposedly motivated by revenge against Cumberland's baseball team running up the score against Tech 22-0 the previous year.^{[citation needed]}

After a divorce in 1919, he left Atlanta to prevent any social embarrassment to his former wife, who chose to remain in the city.^[1] He went back to Pennsylvania for one season in 1920, then to Washington and Jefferson College, before ending his career with four seasons at Rice University.

[edit] Legacy

He was an innovator and developed one of the first shifts, had both guards pull to lead an end run, and had his center toss the ball back, instead of rolling or kicking it. He was a proponent of the legalization of the forward pass.

Heisman subsequently became the athletics director of the former Downtown Athletic Club in Manhattan, New York, and in 1935 the club began awarding annually in his honor what is now almost universally referred to as the Heisman Trophy, given to the player voted as the season's best collegiate player. Voters for this award consist primarily of media representatives, who are allocated by regions across the country in order to filter out possible regional bias, and former recipients. Following the bankruptcy of the Downtown Athletic Club in 2002, the award is now given out by the Yale Club.

[edit] References

[edit] See also

• List of presidents of the American Football Coaches Association

Preceded by Frank Cook	University of Akron Head Football Coaches 1893-1894	Succeeded by Harry Wilson
Preceded by F.M. Hall	Auburn University Head Football Coaches 1895-1899	Succeeded by Billy Watkins
Preceded by Walter Riggs	Clemson University Head Football Coaches 1900-1903	Succeeded by A.B. Shealy
Preceded by John McKee	Georgia Tech Head Football Coach 1904– 1919	Succeeded by William Alexander
Preceded by Bob Folwell	University of Pennsylvania Head Football Coaches 1920-1922	Succeeded by Louis Young
Preceded by Phil Arbuckle	Rice University Head Football Coaches 1924-1927	Succeeded by Claude Rothgeb

[edit] External links

Pennington, Bill. "John Heisman, the Coach Behind the Trophy", New York Times, 2006-12-08. Retrieved on 2006-12-08.