Cal Poly football team plane crash

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On October 29, 1960, a chartered C-46 plane carrying the California Polytechnic State University football team, hours after a loss to Bowling Green State University, crashed on takeoff at the Toledo Express Airport in Toledo, Ohio after the left engine lost power. Twenty-two of the forty-eight people on board were killed, including sixteen players, the team’s student manager, and a Cal Poly football booster. Cal Poly alumnus John Madden’s fear of flying is commonly attributed to the crash, although he has often said it stems from claustrophobia. Madden, who played football for Cal Poly from 1957–58 and was coaching at the nearby Allan Hancock Junior College at the time of the crash, knew many former teammates aboard the plane. Among the survivors were quarterback Ted Tollner, who went on to become head football coach of the University of Southern California and San Diego State University.

On Thanksgiving Day, November 23, 1961, LA County Supervisor Warren Dorn and Bob Hope provided a "Mercy Bowl" in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum between Fresno State and Bowling Green State to raise a memorial fund for the survivors and bereaved families. The event raised about $200,000. As of 2006, memorial plaques for the crash can be found on campus at Mott Gym and the Mustang horse statue. A permanent memorial plaza opened with the new Alex G. Spanos Stadium. The memorial has 18 copper pillars, one for each of the team members who died in the crash. Each copper pillar rises to the height of the player honored, and is adorned with a plaque about that player's life.

On September 29, 2006, the 1960 football team was inducted into the Cal Poly Athletics Hall of Fame.