Fritz Pollard

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Fritz Pollard
Pollard and Robeson.jpg
Fritz Pollard (left) in March 1918
Positions:
Halfback , Trainer
born on January 27, 1894 in Chicago , Illinois
died on May 11, 1986 in Silver Spring , Maryland
Career information
Active : 1920 - 1928
College : Brown University
Teams

as a player

as a trainer

Career statistics
Stats at NFL.com
Stats at pro-football-reference.com
Coaching stats at pro-football-reference.com
Career highlights and awards
Pro Football Hall of Fame
College Football Hall of Fame

Frederick Douglass "Fritz" Pollard (born January 27, 1894 in Chicago , Illinois ; † May 11, 1986 in Silver Spring , Maryland ) was an African American American football player, coach and manager, as well as a music producer. Pollard is considered a pioneer of "black football", as a player at Brown University he came as the second African American to All America honors and in the 1920s Pollard was the first black quarterback and head coach in the NFL professional league . Following the decision of the NFL owners to ban blacks from playing in the NFL, he organized several successful independent professional football teams for blacks. Almost forgotten after the Second World War, he became a leading figure in the growing self-confidence of the black football community and was finally inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2005 under public pressure .

High school and college

Pollard went to Brown University as a graduate of Chicago's Lane Tech High School, in 1916 he was the star of the football team as the left halfback , the New York Times even declared him a “miracle of the” on the occasion of the announcement of their choice of the best amateur footballers year ", within two games he succeeded against the two Erstrivalen Brown Harvard and Yale 531 yards extra space for six touchdowns ; he led the Brown team as a rookie in the Rose Bowl , but was neutralized there by the later coaching legend Wallace William Wade , Brown lost the championship game 14-0. Pollard was the first black man to be in the Rose Bowl. He was also a very successful hurdle sprinter.

Professional football

After college, he was first drafted into military service, after being released in 1919, he was signed by the Akron Pros ; for the pros he mostly played as a halfback, but was used as a quarterback. When the NFL was formed in 1920, Akron were among the 14 founding members. Pollard won the first championship of the new league with the pros, in the following year he trained the team as a player-coach on an equal footing with a second coach. It was not until 1989 that another African American became head coach of an NFL team. Subsequently, Pollard played for several other NFL teams - the Milwaukee Badgers , the Hammond Pros, and the Providence Steam Rollers - all of whom shared the fate of the Akron Pros to be disbanded in the late 1920s, early 1930s, with some of these teams he is said to have also exercised coaching functions, but the sources contradict each other insofar as 1923/24 he played outside the NFL with the Gilberton Cadamounts , a non-league team from Pennsylvania . In 1926 he played his last NFL season for the Akron Pros, who had since been renamed Indians.

In 1928, Pollard returned as the owner and coach of the Chicago Black Hawks, an all-black team who played against teams from the Chicago area in the summer and toured the west coast cities of the United States in the winter months; until the global economic crisis drove the team into bankruptcy in 1932. In 1935 he repeated this in New York City with the Harlem- based Brown Bombers , for whom he hired the best black college players, who at that time had been banned from the NFL - if only unofficially. When the Bombers' home stadium, the Dyckman Oval, was demolished in 1938, he gave up the team and football.

After football

Pollard was also a busy businessman: from 1935 to 1942 he edited the New York Independent News , which was the first tabloid owned by a black man in town, wrote for that paper and, after the paper was closed, for numerous black newspapers in the United States he sports columns. After the Second World War, Pollard produced some light music films that served as vehicles for black musicians, the best known of these films was Rockin 'the Blues from 1956. His sporting successes were almost forgotten during this time, only the Brown University remembered him, it operated in 1954 his induction into the College Football Hall of Fame and in 1971 induction into the newly established university Hall of Fame . In 1981 she awarded him an honorary doctorate in law.

Aftermath

A few years after his death in 1986, Pollard was rediscovered and began to become a leading figure in the black football community; At the beginning of the new millennium, a documentary called "The Fritz Pollard Story" was produced, and since 2004 Brown University and the Black Coaches Association have awarded a Pollard-named award for the best black American football coach. A group of around 200 coaches and in the management of the NFL and its teams, who strive to improve the opportunities for members of minorities in the management and coaching staff of the NFL, is named after Pollard "Fritz Pollard Alliance". Still, it was considered almost certain that he would not be elected to the Hall of Fame in 2005; when he was accepted.

family

Pollard had four children, his son Fritz Pollard, Jr. won the bronze medal in the 110 m hurdles at the 1936 Olympic Games .

literature

  • John Martin Carroll: Fritz Pollard: Pioneer in Racial Advancement. University of Illinois Press, 1992, ISBN 0-252-01814-1

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ " Gridiron Stars of East Picked, " New York Times, December 10, 1916.
  2. ^ A b Joe Burris: " Forgotten pioneer "; The Boston Globe, February 18, 2004 ( accessed April 25, 2008 ).
  3. ↑ Report on the Rose Bowl 1916 ( memento of the original from March 11, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on rosebowlhistory.org ( Memento of the original from March 11, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. ( English, visited April 25, 2008 ). @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.rosebowlhistory.org @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.rosebowlhistory.org
  4. ^ A b William C. Rhoden: " Without Pollard, Football Hall Is a Sham ", New York Times, February 5, 2005 ( English, visited April 25, 2008 ).
  5. ^ A b c " Brown University and the Black Coaches Association establish annual Fritz Pollard Award ", press release on the introduction of the Fritz Pollard Award from February 18, 2004 ( English, visited April 25, 2008 ).
  6. ↑ Brett Hoover: " Fritz Pollard ".
  7. ↑ a b Pollard's entry in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
  8. ↑ a b Stephen Eschenbach and Brett Hoover: " Fritz's Fame ", The Brown Alumni Magazine, March / April 2005 issue. ( English, visited April 25, 2008 ).
personal data
SURNAME Pollard, Fritz
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Pollard, Frederick Douglass
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American football player, coach, manager and record producer
DATE OF BIRTH January 27, 1894
PLACE OF BIRTH Chicago
DATE OF DEATH May 11, 1986
Place of death Silver Spring , Maryland