Bemus Pierce
Homestead Library & Athletic Club | |
1902–1903 | Sherman Institute |
---|---|
Dec 1902–Jan 1903 | All-Syracuse |
1904 (November 26) | Carlisle |
Position(s) | Kenyon |
1911 | Lafayette HS (NY) |
Head coaching record | |
Overall | 31–20–3 (college football) |
Bemus Pierce (February 27, 1875 – February 15, 1957) was an
Background and personal life
Bemus Pierce, a member of the
College
He attended the
At Carlisle, Pierce was teammates with his brother Hawley Pierce. The two brothers, each weighing over 200 pounds, were both among the best players of their day. In 1906, The Washington Post declared them the greatest pair of linesman brothers in the history of the sport:
"But the greatest pair of brother linesmen were the Indians, Pierce. Bemus Pierce and Hawley Pierce were right guard and left tackle in the Carlisle line in the old days when the redskin booters of the prolate had everything in the country scared. Two hundred pounds apiece they weighed, and they won games for their team in 97. Tackle back and guard back for a solid half was the Indian play and it was 400 pounds of Pierce into the opponents' line pretty steady. Bemus was captain of the team and one of the best men on the kick-off football has seen. He could measure and place his kicks accurately and every red knew where the ball was going before it soared."[9]
During a game against Penn, Pierce faced off against Alfred E. Bull. Bull and Pierce faced each other on the line throughout the game, and on a play late in the game Pierce sent Bull to the ground, and the play went over him. After the play, Pierce cried out to the Penn players, "Look, look at Sitting Bull."[10]
In 1919, more than 20 years after Pierce played his last college football game, one sports writer cited him as perhaps the greatest lineman of all time:
"When the great line men are discussed in these days and times, some of the veterans of football hark back to the days of Carlisle's glory on the gridiron and speak of the mighty Bemus Pierce. Pierce played with his brothers, Jerry and Hawley, on the same team ... Bemus Pierce scaled nearly 225 pounds, but he was tall and solid as a rock. Despite his great bulk he was fast as a streak, and no line player of recent years has shown more real ability."[11]
Even after the successes of Carlisle's later stars
Professional football
Pierce went on to play professional football in the early years of the sport. He played for Homestead in 1899, the latter of which won the professional football championship of 1901.
In December 1902 and January 1903, Bemus and Hawley Pierce helped the All-Syracuse football team win the
The wood flooring of the arena was pulled up, and a gridiron was laid out on dirt, with a field 70 yards long and 35 yards wide.[15] A newspaper from Syracuse credited the Pierce brothers with playing to win. Pop Warner and Bemus Pierce were credited with "tearing great holes in the Gotham line."[16] And on offense, the paper wrote that "Bemus Pierce hurdled like a racehorse for distance."[16] "Another interesting chapter occurred when the temper of Bemus Pierce was aroused and he threatened to mix it up with everybody in general."[16]
On New Year's Eve 1902, the Pierce brothers made several big gains as Syracuse defeated the
Coaching career
After retiring as a player, Pierce became a football coach. He coached the University of Buffalo football team in 1899 and gave that institution one of the best football teams it ever had.[6] This likely made him the first Native head coach in college football.[19][20] After spending the 1900 and 1901 seasons playing professional football for Homesetead, Pierce worked at the Sherman Institute at Riverside, California from 1902 to 1903. Pierce introduced football to the Sherman Institute, as the sport was new in the west. The team he coached was the Sherman Institute Braves. Photos and records of this team are part of the Sherman Indian Museum today.[21] Pierce played on the Sherman teams that he coached in 1902 and 1903.
In 1904, Pierce was hired as an assistant football coach at Carlisle under head coach Eddie Rogers. The 1904 season marked the first time the Carlisle school had a Native American coaching staff:
"For the first time in its history, this season the Carlisle Indian football team will have full-blooded Indians as head coach and assistant coaches, with full authority to plan their own campaigns against the products of the white men's universities in the persons of Edward Rodgers, head coach, Frank Hudson and Bemus Pierce, assistants. Never before have the redskins been trusted to do the brainwork incident to the planning for a football season ... Assistant Coach Bemus Pierce is a former Carlisle pupil, and for the past two years has had charge of the Sherman Institute team, of California."[22]
Rodgers, Pierce and Hudson replaced Pop Warner. As an assistant coach at Carlisle, he also played in the 1904 game vs Haskell at Francis Olympic Field in St. Louis, Missouri.[23] Pierce also served as Carlisle's interim head coach in 1906. During the 1904 season, Pierce continued to play professional football. Between games he coached at Carlisle, Pierce played for a semi-professional team in northern New York that made a barnstorming tour.[24]
Pierce also coached football at the Haskell Indian School in 1906 and at Kenyon College from 1908 to 1910.[25] In 1911 he coached football at Lafayette High School in Buffalo, New York.[26]
Death and honors
Pierce died on February 15, 1957, in Loma Linda, California.[27][28]
Pierce has been inducted into the American Indian Athletic Hall of Fame at Haskell in Kansas.[2]
Head coaching record
College football
Year | Team | Overall | Conference | Standing | Bowl/playoffs | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Buffalo (Independent) (1899) | |||||||||
1899 | Buffalo | 6–0 | |||||||
Buffalo: | 6–0 | ||||||||
Carlisle Indians (Independent) (1906) | |||||||||
1906 | Carlisle | 9–3 | |||||||
Carlisle: | 9–3 | ||||||||
Haskell Indians (Independent) (1907)
| |||||||||
1907 | Haskell | 2–6–1 | |||||||
Haskell: | 2–6–1 | ||||||||
Kenyon Lords (Ohio Athletic Conference ) (1908–1910)
| |||||||||
1908 | Kenyon | 7–1–1 | 3–1–1 | 2nd | |||||
1909 | Kenyon | 6–4 | 4–4 | T–5th | |||||
1910 | Kenyon | 1–6–1 | 1–5 | 10th | |||||
Kenyon: | 14–11–2 | 8–10–1 | |||||||
Total: | 31–20–3 |
References
- ^ "1899 Buffalo Football," University at Buffalo Sports History Collection - February 25, 2013.
- ^ a b Bemus Pierce. American Indian Hall of Fame. (retrieved 29 June 2019)
- ^ NATIVE_NEWS: History: A Hundred Years Ago - Carlisle - Week 106. (retrieved 2 July 2009)
- ^ Family Group Record. FamilySearch. 2008 (retrieved 2 July 2009)
- ^ "Sporting Miscellany". Sandusky Star. 1899-05-02.
- ^ a b "Red Brains Matched Against White Brains: Carlisle Football Team, Made Up of Indians and Trained by Indians, To Meet Paleface Teams of United States". Atlanta Constitution. 1904-10-16.
- ISBN 978-0-313-29911-7. (retrieved through Google Books, 2 July 2009)
- ^ "Sport Chatter". Fitchburg Sentinel. 1940-12-04.
- ^ "Unlike Baseball, Gridiron Prowess Runs in Families". The Washington Post. 1906-12-09.
- ^ Lawrence Perry (1930-01-31). "Gridiron Stars Are Invited To Relays". Charleston Daily Mail.
- ^ "Sport Sparks". Capital Times. 1919-11-12.
- ^ Lawrence Perry (1923-11-24). "Gridiron Gossip". The Bee (Danville, VA).
- ^ "Coach Pierce Hurt", Buffalo Evening News, Buffalo, NY, p. 10, November 9, 1899
- ^ "Bemus Pierce on the Eleven: Former Carlisle Star Engaged by All-Syracuse". The Post-Standard. 1902-12-21.
- ^ "Indoor Football Games: Four Teams Open Season in Madison Square Garden: All-Syracuse Eleven Defeated Local Team by Score of 5 to 0; Old College Stars Play". The New York Times. 1902-12-30.
- ^ a b c "All-Syracuse Wins First Gotham Game: Outplays Metropolitan Eleven in Forty Minute Gridiron Struggle". The Post-Standard (Syracuse). 1902-12-30.
- ^ "Indoor Football Games: Syracuse Team Victors in Championship Contest". The New York Times. 1903-01-01.
- ^ "Syracuse Players Win: Carry Off the Indoor Professional Football Championship; Score 36 to 0 Against the Orange Athletic Club - Bemus Pierce's Nose Is Broken". The New York Times. 1903-01-03.
- ^ "Coach Pierce", Buffalo Commercial, Buffalo, NY, p. 6, October 18, 1899
- ^ Benjey, Tom (Fall 2012), "Guiding the White Brethren: The Remarkable Record of Carlisle's Alumni Coaches", National Museum of the American Indian, Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian, pp. 44–49
- ^ Weber, Dan. "Last train out of Riverside: 100 years ago today USC football lost to Sherman Braves."[permanent dead link] The Press-Enterprise. 22 Nov 2002 (retrieved 2 July 2009)
- ^ "Indians to Coach Eleven: Carlisle Team to Be Directed by Graduates of that School". The Washington Post. 1904-09-11.
- ^ "Carlisle Team Played Three Coaches Saturday", Lawrence Journal, Lawrence, KS, p. 7, December 3, 1904
- ^ "Gridiron Gossip". The Washington Post. 1904-10-03.
- ^ "Mt. Union Victorious". Evening Independent. 1910-10-16.
- ^ "Bemus Pierce Coaches". The Washington Times. Washington, D.C. October 28, 1911. p. 17. Retrieved June 22, 2015.
- .
- ^ C. Richard King. Native Americans in Sports: A-L. p. 243.