Bob Blake (American football)

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Bob Blake
St. Louis, Missouri, U.S.
Height6 ft 0 in (1.83 m)
Weight170 lb (77 kg)
Career history
CollegeVanderbilt (1903, 1905–1907)
High schoolBowen School
Career highlights and awards

Robert Edwin Blake (January 31, 1885 – May 8, 1962) was an

Rhodes Scholar.[1]

His three brothers, Dan, Vaughn, and Frank, also played on those winning teams. Dan, Bob, and Vaughn were captains of the 1906, 1907, and 1908 Vanderbilt football teams respectively. He thus signed letters "Bob Blake, pater familias."[2]

Blake was later general counsel for the International Shoe Company, and married Dorothy Gaynor.[3] Blake was also president of the Missouri Constitutional Convention in 1944.[4]

Early years

Blake was born on January 31, 1885, in Cuero, Texas, to Daniel Bigelow Blake, Sr. and Mary Clara Weldon. Dan, Sr. was a physician and once president of the Nashville Academy of Medicine.[5] Bob Blake prepped at Bowen School.[6]

Vanderbilt University

Blake was

letters,[7] participating in football, basketball, baseball, and track. He stood 6 feet and weighed 170 pounds.[8] While a senior, Blake was honored as Bachelor of Ugliness
.

Football

The Blake brothers of Vanderbilt. Bob is second from left.

Blake was a prominent

Owsley Manier.[6] Grantland Rice once said about Bob Blake, “he was the only halfback who never lost a yard around right end.”[7]

A fellow student at Vanderbilt once said of Blake "He is an athlete and this has been one great factor in making him popular, but Bob Blake would have been a popular man if he had not been an athlete. In the third place he is interested in and takes an active part in every phase of college life. In the fourth place he has maintained himself well in scholarship, while not a brilliant student, he has, in my opinion, made a record above that of the average student."[5] In the opinion of fellow Vanderbilt player Honus Craig, Blake was the South's greatest player.[10] Blake was chosen for an all-time Vandy team in 1912,[11] and for an Associated Press Southeast Area All-Time football team 1869–1919 era.[12]

Blake cropped from 1903 team picture.

1903

Both Blake and teammate

Rhodes Scholars. Blake broke his wrist in the Sewanee–Vanderbilt game.[13]

1904 and 1905

Bob Blake did not play in Dan McGugin's first year of 1904, but resumed play on the 1905 team.[6]

1906

Vanderbilt won a major intersectional contest in 1906 when it defeated Carlisle 4–0 via a single, 17-yard Blake drop kick,[9] "the crowning feat of the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association season."[10][14] The score was 4 to 0, as field goals then counted for 4 points. College Football Hall of Fame inductee Albert Exendine was playing for Carlisle. Frank Mount Pleasant missed four field goals.[9]

1907

Fielding Yost (pictured) selected Blake first-team All-American
.

He made

Fielding Yost. Blake threw the pass to Stein Stone on a trick double-pass play which set up the score to beat Sewanee in 1907 for the SIAA championship, which was cited by Grantland Rice as the greatest thrill he ever witnessed in his years of watching sports.[15][16] Blake missed two kicks on a slippery field in the 8–0 loss to Michigan.[17]

Coaching

Gordon Institute

He assisted his brother Frank Blake in coaching at

Gordon Institute in 1907.[18]

Return to Vanderbilt

In 1910, Blake was awarded a law degree and returned to Vanderbilt for one season as an assistant football coach for Dan McGugin.[7] The 1910 team shocked defending national champion Yale with a scoreless tie.[19]

Montgomery Bell

He coached at Montgomery Bell Academy in 1912.[20]

Missouri

International shoe company

After practicing law in Nashville from 1911 to 1919, he engaged in business in

Saint Louis, Missouri. He was elected to the board of directors of the International Shoe company in 1921,[21] and directed the company since 1929.[22]

Missouri Constitutional Convention

Blake was president of the Missouri Constitutional Convention and awarded the "Man of the Year" award for Saint Louis in 1944.[22]

Death

Blake died in St. Louis in 1962.[7]

See also

References

  1. ^ Henry Jay Case (1914). "Vanderbilt–A University of the New South". Outing. 64: 320–331.
  2. ^ "Personal News". The American Oxonian: 114. 1915.
  3. ^ "Dorothy Gaynor Blake". Archived from the original on March 26, 2017. Retrieved September 10, 2016.
  4. OCLC 17911245
    .
  5. ^ a b Charles Wells Moulton (1906). "Blake, Daniel Bigelow". The Doctor's Who's Who. 12. The Saalfield Publishing Co.
  6. ^ a b c John Heisman (January 21, 1915). "Dixie's Football Hall of Fame". The Tennessean. p. 11. Retrieved September 10, 2016. Open access icon
  7. ^ a b c d Bill Traughber (November 23, 2011). "Vandy's gridiron Rhodes Scholars". Archived from the original on July 2, 2016. Retrieved September 27, 2014.
  8. ^ "Vanderbilt". Caduceus of Kappa Sigma. 20: 377. 1905.
  9. ^
    Newspapers.com. Open access icon
  10. ^ a b ""Honus" Craig, All-Southern Right Halfback---He Talks". Abilene Daily Reporter. April 25, 1909. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016.
  11. ^ Vanderbilt University (1913). Vanderbilt University Quarterly. Vol. 13. p. 56.
  12. ^ "All-Time Football Team Lists Greats Of Past, Present". Gadsden Times. July 27, 1969.
  13. Newspapers.com. Open access icon
  14. ^ Dan McGugin (1907). "Football In Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association". The Official National Collegiate Athletic Association Football Guide: 49.
  15. ^ "Claiming Rampant". The Miami News. February 9, 1954.[permanent dead link]
  16. ProQuest 497709192
    .
  17. Newspapers.com. Open access icon
  18. ^ "Bob Blake Is In City". Atlanta Georgian. September 13, 1907.
  19. ^ Traughber, Bill (November 9, 2005). "Commodores Shock Powerful Yale in 1910". Archived from the original on February 12, 2015. Retrieved February 11, 2015.
  20. Newspapers.com. Open access icon
  21. ^ "Robert e. Blake Constitutional Convention Papers | the State Historical Society of Missouri" (PDF).
  22. ^ a b "The convention goes to work - Documents".
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