1. Alan Ameche, nicknamed "the Iron Horse", or simply "the Horse", was an American professional football player who was a fullback for six seasons with the Baltimore Colts in the National Football League.
18 Facts About Alan Ameche
1. 2.
Alan Ameche played college football for the Wisconsin Badgers and won the Heisman Trophy during his senior season in 1954.
3.
Alan Ameche was elected to the Pro Bowl in each of his first four seasons in the league.
4.
Alan Ameche is often remembered for scoring the winning touchdown in overtime in the 1958 NFL Championship Game against the New York Giants, labeled "The Greatest Game Ever Played".
5.
Alan Ameche was born in Kenosha, Wisconsin, as Lino Dante Amici to Italian immigrant parents who came to the United States in the late 1920s, although they returned for a year to Italy during his childhood.
6.
Alan Ameche was a cousin of actor brothers Don and Jim Alan Ameche.
7.
Alan Ameche played in the program's first bowl game, the 1953 Rose Bowl, as a sophomore, rushing for 133 yards on 28 carries.
8.
Alan Ameche won the Heisman Trophy in 1954, the first for the Badger program.
9.
Alan Ameche is one of six Wisconsin football players to have a number retired by the program and enshrined on the Camp Randall Stadium facade as of 2008: fellow Heisman winner and current career rushing record holder Ron Dayne, Elroy Hirsch, Dave Schreiner, Allan Schafer, and Pat Richter are the others.
10.
Alan Ameche was inducted into the Wisconsin Athletic Hall of Fame in 1967, the College Football Hall of Fame in 1975, and the Rose Bowl Hall of Fame in 2004.
11.
Alan Ameche was the third overall selection of the 1955 NFL draft and played fullback for the Baltimore Colts from 1955 until 1960.
12.
Alan Ameche averaged 4.2 yards per carry over his career, and held the record for most rushing yards in his first three NFL games until Carnell "Cadillac" Williams broke the record by gaining 434 yards in 2005.
13.
Alan Ameche is one of only four players named to the National Football League 1950s All-Decade Team not elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
14.
Alan Ameche's had five locations, all located in Baltimore or its suburbs:.
15.
Alan Ameche trademark was a Big Boy-like football player running through the uprights carrying a hamburger.
16.
Alan Ameche had undergone triple bypass surgery at age 46 in 1979.
17.
Alan Ameche died of a heart attack in 1988 at age 55 at Methodist Hospital in Houston, Texas, a few days after undergoing another heart bypass surgery, under the care of Dr Michael DeBakey.
18.
Alan Ameche is interred at Calvary Cemetery in West Conshohocken, Pennsylvania.