1. Benjamin Gilbert Owen was an American college football player and coach of college football, college basketball, and college baseball.
19 Facts About Bennie Owen
1. 2.
Bennie Owen was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as a coach in 1951.
3.
Bennie Owen was born in Chicago, in 1875, and his family moved to St Louis, when he was 12.
4.
Bennie Owen then enrolled in the University of Kansas in 1897 to pursue his medical studies and he soon discovered his knack for football.
5.
Bennie Owen played football at Kansas under two excellent, but contrasting coaches.
6.
Bennie Owen got a part-time job working as a medical assistant for Woodruff and it was Woodruff who encouraged Bennie Owen to try out for the Kansas football team.
7.
Bennie Owen was the star quarterback for Yost's undefeated 1899 team.
8.
Bennie Owen got his first exposure to the Oklahoma football team while head coach at Bethany College in Lindsborg, Kansas.
9.
Bennie Owen took over the Oklahoma football team in 1905, succeeding one-year coach Fred Ewing.
10.
Bennie Owen stepped in and immediately turned the fledgling team around, giving Oklahoma its very first win over the rival Texas Longhorns.
11.
Bennie Owen was loved by the players as he regularly would involve himself in scrimmages when he felt his players were lagging.
12.
In 1907, Bennie Owen lost his right arm in a hunting accident.
13.
Early in Stratton D Brooks's tenure as president of the University of Oklahoma, Owen was fired by the state legislature.
14.
Bennie Owen is known for introducing the forward pass to football in the Southwestern United States.
15.
In 1910, Bennie Owen became an initiated member of the Delta Epsilon chapter of Sigma Nu at the University of Oklahoma.
16.
Bennie Owen had been living in the Sigma Nu chapter house's basement at 526 South University Boulevard during this time.
17.
Bennie Owen would go onto be very active with Sigma Nu for many years, notably helping found the Epsilon Epsilon chapter of Sigma Nu at Oklahoma State University in 1920.
18.
Bennie Owen was a charter member of the College Football Hall of Fame, elected in 1951.
19.
Bennie Owen died February 26,1970, in Houston, Texas, at age 94.