Frank "Gunner" Gatski was an American professional football player who was a center for the Cleveland Browns of the All-America Football Conference and the National Football League in the 1940s and 1950s.
39 Facts About Frank Gatski
2.
Frank Gatski won an eighth championship after he was traded to the Detroit Lions in 1957, his final season.
3.
Frank Gatski was born in West Virginia to a coal-mining family.
4.
Frank Gatski played for three years on his local high school team before attending Marshall University, where he continued to play football.
5.
Frank Gatski joined the US Army in 1942 and went to fight in World War II.
6.
Frank Gatski played as a linebacker and backup center for most of his first two years before earning a spot as the starting center.
7.
Frank Gatski retired after the 1957 season when he won an eighth title with the Detroit Lions, never having missed a game or practice in his career.
8.
Frank Gatski then joined a reform school in West Virginia as athletic director and head football coach, staying there until the school closed in 1982.
9.
Frank Gatski was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1985.
10.
Frank Gatski died that year in a nursing home in West Virginia.
11.
Frank Gatski was born in 1921 and raised in Farmington, West Virginia.
12.
Frank Gatski started at center for three years on his Farmington High School football team, which played on a cow pasture with no scoreboard, bleachers or game clock.
13.
Frank Gatski worked in the coal mines during the summers, and went to work in the mines full-time during his senior year in 1939.
14.
Frank Gatski was reserved and aloof, but he was known as a graceful dancer.
15.
Frank Gatski joined the junior varsity team, where he was the starting center for a season before moving to Marshall's varsity football team in 1941.
16.
Frank Gatski enlisted in the Army Enlisted Reserve Corps before the 1942 season as America's involvement in World War II intensified.
17.
Marshall canceled its football program in 1943 as Frank Gatski entered his senior year, and he was called to active duty and later sent with an infantry division to fight in the European theater of World War II.
18.
Frank Gatski returned from duty in 1945, but Marshall had yet to resume its football program, so he enrolled at Auburn University in Alabama and finished out his studies, playing part of the season on the school's football team.
19.
When Frank Gatski graduated, Sam Clagg, a teammate at Marshall, helped get him a tryout with the Cleveland Browns after contacting John Brickels, an assistant coach with West Virginia ties.
20.
Frank Gatski, who was working in the mines after graduating from Auburn, hitchhiked to Bowling Green, Ohio for the team's training camp.
21.
Frank Gatski did not consider a football career a certainty, and returning to the coal mines where his father had died in an accident was a distinct possibility.
22.
Frank Gatski arrived in Bowling Green with the nickname "Gunner" for his strength and speed on the offensive line that he had acquired in Huntington.
23.
Frank Gatski made the team and signed a $3,000 per year contract.
24.
Frank Gatski played mostly as a backup to Scarry and as a linebacker in his first and part of his second season.
25.
Frank Gatski became the full-time starter at center in the 1948 season.
26.
Frank Gatski helped push away defenders and create space for fullback Marion Motley to run47- in.
27.
Frank Gatski practiced hitting targets with his bow and arrow at League Park in Cleveland, where the Browns trained during the season.
28.
Frank Gatski was one of the Browns "Filthy Five" players who did not wash their practice uniforms during the season.
29.
Frank Gatski was named to All-Pro lists in all but one year between 1951 and 1955.
30.
Frank Gatski only played in the 1957 season with the Lions.
31.
Frank Gatski did not miss a practice or a game during his 12 seasons in football.
32.
Frank Gatski was tough with the tough kids he had at Prunytown, having them jump off a 20-foot cliff at the start of the season to prove they were tough enough.
33.
Frank Gatski worked there until the school shut down in 1982.
34.
Frank Gatski hunted and fished in retirement, and was often difficult to reach.
35.
Frank Gatski lived on a mountain in West Virginia and did not have a telephone for many years.
36.
Frank Gatski said he had not expected to make it into the hall.
37.
Frank Gatski had not played for 28 years when he was selected by an old-timers committee.
38.
Frank Gatski was the first and remains the only Marshall football player to be so honored.
39.
Frank Gatski died on November 22,2005, at a nursing home in Morgantown, West Virginia and was buried at the West Virginia National Cemetery in Grafton.