21 Facts About Pudge Heffelfinger

Pudge Heffelfinger is considered the first athlete to play American football professionally, having been paid to play in 1892 for the Allegheny Athletic Association.

Pudge Heffelfinger was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as player with the inaugural class of 1951.

Heffelfinger was born in 1867 in Minneapolis, to Christopher B Heffelfinger and Mary Ellen Totton, both of whom were born in Pennsylvania.

Pudge Heffelfinger's father came by riverboat to Minneapolis, eventually joining the Union Army at the outset of the Civil War.

Pudge Heffelfinger played baseball and football at Minneapolis Central High School.

The freshman Pudge Heffelfinger was 6 feet 3 inches in height, weighed 210 pounds and looked like the most demure, gentle, self-effacing individual that could be imagined.

Pudge Heffelfinger wrote Heff, with pen dipped in blood which be had obtained from a slaughter house, one of the sharpest, strongest of letters, using every reasonable form of expression to get Heff out of his lethargy.

Pudge Heffelfinger's teammates included, besides Pa Corbin: Alonzo Stagg, Charley Gill, Billy Rhodes, Lee "Bum" McClung and George Washington Woodruff.

Pudge Heffelfinger was widely considered the best player at the time.

Pudge Heffelfinger scored the game's only touchdown on a recovered fumble.

Pudge Heffelfinger took his first head football coaching job with the University of California, Berkeley for the 1893 football season and was the third person to be assigned to the post.

Pudge Heffelfinger was the third head football coach for Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and he held that position for the 1894 season.

Pudge Heffelfinger's overall coaching record at Lehigh was 5 wins and 9 losses.

Pudge Heffelfinger coached the University of Minnesota football team in 1895.

Pudge Heffelfinger was a delegate to the Republican National Convention in 1904 and 1908.

Pudge Heffelfinger first won elective office in 1924, running against more experienced politicians and easily capturing a seat on the Hennepin County Board of Commissioners.

Pudge Heffelfinger played competitively in charity and exhibition games against much younger men, playing his last game at age 65.

From 1935 to 1950, Pudge Heffelfinger edited Pudge Heffelfinger's Football Facts, a yearly booklet featuring history, rules, statistics, and professional and college schedules for the upcoming season.

Pudge Heffelfinger was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1951.

Pudge Heffelfinger was chosen as one of two guards on the pre-1920 squad.

Pudge Heffelfinger was named one of the 10 inaugural members for the Football Learning Academy's Hall of Honor in 2022, which looks to acknowledge icons not currently inducted in the hall.