duck downs: oregon football history

By 1955, Len Casanova should have had the Ducks going his way. Coming off the team’s first winning season since 1948, Oregon had a solid roster of athletes, but a daunting schedule – opening with road contests at Utah and USC has never been easy – and an unusual degree of attrition, with just 36 players on the roster for the opening game, led to more uncertainty than any coach could handle comfortably.

But Cas liked the intelligence of the players he had. And there was some high football IQ on the ‘55 team:

Guard Reanous Cochran would go on to coach at Thurston High in Springfield for decades.
Halfbacks Dick James and Jack Morris both starred in NFL backfields, with Washington and the Rams respectively.
Center Norm Chapman coached at Springfield High and was an assistant at Oregon under Jerry Frei.
End Bill Tarrow was hired by Rich Brooks as an assistant coach and stayed for 20 years.
John Robinson won a national championship at USC.
Tackle “Captain” Lon Stiner’s father had coached at Oregon State for 14 years and won a Rose Bowl.
Spike Hillstrom was a longtime assistant coach at Air Force (and interviewed for the Oregon job after Frei resigned).
Guard Harry Mondale coached for years at Phoenix High in southern Oregon.
And of the assistant coaches, John McKay would go on to some success.

So, there were three future members of the College Football Hall of Fame on Oregon’s sideline in 1955. None of this future football career trivia meant a lot in the autumn of 1955, of course, and by the middle of October, Cas was frustrated enough to call off a “Cal week” practice early, because the players showed little interest in concentrating on the task at hand. But by game time the players had pulled it together, and under the lights at Multnomah Stadium – California’s first night game ever – the Ducks beat Pappy Waldorf’s Bears soundly, 21-0. The team that couldn’t make it through a full practice held Cal to 145 yards.

In Berkeley, students with a short memory – they’d been to three straight Rose Bowls recently – hung Coach Waldorf in effigy. His administration gave him a vote of confidence, but his teams would win just four more games through 1956, when he finally retired.

Oregon’s victory stopped a three-game losing streak. The Webfoots would go on to win five of their last six games, including a 28-0 stomping of Oregon State in the Civil War.

Program Notes:

Another nice Howard Brodie cover; this one takes the same concept of the Gillies 1945 OSC cover, only here the player is autographing a program for a boy, and the program has on its cover an image of a player autographing a program for a boy, etc.
Page 5 has the requisite opponent’s outlook, usually provided by the other team’s athletic department, but this year it’s uncredited, merely titled “The Bears are coming”. But there is some classic filler included. The Bears “played a thrilling 20-20 standoff with the Washington State Cougars. Thus, while the Californians have yet to taste the fruits of a PCC victory, they also have not met defeat in league competition.”
Also without a byline is an odd piece on the inside cover, concerning the importance of the alumni to the University. “No man was placed on earth to be a pure parasite…” OK.
As usual, the only color outside the cover is cigarette advertising, including the center roster spread (“Only Chesterfield is made the Modern way – with AccuRay”, whatever that meant). But there’s a great DeSoto ad on page 6 (“the only car in its price class with the exciting Forward Look.. the newest idea in automotive styling… giving DeSoto its lithe look of power and motion even when standing still.” Uhh, yeah.)
The last player photo included for Cal is of one Remo Jacuzzi. Yes, he’s from that Jacuzzi family, who invented what we now know as the hot tub. Remo was president of Jacuzzi for a while and now is president of spa manufacturer Jason International. “Jason” is a portmanteau of “Jacuzzi” and “son”.. clever, eh?
A tribute to the NCAA, on the occasion of the association’s 50^th anniversary, includes a photo montage of head shots of the Tall Firs, Oregon’s 1939 national champion basketball squad. Laddie Gale bears a resemblance to John Travolta, Bob Hardy and Christian Slater could have been separated at birth, and the part of Slim Wintermute was played by Al Pacino.