GoldandBlack.com Purdue Football History 101: The World War II Years and the 'Cradle' begins

In the third installment of our GoldandBlack.com series, Tom Dienhart, Alan Karpick, and Tom Schott take you through the World War II Years (1937-55), a time that marked Purdue’s most recent undefeated team (1943) and the beginning of the Cradle of Quarterbacks.

Audio Only

More: GoldandBlack.com’s Purdue Football History 101: The Early Years (1887-1936) |GoldandBlack.com Purdue Football History–The Mollenkopf Years

Purdue Football Vault Excerpt (1937-55)

Link to Tom Schott’s book Purdue Football Vault

UP AND DOWN

1937-1955

RECORD: 75 WINS, 82 LOSSES, 11 TIES

Allen “Mal” Elward was an assistant with the Boilermakers for 10 years before taking over as interim head coach for the ailing Noble Kizer in August of 1937. Elward was regarded as a keen technician and credited with having a key role in the rise of Purdue football over the previous decade. He had head coaching experience — in high school, the armed services (he was a U.S. Navy pilot during World War I), and at Grinnell College and John Carroll University.

Elward’s unique nickname stemmed from his youth, when his French class teacher asked him what “mal” meant. Elward, apparently daydreaming about football, responded that he did not know, to which his teacher snapped, “It means bad, and you’re the limit.” His classmates were struck by the word, and he was known as “Mal” thereafter.

Like his two predecessors at Purdue, Elward played at Notre Dame. The native of New Brunswick, Canada, was an end from 1912 to 1915, backing up Knute Rockne for two years before becoming a starter his junior and senior seasons. Elward, who weighed 142 pounds as a player, is credited with devising the end shift that gave him a better shot at taking on the ever-growing tackles of postwar days. He was tough, albeit his size, disdaining the use of a head guard, knee pads or thigh pads, and even shedding his shoulder pads for the final two games of his career so as not to be slowed down by the extra weight.

Headlining Elward’s first team were senior brothers Cecil and Cody Isbell. Cecil was a halfback who excelled as a runner, passer and punter, while Cody played end. The 1937 Boilermakers were plagued by turnovers, including 10 against Wisconsin on a rainy, snowy day in Madison on Nov. 13. They threw six interceptions and lost four fumbles, yet managed a 7-7 tie. The following week, Purdue defeated 20th-ranked Indiana 13-7 in snow-covered Bloomington to finish with a 4-3-1 record (2-2-1 Big Ten). Cecil Isbell threw a 28-yard touchdown pass to junior end Jim Zachary in the first quarter and rushed for a 10-yard score with less than two minutes to go in the game. The victory was inspired by a pregame long-distance phone call from Kizer to the team.

Wrote Gordon Graham in the Nov. 22, 1937, Lafayette Journal and Courier: “Great Boilermaker backs of the past, such as Cotton Wilcox, Pest Welch, Duane and Jim Purvis, Roy Horstmann, etc., have caused the Indianans to call for head ache pills, but Hoosier fans will tell you that none of these men ever topped the spectacular performances turned in by Cecil Isbell against the Cream and Crimson last year and this.”

Cecil Isbell’s season was capped with his selection as an All-American and Most Valuable Player of the of the College All-Star team that defeated the Washington Redskins 28-16 in August of 1938. He was a first-round draft pick (seventh overall) of the Green Bay Packers. Isbell, who returned as head coach of the Boilermakers from 1944 to 1946, was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1967.

Purdue went 5-1-2 overall during the 1938 season and tied Michigan for second place in the Big Ten with a 3-1-1 mark. Minnesota, which won three consecutive national championships from 1934 to 1936, captured its second straight conference title and fourth in five years. The Boilermakers gave it a go against the Golden Gophers, losing 7-0 in Minneapolis on Oct. 8, but it was a 0-0 tie at Iowa on Oct. 29 that cost Purdue a share of the conference crown. Five more fumbles proved to be the Boilermakers’ undoing.

Two tough games at the top of the schedule awaited what was regarded as a talented Purdue squad in 1939. The Boilermakers lost at Notre Dame 3-0 on Sept. 30 and tied Minnesota 13-13 in Minneapolis on Oct. 14, leading to a 3-3-2 overall record and 2-1-2 Big Ten mark, good for third place behind Ohio State (5-1) and Iowa (4-1-1). Purdue did not play the Buckeyes and lost to the Hawkeyes 4-0 at Ross-Ade Stadium on Nov. 4, as Iowa blocked two punts that resulted in safeties. The low score was a microcosm of the season, during which the Boilermakers mustered merely 56 points and allowed only 53.

(Between 1940 and 1952, nine schools competed for the Big Ten championship. Chicago’s last season was 1939, and Michigan State’s first was 1950, although its games didn’t count in the standings until 1953. The league often was referred to as the Big Nine, sometimes as its historical name of the Western Conference and occasionally still as the Big Ten.)

After achieving winning records for a stretch of 12 of 14 seasons (and breakeven marks the other two years), Purdue dropped to 2-6 (1-4 Big Ten) in 1940. Senior end Dave Rankin earned All-America honors for the second straight season, and this year it was consensus. He also was a track and field standout, setting the U.S. record in the indoor 60-yard low hurdles. Rankin went on to serve as an assistant football coach in 1947 and 1948 and was head track and field coach from 1946 to 1981. Rankin Track and Field at Purdue was named in his honor in 1993.

With World War II escalating, Purdue essentially suffered a repeat during the 1941 season, going 2-5-1 overall (1-3 Big Ten). The Boilermakers were shut out five times and scored just 27 points all year. More than half of their offensive output came in a 16-14 loss to 10th-ranked Ohio State in Columbus on Oct. 18. They scored one touchdown the remaining five games.

Elward, who assumed the role of athletics director upon Kizer’s death in July of 1940, resigned to enlist in the Navy following the 1941 season. He returned to coaching as an assistant at Stanford University from 1946 to 1956.

On Feb. 25, 1942, Purdue named Guy “Red” Mackey athletics director and Elmer Burnham football coach. Mackey played end for the Boilermakers from 1926 to 1928 and was an assistant football coach from 1931 to 1942, while Burnham had been the freshman football coach the previous seven years. Previously, Burnham was a successful prep coach at Central High School in South Bend, Indiana, posting a 118-30-8 record.

During World War II, many schools dropped football due to a lack of able bodies, and service teams emerged. Purdue stayed the course in 1942, despite a roster of 42 players, but managed to win just one game — 7-6 at Northwestern on Oct. 10. The Boilermakers were shut out five more times and were outscored 179 to 27 on their way to a 1-8 record (1-4 Big Ten).

Ross-Ade Stadium was the site of a war bond sale show on Sept. 24, with actress Dorothy Lamour, subbing for an ailing Rita Hayworth, as the headliner. Some 20,000 people showed up on a chilly evening, and the show raised more than half a million dollars.

The V-12 Navy College Training Program was initiated in 1943 to supplement commissioned officers’ duty in World War II. Between July 1, 1943, and June 30, 1946, more than 125,000 men enrolled in the program in 131 colleges and universities across the United States. V-12 participants were required to carry 17 credit hours and 9 1/2 hours of physical training each week. Purdue had such a program, and the football program benefitted from the addition of seven naval trainees and 26 marine trainees. Among them were guard Alex Agase and fullback Tony Butkovich from Illinois and quarterback Sam Vacanti from Iowa. Boris “Babe” Dimancheff, a civilian halfback from Indianapolis, also joined the squad.

It didn’t take long for the new-look Boilermakers to show their stuff. In the season opener on Sept. 18 against a team from the Great Lakes naval service training command, Purdue won 23-13 in Chicago. In the Big Ten opener on Oct. 2, the Boilermakers defeated Illinois 40-21 at Ross-Ade Stadium in the inaugural game for the Cannon trophy. Purdue students first took the cannon to Champaign in 1905 in anticipation of firing it to celebrate a victory. But Illinois supporters, including Quincy Hall, discovered the cannon hidden in a culvert and confiscated it. Hall kept possession of the cannon until 1943, when he suggested it be used as a traveling trophy between the two schools.

Week-in and week-out, the Boilermakers won behind the rushing of Butkovich and Dimancheff, the passing of Vacanti and stout defensive play. They won their next six games without really being tested and rose to No. 2 in the Associated Press national poll. But seven Purdue players — Agase, Butkovich, Jim Darr, John Genis, Tom Hughes, Bill Newell and Bill O’Keefe — were called into active duty with two games remaining on the schedule.

On Nov. 6, Purdue traveled to Minneapolis and was tied 7-7 with the Golden Gophers at halftime. In the fourth quarter, halfback Chalmers “Bump” Elliott came up with his second interception of the game, this one in the end zone, and Dimancheff caught a 19-yard touchdown pass from Vacanti with 38 seconds left that gave the Boilermakers a 14-7 victory. Following a week off, Purdue visited Indiana and capped its undefeated season with a 7-0 win. The only score came on a 38-yard touchdown pass from Vacanti to end Frank Bauman late in the first quarter. Then it was up to the defense, which stopped the Hoosiers from inside the 1-yard line on the last four plays of the game. Afterward, Indiana’s John Cannady punched Vacanti in the jaw, knocking him out for 10 minutes.

The Boilermakers finished 9-0, shared the Big Ten championship with Michigan (both 6-0) and were ranked fifth in the final AP poll. They outscored their opponents 214 to 55. Agase, an All-American at Illinois a year earlier, earned consensus honors in 1943 before returning to the Fighting Illini. Butkovich led the Big Ten in rushing and scoring while setting a school record with 14 rushing touchdowns in just seven games. The mark has been equaled twice (by Leroy Keyes in 1968 and Mike Alstott in 1994) but not surpassed. A member of the Sixth Marine Division, Butkovich was killed on the Japanese island of Okinawa on April 18, 1945.

In May of 1944, Burnham, a native of West Newbury, Massachusetts, resigned to become head coach and associate professor of physical education at the University of Rochester. He remained there 17 years and became the school’s all-time winningest coach.

Purdue tabbed Cecil Isbell as its next coach, and he became the second alum to guide the Boilermakers. Isbell played quarterback for the Green Bay Packers from 1937 to 1942 before returning to his alma mater as an assistant under Burnham in 1943. The 1939 Packers were National Football League champions, defeating the New York Giants 27-0 in the first shutout in an NFL title game. During his final two seasons in Green Bay, Isbell set NFL records with 1,479 and 2,021 passing yards. He also set a record with 24 touchdown passes in 1942.

“It seems like a dream come true,” Isbell said upon being named head coach. “This is something I’ve looked forward to all my life. I only hope that I am able to justify the appointment and make it possible for Purdue to carry on in football as it did under Elmer Burnham last season.”

Minus many of the imports from their undefeated season, the Boilermakers relied on Dimancheff to carry the load in their first season under Isbell. Purdue won three of its first five games — the two losses coming to service teams Great Lakes and Iowa Pre-Flight — when several more players, including Elliott, were called into duty. Dimancheff almost single-handedly beat Wisconsin 35-0 in a Homecoming game at Ross-Ade Stadium on Nov. 4, 1944. Playing fullback for the injured Ed Cody, Dimancheff totaled 265 yards and scored four touchdowns. Isbell spent the game coaching from a photographer’s booth at the top of Ross-Ade, becoming one of the first coaches in the country — if not the first — to do so. Wrote Graham in the Nov. 6 Journal and Courier: “Isbell spotted weaknesses in the Wisconsin defense from this high vantage point and phoned instructions to (assistant coaches) Joe Dienhart and Guy Mackey on the sidelines.” The Boilermakers wound up 5-5 overall and 4-2 in conference play, good for third place. Dimancheff led the Big Ten with 12 touchdowns.

By the start of the 1945 season, World War II was over, but the draft remained operative and players had service commitments to honor. Upon his return, Elliott attended Michigan and was the Big Ten Most Valuable Player and an All-American in 1947. He later coached the Wolverines from 1959 to 1968 and was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1989.

Two members of the 1945 Boilermakers would go on to have long, distinguished careers in Purdue athletics — quarterback Bob DeMoss and end Ned Maloney.

DeMoss, from Dayton, Kentucky, started as a freshman and helped the Boilermakers win their first four games and move into the national rankings at No. 9. Their next opponent was fourth-ranked Ohio State in Columbus on Oct. 20. Purdue raced to a 28-0 lead and went on to an improbable 35-13 victory before 73,585 fans, the most ever to watch the Boilermakers. But the 5-0 start turned into a 7-3 final record (3-3 Big Ten).

Following his playing days, DeMoss had a cup of coffee in the pros with the New York Bulldogs in 1949 before returning to Purdue as an assistant coach (1950-69), head coach (1970-72) and assistant athletics director (1973-92). Maloney, who was the first two-time team Most Valuable Player in school history, played professionally with the San Francisco 49ers in 1948 and 1949, then came back to the Boilermakers as an assistant coach (1951-72) and equipment manager (1974-87). Both maintained residence in West Lafayette upon retiring.

In 1946, Purdue limped home with a 2-6-1 record. The Boilermakers did not win any of their six Big Ten games — they tied Ohio State 14-14 in Columbus on Oct. 12 — going winless in conference play for the first time since 1925. Purdue lost to Indiana for the third time under Isbell and for the sixth time in seven years. Isbell resigned in February of 1947 to become head coach of the Baltimore Colts in the year-old All-American Football Conference that sought to challenge the NFL.

Forty years before Joe Tiller brought “basketball on grass” to Purdue football, the Boilermakers hired a basketball coach to be their football coach. Stu Holcomb, the head basketball coach at Army, was hired March 1, 1947. He also was a football assistant at West Point and previously had been the head coach at Findlay College, Muskingum College, Washington & Jefferson College and Miami University. The Black Knights were 27-0-1 and won back-to-back-to-back national championships during Holcomb’s three seasons on staff from 1944 to 1946. Holcomb was a fullback and halfback at Ohio State from 1929 to 1931, serving as team captain his senior season.

Holcomb stayed at Purdue for nine seasons — the most of any coach up to that point and still the third-most in school history — and his tenure has been described accurately as a “roller coaster ride.” The Boilermakers posted a 35-42-4 overall record, including a 25-26-2 mark in conference play. They had five winning campaigns but never won more than five games in a season. Twice Purdue managed merely two victories.

His first season provided a clear indication of what things would be like under Holcomb. The Boilermakers opened with a 32-14 loss at Wisconsin on Sept. 27 but bounced back the following week with a 24-20 victory over Ohio State, its first Big Ten win since beating the Buckeyes in 1945. On Oct. 18, the Boilermakers defeated Boston University 62-7 at Fenway Park, scoring their most points since a 62-0 victory over Rose Poly in 1913. A week later, Purdue topped fifth-ranked and defending Rose Bowl champion Illinois 14-7 on Homecoming at Ross-Ade Stadium. “No matter what happens the rest of the season, Purdue is on its way back,” Graham declared in the Oct. 27, 1947, Journal and Courier.

But the year ended with the Boilermakers suffering their fourth straight loss to Indiana, 16-14 in Bloomington on Nov. 22. Purdue fans were growing restless, and Holcomb, a newcomer to the rivalry, didn’t understand what all the fuss was about. “We didn’t put that much importance on the Indiana game,” he admitted. “We actually believed that when we upset Ohio State we gave our fans a successful season. But if victory over Indiana is what they want, that’s what they’ll get. Indiana never will beat us again.” Pretty heady talk, but Holcomb was true to his word. He beat the Hoosiers the eight remaining times he faced them.

The 1947 Boilermakers finished 5-4 (3-3 Big Ten) before slipping to 3-6 (2-4 Big Ten) and 4-5 (2-4 Big Ten) the next two years. They went from tying for third place in the conference to tying for fifth and finishing alone in eighth. Purdue averaged just 13.6 points per game in 1948 and 1949. Halfback Harry Szulborski was the Boilermakers’ primary offensive weapon. He nearly became the first 1,000-yard rusher in school history as a junior in 1948, finishing with 989 yards in a nine-game season.

Early in the 1948 season, the Boilermakers were ranked No. 15 in the Associated Press Poll and welcomed seventh-ranked Michigan, the defending national champions, to Ross-Ade Stadium for Homecoming on Oct. 9. The Wolverines rolled to a 40-0 victory before 46,000 fans, the biggest crowd in school history, and went on to repeat as national champions. On Oct. 29, 1949, Purdue upset seventh-ranked Minnesota 13-7 in Minneapolis. In a 41-7 win over Marquette at Ross-Ade on Nov. 12, 1949, the Boilermakers had three 100-yard rushers: Szulborski (162), senior halfback Norbert Adams (113) and junior fullback John Kerestes (101).

A third straight losing season occurred in 1950, as the Boilermakers went 2-7 (1-4 Big Ten). Their first win was historic: 28-14 over No. 1-ranked Notre Dame in South Bend on Oct. 7, snapping the Fighting Irish’s 39-game unbeaten streak. The victory marked Purdue’s first-ever over a top-ranked team and led to the nickname “Spoilermakers.” Sophomore quarterback Dale Samuels had a coming-out party with 151 yards passing and two touchdowns, a 35-yarder to senior halfback Neil Schmidt just before halftime that gave Purdue a 21-0 advantage and a 56-yarder to senior halfback Mike Maccioli in the fourth quarter. The 5-foot-9 Samuels benefitted from a new formation — the moving pocket — in which he would roll out instead of drop back and have his vision blocked by tall linemen.

“Purdue was beautifully prepared for this game, much better than we were,” Notre Dame coach Frank Leahy said. “I enjoy the pressure a winning streak builds up, but if we had to lose I’m happy it was to our wonderful friends and rivals from Purdue.”

When the Boilermakers returned home, they were greeted at the Big Four Train Station downtown with a crowd so large that the mile-long-plus bus trip back to campus was wall-to-wall people. Those who witnessed the event say the only bigger celebration the city has ever seen was after the Japanese surrendered to end World War II.

What followed, though, was a six-game losing streak for Purdue, snapped with a 13-0 victory over Indiana in the season finale on Nov. 25. Samuels became the first quarterback in school history to pass for 1,000 yards (he finished with 1,076) and throw 10 touchdown passes.

Like DeMoss, Samuels essentially proved to be a lifelong Boilermaker. He was selected in the third round of the 1953 National Football League draft by his hometown Chicago Cardinals but never played professionally. Samuels returned to Purdue as an assistant coach from 1960 to 1963 and from 1970 to 1972, and served as associate director of the Purdue Alumni Association in 1968 and 1969, administrative assistant for the athletics department from 1973 to 1979 and in 1981 and 1982, and associate athletics director from 1983 to 1995. He also provided color commentary on Purdue’s football radio network for several years.

In 1951, the Boilermakers featured three fine ends in senior Pete Brewster, junior Bernie Flowers and senior Leo Sugar. After a 1-4 start, Purdue won its final four games to finish with a 5-4 record and just missed winning the Big Ten with a 4-1 conference mark. Illinois won it at 5-0-1.

With a talented and veteran squad, optimism was high entering the 1952 campaign. The Boilermakers were 3-1-1, including a 21-14 win over No. 15 Ohio State on Oct. 4, and ranked eighth in the nation before losing two games and tying one the first three weeks of November. Heading into the final day of the season, four teams were in the running for the Big Ten championship: Purdue, Wisconsin, Michigan and Minnesota. The Boilermakers defeated Indiana 21-16 at Ross-Ade Stadium, Wisconsin and Minnesota tied 21-21, and Michigan lost to Ohio State 27-7, leaving Purdue and Wisconsin as co-champions with 4-1-1 conference records.

On a rainy, muddy Nov. 22 afternoon, the Boilermakers opened a 14-0 lead before the Hoosiers responded to take a 16-14 advantage. With 4:22 left, sophomore halfback Rex Brock scored the game-winning touchdown on a 24-yard scamper. The game, however, wasn’t settled until Purdue stopped Indiana’s Petey Fisher three or four yards short of the goal line as time expired. Evidence of the Big Ten balance was clear as the Boilermakers were co-champions and the Hoosiers finished last.

The co-championship meant the conference athletics directors had to vote to determine “what team best would represent the Big Ten in the Rose Bowl.” Purdue’s overall record was 4-3-2, while Wisconsin was 6-2-1. The teams did not face one another during the season.

Wisconsin was the choice and, although the results were not made public, it was believed to be at least 7-3 in favor of the Badgers. The announcement came Nov. 24 on what was called “Blue Monday” around Purdue. Wisconsin played Southern Cal and lost 7-0, the first time a Big Ten team was beaten by a Pacific Coast Conference (now Pac-10) team in the “Granddaddy of all bowl games” since the conferences agreed to an exclusive Rose Bowl contract in 1946.

Flowers, as loyal and true a Boilermaker as ever there has been, earned consensus All-America honors after setting school records with 43 receptions for 603 yards and seven touchdowns.

The 1953 season mirrored 1950: a 2-7 record (2-4 Big Ten), with an unexpected victory — 6-0 over No. 1 Michigan State at Ross-Ade Stadium on Oct. 24, snapping the Spartans’ 28-game winning streak — and another win over Indiana, 30-0 in Bloomington on Nov. 21.

The Boilermakers believed Michigan State was one of the schools that voted for Wisconsin to go to the Rose Bowl, even though Purdue only lost to the top-ranked Spartans 14-7 and Wisconsin did not play them. The perceived snub had not been forgotten.

Senior fullback Dan Pobojewski, a transfer from Michigan State who essentially had been cut by the Spartans, scored the lone touchdown on a 1-yard plunge early in the fourth quarter. “I felt so good I just lay there and bawled,” Pobojewski said. Defensively, the Boilermakers uncovered a new 4-5-2 scheme and came away with six turnovers (five interceptions and one fumble). Five-foot-five sophomore halfback Ed Neves cinched the victory with an interception at the Purdue 23-yard line in the final seconds. Michigan State was shut out for the first time in a span of 58 games. The game ball went to senior quarterback Roy Evans, who missed the game with a separated shoulder and was replaced by sophomore Froncie Gutman.

Wrote Graham in the Oct. 26 Journal and Courier: “The wild Boilermaker fans spilled out on to the field. Fences came down; so did the goal posts … Players and coaches were almost mobbed as students carried their heroes around the field and finally into the dressing room.”

The emergence of sophomore quarterback Len Dawson highlighted the 1954 season. Recruited by Ohio State and Notre Dame, among other schools, Dawson picked Purdue for the opportunity to play early in his career. He got the chance in the first game of the year against Missouri at Ross-Ade Stadium on Sept. 25. Dawson entered in the first quarter and proceeded to throw four touchdown passes in a 31-0 victory. The following week, Dawson threw four more scoring strikes as Purdue upset top-ranked Notre Dame 27-14 in South Bend. The media dubbed him the “Golden Boy” following those two memorable performances and, soon after, the Purdue “All-American” Marching Band developed the “Golden Girl,” a twirler position that remains a treasured tradition.

Purdue went on to go 5-3-1 overall (3-3 Big Ten) as Dawson set school records with 1,464 passing yards and an NCAA-best 15 passing touchdowns. A jammed thumb prior to the start of the 1955 season deterred his progress, yet the Boilermakers repeated their 5-3-1 overall record and improved to 4-2-1 in conference play, good for fourth place.

At his weekly Downtown Gridiron club meeting on Nov. 21, 1955, Holcomb told the story of his job interview with Purdue President Hovde eight and a half years earlier. The two met in Washington, D.C., but Holcomb initially thought Philadelphia to be the location and withdrew enough money to cover such a trip from West Point. When he remembered it was Washington, Holcomb had spent all the money he had drawn out. First he had to walk 15 blocks in the snow from the train station to meet Hovde, and later he had to talk a railroad official into cashing a check to pay the cab fare back to the station after the taxi dropped off Hovde. “I couldn’t tell the president of Purdue University that his prospective coach was so broke that he couldn’t even handle a cab fare,” Holcomb recalled. “What a way to get a Big Ten head coaching job.”

Meanwhile, speculation grew immediately after the 1955 season that Holcomb would leave Purdue to become athletics director at Northwestern. He did on Dec. 9, with four years left on his contract. Holcomb signed a five-year contract with Northwestern, where he also became an associate professor of physical education, for a reported $13,000 to $15,000 annual salary. “I believe that every football coach — more so today than ever before — has an ambition to become an athletic director and be removed from the pressure shouldered by coaching football,” the 45-year-old Holcomb said. “A football coach’s job today is for a young man.”

Holcomb asked one of his assistant coaches at Purdue, Jack Mollenkopf, to accompany him to Northwestern as assistant athletics director. But Mollenkopf also was a candidate to replace Holcomb as coach of the Boilermakers, and he was awarded that job on Dec. 12.