Legends

Bob Blackman 1918-2000He won more footballgames—and changed morelives—than any coach inDartmouth history.

Those were the days when an Ivy League coach's decision not to defect to lowa and the Big Ten would be a screaming headline across the top of The Boston Herald's sports section. Those were the days when a showdown between Ivy undefeateds could sell out the Yale Bowl and receive national attention. Those were the days when an Ivy League football team could finish a season ranked 14th in the nation.

Those were the days when Robert L. Blackman coached football at Dartmouth College.

For 16 autumns (1955-70) Bob Blackman was the face of Dartmouth sports. His teams won or shared seven Ivy championships. Three of his squads finished without a loss. The 1970 team permitted its rivals to score in only one third of the games that season, relinquishing only 42 points all fall. And so Blackman's death more tha the passing of a man. It signaled, too, the passing of an era.

Sport Illustrated called Blackman "an Ivy League Lombardi," and there was something to that. Blackman believed in football and in its power to transform a man (and a college).

he believed in discipline. lle believed in commitment.And he believed in precision.

Moatly it was precision that defined Blaekman. and Dartmouth's football eleven, in the years he coached at Hanover and lived in the gray house built for him on the hillock on lyme Road.His assistant coaches, many of whom later woul become head coaches or athletic directors elsewhere, dressed with precision (coat and very thin tie every day). Pass patterns were run with precision. Quarterback sneaks were run with precision. Practices were run with precision. If a drill was to last eight minutes, it lasted eight minutes. Nevernine. And certainlynot seven.

He was a master recruiter. He was a master tactician. He was a master strategist. He was a master innovator, once even contriving a "human steps" play to catapulta gangly half back into the air as a defense against Princeton kicking .standout Charley (jogolak. Today'seollege iootbali it ofmultiple forimtions more to Blackman than to any other single coach. He was a revolutionary.

He wasn't a Dartmouth man, and yet, during theyears he reigned at Davis Varsity House, there wasn't a soul more devoted to the place.

Blackman, who wasinducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1987, came to Hanover from Pasadena City College and the University of Denver, and during his tenure Dartmouth won 104 games,lost37 and tied three. Twice his teams and not, those from Syracuse or penn State were a warded the lambert trophy,emblem atic of football supremacy in the East. Four times he was named Eastern coach of the year. Once he was named na tional coach of the year.

Then, lured by the chance to be a Big Ten coach, he left. Hisyears atlllinois were frustrating (and, with a 29-36-1 record, disappointing). He then decamped to Ithaca, taking over Cornell widi the warning that "the sleeping giant of the Ivy League is awake." He finished witha23-37-1 record at Cornell, finishing second in the league in 1980.

But Blaekman, whose own football career at the University of Southern California was cut short by a bout with polio, was fated to be remembered as Dartmouth's coach and to think of himself that way. The College awarded him an hfihorMy'fegree in 1996 and the class of 1937 adopted him as.an honorary member. And when he died, the four column, headlipc-at the topofthe obituary page of The New YorkTimes read:"Bob Blackman, 81,Coach of Dartmouth Football, Is Dead."

"Bob is not a jolly joker by any means,"the late Amos Blandin '18,cerebral New Hampshire state supreme court justice and shrewd observer of the Hanover sceae,oncesaid."On the other hand,Bob makes the game interesting to the bits."

blackman of Dartmouth. He made the game interesting to the boys.

David M.Shribman is theWashington bureau chief andassistant mannging editor of The Boston globe.He is a trustee of the College.

Blackman believed in football and in its power to transform a man (and a college). He believed in discipline. He believed in commitment. And he believed in precision.