|
|
|
The man who led the 1947-48 ‘Battling Bulldogs’ to their perfect season on the gridiron has died. On October 26, Coach Owen Taylor passed away peacefully in his Lamar, Mo. home at the age of 100.
Coach Taylor’s longevity, like the magical football season his boys hoped would never end, was the result of hard work and ethics that didn’t allow for ever playing ‘fast and loose’ with the rules. The soft-spoken but uncompromising discipline with which he pushed his athletes to do their best began with the task-driven discipline he expected from himself. A lifelong educator certified to teach both physics and chemistry, Taylor substitute taught high school biology until he was 90 and only stopped then because his wife’s Alzheimer’s had advanced to the point that she needed round-the-clock care. Coach‘s daughter Karen explains, “Mom’s Alzheimer’s became so severe that he had to literally lock himself in the house with her for three years. He refused to put her in a nursing home and took care of her himself 24 hours a day, seven days a week, because he saw it as his duty. That was the kind of man my Father was.” Shortly after his wife passed away in 2005, Coach shattered his right shoulder and was in a nursing home for three months. “He was too independent to stay there longer and drove us crazy insisting on lunch from McDonald’s,” recalls Karen with a smile. “He told us it was time for him to go home! How could we refuse?”
Born in Brookfield on February 8, 1911, William Owen Taylor was one of eight children who worked in support of his family from the time he was nine years old. As a third grader, Taylor routinely rose before the break of dawn to throw his paper route, sweep out a local grocery store in exchange for food for his family, and then begin his day at school. He was a Boy Scout who earned the rank of Eagle Scout and set records in both football and track during his years at Brookfield High.
Following his graduation from Brookfield H.S. in 1930, Taylor went on to become an outstanding running back at Missouri Valley College. He suffered a broken collar bone during one contest and still managed to rush for over 300 yards, many of them with one arm taped to his body to immobilize the fractured bone. Former teammates, as well as young men who played for Coach Taylor, recall that he could run backward faster than most of them could sprint forward. In 1932 and 1933 Taylor was selected for both the Missouri All-Star Team and the M.C.A.U All-Star Team. In 1978 he was inducted into the Missouri Valley College Hall of Fame. Taylor signed to play professional football in Kansas City after his college graduation but was permanently sidelined after suffering a cracked vertebrae during practice.
The man who led the 1947-48 ‘Battling Bulldogs’ to their perfect season on the gridiron has died. On October 26, Coach Owen Taylor passed away peacefully in his Lamar, Mo. home at the age of 100.
Coach Taylor’s longevity, like the magical football season his boys hoped would never end, was the result of hard work and ethics that didn’t allow for ever playing ‘fast and loose’ with the rules. The soft-spoken but uncompromising discipline with which he pushed his athletes to do their best began with the task-driven discipline he expected from himself. A lifelong educator certified to teach both physics and chemistry, Taylor substitute taught high school biology until he was 90 and only stopped then because his wife’s Alzheimer’s had advanced to the point that she needed round-the-clock care. Coach‘s daughter Karen explains, “Mom’s Alzheimer’s became so severe that he had to literally lock himself in the house with her for three years. He refused to put her in a nursing home and took care of her himself 24 hours a day, seven days a week, because he saw it as his duty. That was the kind of man my Father was.” Shortly after his wife passed away in 2005, Coach shattered his right shoulder and was in a nursing home for three months. “He was too independent to stay there longer and drove us crazy insisting on lunch from McDonald’s,” recalls Karen with a smile. “He told us it was time for him to go home! How could we refuse?”
Born in Brookfield on February 8, 1911, William Owen Taylor was one of eight children who worked in support of his family from the time he was nine years old. As a third grader, Taylor routinely rose before the break of dawn to throw his paper route, sweep out a local grocery store in exchange for food for his family, and then begin his day at school. He was a Boy Scout who earned the rank of Eagle Scout and set records in both football and track during his years at Brookfield High.
Following his graduation from Brookfield H.S. in 1930, Taylor went on to become an outstanding running back at Missouri Valley College. He suffered a broken collar bone during one contest and still managed to rush for over 300 yards, many of them with one arm taped to his body to immobilize the fractured bone. Former teammates, as well as young men who played for Coach Taylor, recall that he could run backward faster than most of them could sprint forward. In 1932 and 1933 Taylor was selected for both the Missouri All-Star Team and the M.C.A.U All-Star Team. In 1978 he was inducted into the Missouri Valley College Hall of Fame. Taylor signed to play professional football in Kansas City after his college graduation but was permanently sidelined after suffering a cracked vertebrae during practice.
