- GRAMBLING LEGENDS -

• Eddie G. Robinson
• Fred C. Hobdy
• Ralph Waldo Emerson Jones
• Collie J. Nicholson

 Grambling Legends: Eddie G. Robinson

By Nick Deriso

Doug Williams valued his relationship with former Grambling coach Eddie Robinson because it was always about more than football.

“He wasn’t a guy that everything that came out of his mouth was Xs and Os,” said Williams, who was quarterback for Robinson in the 1970s then followed him as coach at Grambling State in 1998. “Everything that he did and related to was about life. He related football to life. It was about being able to survive in America.”

Robinson passed legendary coach Paul “Bear” Bryant for career victories on Oct. 5, 1985, finishing with 408 career wins. Though that Division I record may one day fall, Williams said the way it was earned will stand the test of time.

“Coach Rob’s victories were tougher than anybody else’s,” said Williams. “The key wasn’t so much Division I or Division II. His was the tougher job because of the times. There was no practice equipment. They were playing on sand. They couldn’t even stay in town when they travelled.”

Robinson sent more than 200 players into the pros – of which four have been inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. The Football Championship Subdivision, formerly known as Division I-AA, recognizes its best coach each year with an award named after Robinson, a member of the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame.

He would lead Grambling State to 17 Southwestern Athletic Conference titles, despite facing dizzying obstacles at the tiny, rural school. Robinson’s easy-going approach to the challenge, and his straightforward nature, still resonate with Williams today.

“A leader is somebody that you have to believe in,” said Williams — who, after an all-conference career at Grambling, made history as the first black Super Bowl quarterback and MVP in 1988.

“Coach Rob was a person who had your attention. I can remember sitting in a meeting and he could say things that would get you in the frame of mind to do whatever it took to get it done.”

Robinson’s abiding patriotism sprang from a life’s journey that began as a sharecropper’s son, but ended in the company of presidents and hall of famers. He talked about that love for America in ways large and small, usually with a splash of self-deprecating humor.

“I will never forget that we had a guy named Michael Moore at tight end,” Williams said. “They were playing the National Anthem and Michael stood up with his fist in the air. Coach went up to him and said: `Don’t you ever clinch your fist like that — if you ain’t got no money in it.’ ”

Williams chuckles at the memory, now decades old.

“That made a lot of sense. That’s the American dream,” Williams said. “Coach Rob waved the flag better than anybody. He wanted everyone to believe that if it can be accomplished, it can happen in America. He preached that, because it was his life.”

Williams spent one of his career’s most important moments — celebrating on the field after leading Washington to the NFL championship — with his former college coach.

“I won the Super Bowl and credit all of that to Grambling and Eddie Robinson,” Williams said.

“That day, he told me: `You will not understand the impact of this until you get older.’ You know, he’s right? That’s the old saying, that you grow up and you realize that your daddy was right all along. I find myself to this day saying that about things Coach Robinson first told me.”

http://www.thederisoreport.com/2009/07/18/grambling-legends-eddie-robinson/

Career highlights

Robinson spent fifty-six years as the head coach at historically black Grambling State University in Grambling in Lincoln Parish in northern Louisiana, from 1941 through 1997. During his tenure, Robinson established himself as the winningest coach in college football history, becoming the first coach to record 400 wins (although 45 of his wins occurred before Grambling was an accredited college). Robinson is second on the list of wins by a college coach, immediately behind active coach John Gagliardi of St. John's University (Minnesota). Robinson retired with a record of 408 wins, 165 losses and 15 ties. More than 200 of his players went on to play in the American Football League and in the NFL. Robinson coached three American Football League players who would later be inducted to the Pro Football Hall of Fame: the Kansas City Chiefs' Buck Buchanan; the Oakland Raiders' Willie Brown; and the Houston Oilers' Charlie Joiner. Robinson also coached James Harris, who with the AFL's Buffalo Bills became the first black quarterback in modern Pro Football history to start at that position in a season opener. He also coached Packers defensive end and Hall of Famer Willie Davis and the Super Bowl XXII MVP, Redskins quarterback Doug Williams, who would ultimately succeed Robinson as Grambling's head coach in 1998.

During his coaching career, Robinson compiled 45 winning seasons, including winning or sharing 17 Southwestern Athletic Conference championships and eight black college football national championships [1].

After several losing seasons in the 1990s, pressure mounted for Robinson to resign. In 1997, news escaped that Grambling was planning to dismiss him. Public outcry — including condemnation from Louisiana elected officials — led Grambling to retain Robinson's services through the remainder of the season.

Robinson died on April 3, 2007, at Lincoln General Hospital in Ruston, Louisiana, after being admitted earlier in the day.[2]

Surprisingly, while at Grambling, Eddie Robinson held several jobs other than Football coach, including teaching at Grambling High School, and coaching the girls' basketball team during the war.

Biography

Robinson was born in Jackson, Louisiana to the son of a sharecropper and a domestic worker. He went on to graduate from McKinley Senior High School in Baton Rouge in 1937. He went on to earn his bachelor's degree from Leland College (an unaccredited institution) in Baker in East Baton Rouge Parish, then went on to obtain his Master's degree from the University of Iowa in Iowa City in 1954. Robinson was a member of Alpha Phi Alpha, the first intercollegiate Greek-letter fraternity established for African Americans.

'Nobody has ever done or will ever do what Eddie Robinson has done'

Wire reports

For legendary Grambling State University football coach Eddie G. Robinson, football has always been the driving force motivating one of the most successful men to have ever set foot on a
football field.

Coach Robinson spent 57 seasons consistently fielding stellar football teams and guiding his young charges to successful lives both on and off the gridiron. His earned an unprecedented 408 college football victories to set the NCAA’s benchmark for wins in Division I. Coach Robinson retired with an overall record of 408 wins, 165 losses, and 15 ties.

More than 200 of his players went on to play in the National Football League, including Super Bowl XXII MVP quarterback Doug Williams, who would ultimately succeed Robinson as Grambling's head coach in 1998.

Though ultra-successful, Coach Robinson has always remained humble, crediting his players, his family, his loving wife Doris, the media, and football fans from all over the world for making the name Eddie Robinson synonymous with the best that college football has to offer.

On October 7, 1995, Robinson became the first college football coach to break the 400-win barrier, a mark once thought to be unreachable. The 42-6 triumph over Mississippi Valley State came before a national television audience on ESPN2.

“Nobody has ever done or will ever do what Eddie Robinson has done for this game,” legendary Penn State football coach Joe Paterno said. “Our profession will never, ever be able to repay Eddie Robinson for what he has done for this country and the profession of football.”

Time after time Coach Robinson proved that hard work, dedication, and determination could lead to unimaginable accomplishments. Neither of Coach Robinson’s parents graduated from high school, but they encouraged their son’s desire to stay in school and earn a college degree. A young Robinson moved on from high school to become a star quarterback at Leland College under Reuben Turner, a Baptist preacher who introduced Robinson to the concepts of a playbook and coaching clinics.

With no coaching opportunities available following college, Robinson took a job in a Baton Rouge feed mill before learning from a relative that there was an opening for a football coach at Louisiana Negro Normal and Industrial Institute, later to become Grambling State University. After an interview with school president Dr. Ralph Waldo Emerson Jones, Robinson was chosen as the sixth head football coach of the Tigers.

It didn’t take Coach Rob, as he is affectionately known, long to prove his worth. Following his initial season, Coach Robinson took command and dismissed some players who he felt were not living up to expectations. The results came soon thereafter, as the next season Coach Robinson’s team posted a perfect 9-0 season with the team going undefeated, untied, and unscored upon. Grambling was only the second collegiate team to have shut out every opponent, a feat which has not been repeated since.
By 1949, Grambling’s football program was receiving national acclaim after former Tigers running back Paul “Tank” Younger signed with the Los Angeles Rams of the National Football League, thus becoming the first player from a historically black college to be taken in the NFL.

In 1955, Grambling claimed the national Black College Championship by going 10-0 (the best record in school history) and outscoring opponents by a 356-61 margin. After picking up his 100th career coaching victory against Bethune-Cookman in 1957, Coach Robinson and his Tigers joined the Southwestern Athletic Conference (SWAC) in 1959. The following season he led the Tigers to the first of 17 SWAC titles under his guidance.

Another of Robinson’s former Tigers made NFL waves in 1963 as the late Junius “Buck” Buchanan became the first player from a Historically Black College and University (HBCU) to have been chosen first overall in the NFL Draft.

By 1984, Coach Robinson was poised to become college football’s winningest coach. After surpassing Amos Alonzo Stagg’s 314 coaching victories that year, he tied legendary Alabama coach Paul “Bear” Bryant’s 323-win mark with a 23-6 win over Oregon State before becoming the career wins leader the next week with a 27-7 win over Prairie View A&M.

Coach Robinson finally relinquished his reigns to the Tigers following the 1997 season, but his contribution to the game will be remembered forever. Also during the same year, he was officially inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.

The Football Writers of America's Coach of the Year award is named after Coach Robinson. Grambling also named its football stadium the Eddie Robinson Stadium.

Robinson graduated from McKinley Senior High School in Baton Rouge, Louisiana in 1937. He went on to earn his Bachelor's Degree from Leland College in Baker, Louisiana, then went on to obtain his Masters Degree from the University of Iowa in 1954.