He thanked his teammates, his family and the Maras. Emlen Tunnell: A Largely Unknown NFL Great Emlen Tunnell was the first black player voted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. And his last bit of thanks were to that truck driver who gave him the ride into New York City.Copyright © 2011 NPR.
Emlen Tunnell was the first black player voted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Tunnell's neck injury in 1942 resulted in his being rejected in efforts to enlist in both the In the fall of 1944, Tunnell played at the halfback position for the San Francisco Coast Guard Pilots football team.On December 12, 2017, the Coast Guard announced that it planned to name its 45th Tunnell was discharged from the Coast Guard in April 1946.On October 11, 1947, he set an Iowa single-game record with 155 receiving yards and three touchdowns on six receptions.Tunnell left Iowa in January 1948 in order to make some money to enable him to return and play football in the fall.As a rookie in 1948, Tunnell appeared in 10 games and intercepted seven passes, including one returned 43 yards for a touchdown.Tunnell remained with the Giants for a total of 11 years from 1948 to 1958.
Tunnell's Hall of Fame enshrinement speech, delivered eight years earlier, lasted five sentences before he got choked up. He listed his birth date as March 29, 1923, at Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania.
U.S., Department of Veterans Affairs BIRLS Death File, 1850–2010 [database on-line].Application for World War II Compensation completed by Emlen Lewis Tunnell and dated March 20, 1950. Emlen Tunnell, Self: The NFL on CBS. U.S., Social Security Death Index, 1935–2014 [database on-line].Ancestry.com. Emlen Lewis Tunnell (March 29, 1924 – July 23, 1975), sometimes known by the nickname "The Gremlin", was an American professional football player and coach. Source Information: Ancestry.com.
When he entered the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1967, Emlen Tunnell was the first black man to . Tunnell, who grew up in an integrated neighborhood near Philadelphia, attended the University of Toledo and then Iowa, with a stint in the Coast Guard in between.That he excelled on the field, not to mention saved shipmates' lives on two separate occasions, mattered little to the NFL, which had only a single integrated team, the L.A. Rams.
U.S. WWII Draft Cards Young Men, 1940-1947 [database on-line]. be inducted. Emlen Tunnell was born on March 29, 1925 in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, USA as Emlen Lewis Tunnell. He walked into my grandfather's office in 1948 and asked for a tryout.PESCA: And it's a good thing that he got one, says John K. Mara, Giants co-owner, because Tunnell went on to set interception records and helped the Giants win a championship in 1956 through his defense and kick returns.Tunnell was soon lured away to the worst team in football, but the Green Bay Packers' new coach and Giants former coordinator, Vince Lombardi, knew that he needed Tunnell's leadership. Seventy-nine interceptions, two behind the all-time leader, Paul Krause, and Tunnell played in 59 fewer games. Pennsylvania, Veteran Compensation Application Files, WWII, 1950-1966 [database on-line].The National Archives in St. Louis, Missouri; St. Louis, Missouri; Draft Registration Cards for Pennsylvania, October 16, 1940 – March 31, 1947; Record Group: Records of the Selective Service System, 147; Box: 2560. The interception numbers are especially impressive because he had far fewer opportunities. Michael MacCambridge.MACCAMBRIDGE: Em Tunnell in 1948 hitchhikes up to New York, waits for a couple hours before he gets a ride, but a West Indian gentleman driving a banana truck stops by and gives him a ride into New York City, where Tunnell, with $1.50 to his name, goes in and has a meeting with the Giants.JOHN MARA: The story that I always heard was that he showed up unanounced.
He was also the first defensive specialist elected to the Hall of Fame, the first African American to be a scout and the first African American on a coaching staff. But the New York Giants did show a bit of interest in Tunnell, not that they drafted him or even gave him train fare.
Emlen Tunnell was a famous American football player, who was born on March 29, 1925. During that time, he was selected as a first-team All-Pro six times, played in eight Pro Bowls, and set franchise records that still stand with 74 intercepted passes for 1,240 interception return yards and four touchdowns (tied with In March 1962, Tunnell announced his retirement as a player.During his 14-year NFL career, Tunnell also totaled 16 fumble recoveries, 8.6 yards per punt return, and 1,215 yards on 46 kickoff returns (26.4 yards per return).Tunnell has received numerous honors for his contributions to the sport, including the following: John Mara was only seven years old when Tunnell retired, but remembers him dearly.MARA: He was, I think it's fair to say, the most beloved member of this organization, maybe in its history.
It always hung outside my father's office and then, when we moved into this facility, I wanted to make sure it hung outside of my office because, you know, I have special memories of him.PESCA: Mara was with Tunnell the night he died of a heart attack in 1975. He was known as that team's "offense on defense."
Visit our website And though he still ranks second all-time in interceptions, he is a casualty of the unfamiliarity football often has with its past.Fifty years ago, Emlen Tunnell played his last pro-football game. In May 1963, he was hired by the Giants as a special assistant coach under head coach In February 1965, Tunnell was promoted to assistant coach responsible for the Giants' defensive backs.Tunnell suffered a minor heart attack in October 1974 and thereafter assumed a new position as the Giants' assistant personnel director.As noted in the "Early years" section below, reliable sources are substantially in dispute as to w whether Tunnell was born in 1922, 1923, 1924, or 1925.Ancestry.com. He played his last game 50 years ago on Saturday.
Emlen Tunnell was born on March 29, 1925 in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, USA as Emlen Lewis Tunnell. Second in interceptions is Emlen Tunnel.PESCA: A couple fans I spoke with said the name does sound familiar. During the decade of the 1950s, when the New York Giants were a perennial contender in the National Football League, Emlen Tunnell served as the key “strut” in the Giants’ famed “Umbrella Defense,” and in so doing, put fear into the hearts of the opposition.
On June 2, 2018, a statue of Tunnell was installed in In the fall of 1962, Tunnell worked as a scout for the Giants and Packers, observing college players on Saturdays and watching the Giants' upcoming opponents on Sundays. All rights reserved. There's one big oil painting here and it's of Emlen.MARA: It's of Emlen. And since Eagles' linebacker Chuck Bednarik, who entered with him, was considered