Lin Houston

Lindell Lee Houston (January 11, 1921 – September 9, 1995) was an American football guard who played eight seasons in the All-America Football Conference (AAFC) and in the National Football League (NFL) with the Cleveland Browns. He was the older brother of Jim Houston.

Houston played with the Browns from their inception in 1946 through the 1953 season. Cleveland reached the league championship game in each of Houston eight seasons with the club, winning four times between 1946 and 1949 in the AAFC and once in the NFL in 1950. Houston played for coach Paul Brown during every phase of his football career: at Massillon (Ohio) High School, Ohio State and the Browns. He retired from football after the 1953 season and worked as an executive in the steel industry. He died in 1995.

High school and college career

Houston was born in Illinois, but his family moved to Ohio after a relative got a job at a steel mill in Massillon and convinced his father to move there. Houston had been a standout basketball player in Illinois, but Paul Brown, the head football coach at Massillon Washington High School, thought his combination of quickness and size would make him a good football player. He played as a guard on the school's varsity football team starting as a sophomore in 1941 under Paul Brown, who had by then been hired as the school's head football coach. Collier's named him an All-American that season, when the Ohio State Buckeyes football team won the school's first national championship.

Houston joined the U.S. Army in 1943. He stayed at Ohio State but was not allowed by the Army to play on the football team. In 1944, he played in the College All-Star Game against the Chicago Bears.

Professional career

Houston signed in 1946 with the Cleveland Browns, a professional team under formation in the new All-America Football Conference and coached by Paul Brown. Houston became a starter when Bill Willis was ill in 1946. The Browns won the AAFC championship that year.

In later seasons, Houston rotated with Bob Gaudio as part of a system where Brown used guard substitutions to relay plays to his quarterback. The Browns won three more AAFC championships in 1947, 1948 and 1949 before the league dissolved and the Browns were absorbed by the more established National Football League. The Browns won the NFL championship in 1950, their first season in the league.

Houston's job was to protect quarterback Otto Graham and open up running room for fullback Marion Motley. He was known for his toughness and durability. In a 1950 game against the Washington Redskins in which the Browns were ahead 24 points, he rushed through five Redskins players to make a tackle on a kickoff, risking injury. He retired for good in 1954, after 12 years playing for Paul Brown's teams. He left the game to concentrate on his job at the Sharon Steel Products Company.

Later life and death

Houston spent much of his life after football as a steel executive. He died of cancer in 1995 and was inducted into the Stark County High School Football Hall of Fame in 2008.