Neil Snow

Neil Worthington Snow (November 10, 1879 – January 22, 1914) was an American athlete. He competed in American football, baseball, and track and field at the University of Michigan from 1898 to 1902. He was selected as a first-team All-American football player in 1901 and the MVP of the 1902 Rose Bowl, a game in which he scored five touchdowns. He was posthumously inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1960.

Early years Snow was born into a wealthy family in Detroit, and attended local Central High School.

University of Michigan At the University of Michigan, Snow was the captain of the football, baseball and track teams, and had the distinction of winning more varsity letters than any other man — four in baseball, four in football and three in track. He stood 5 feet 8 inches and weighed 190 pounds. At least one 1905 newspaper account reported that he also lettered in tennis. Various reports differ as to whether he received 10, or 12 varsity letters at Michigan.

While at Michigan, Snow was also a mandolin player of "great talent," and was a member of the mandolin, guitar and banjo club. He was also regarded as "one of the best students in the university." The 1898 team went 10–0 and won Michigan's first Western Conference football championship, finishing the season with a 12–11 win over the University of Chicago that inspired Louis Elbel to write The Victors, Michigan's fight song. Elbel's lyric, "Champions of the West", refers to Michigan's having won the Western Conference championship for the first time in the school's history.

In 1899, Snow started seven games at right end. In December 1899, he was elected by his teammates to be captain of Michigan's 1900 football team.

As the junior team captain in 1900, he started nine games at right end and led Michigan to a 7-2-1 record. In December 1900, Snow was defeated in his bid for re-election as captain of the football team by a vote of 15 to 7.

Snow's fame grew as a result of his role on the 1901 Michigan Wolverines football team, considered by some the greatest Michigan football team of all time. In Fielding H. Yost's first year as coach, Yost switched Snow to the fullback position where he started all 11 games. Grantland Rice also compared Snow to Thorpe for his talent in football, baseball, and track, and opined that Thorpe was "nothing like Snow's equal on the ballfield."

Michigan finished 11–0, did not allow a single point to be scored by an opposing team, and outscored its opponents 550–0. The 1901 Wolverines became known as the "point-a-minute" team, as their offensive production resulted in an average of one point being scored every minute. The 1901 team was invited to play in the first Rose Bowl game on January 1, 1902, a 49–0 win over Stanford. Snow scored five touchdowns in the 1902 Rose Bowl, as follows: A five-yard run for a touchdown in the first half for the game's first points; A two-yard run for a touchdown in the second half to extend Michigan's lead to 22–0; An eight-yard run to extend the Michigan lead to 33–0; A 17-yard run to extend the Michigan lead to 38–0; and A four-yard run to extend the lead to 44–0.

Snow's five touchdowns and 25 points (touchdowns counted for five points) in the 1902 Rose Bowl is still the all-time Rose Bowl record. Snow was named the Most Valuable Player of the game when the award was created in 1953 and selections were made retroactively. Snow was also named an All-American by Caspar Whitney in the December 1901 issue of Collier's magazine — the only Western player named to the All-American team for 1901 and only the second player in Michigan history (William Cunningham was the first) to receive the honor. Whitney wrote: "To be fast, to break interference, and to be wise about the time of going in, make up the requisites of an end rusher, and all of these Snow possessed in a marked degree." His final game as a Wolverine baseball player was a 7–4 win over Cornell, in which Snow was responsible for six runs, including three RBIs on a bases-loaded triple. Fogel's wire to Snow reportedly read, "What are your terms to play with New York", to which Snow replied tersely, "Am not on the market."

Coaching career Snow coached football at the University of Nashville in 1902. After that season, he resigned never to coach again, accepting a construction position in New York.

Later years In June 1905, Snow's younger brother broke his neck in an accident in switching sand cars at Hammond, Indiana. Newspaper accounts indicate that Neil Snow hurried to his brother's bedside at St. Margaret's hospital in Hammond.

Snow's principal career after college was with the Detroit Drill Twist Company, where he became the company's treasurer, general manager, and eventually its president. One writer noted: "The larger colleges in the East had come to realize with what great efficiency Neil Snow acted as an official and his services were eagerly sought." At the time of Snow's death, noted American poet, Edgar A. Guest published the following poem as a tribute to Snow:

The whistle sounds: The game is o'er! We pay tribute now with tears. Instead of smiling eyes and cheers.

Neil Snow has crossed the line once more

Life's scrimmage ends! A manly soul Now passes bravely through the night Undaunted still and Spotless White

Neil Snow has made another goal

The crowds depart. The setting sun Blazes his pathway to the west. The stamp of valor's on his breast.

Neil Snow the Master's M has won.

Snow's sudden death at age 34 was seen as a cautionary tale of "the great over-do it age." He was cited as proof that endless competition puts undue strain on the heart and nerves, with one article noting: "Snow was big and powerful and always in fine condition. Yet after a hard squash game he died in less than five minutes, where 20 minutes before he had seemed to be in perfect health."

He has been called "the greatest all-round athlete ever graduated from the University of Michigan" and was named a member of Fielding H. Yost's "all-time" Michigan team at the right end position. The Post opined that Snow was an end quite worthy to rank with the great ends of the East and that he "was just the kind of man who would have been suited to the advanced requirements of the new game and its additional demand for alertness, in an end." The Tribune wrote of Snow:

Undoubtedly one of the greatest was the late Neil Snow of Michigan. Snow stood as one of the great football players of the game. He was an all-American end and a great plunging full back. As a ball player he batted over .390 for Michigan his last two years and received at least three good offers from big league clubs. He was one of the best college first basemen that ever lived. On the track Snow could high jump around six feet; he could put the shot 45 feet; he was a fine hurdler. Taking both quality and quantity, we should say that Snow was the equal at least of any man that has been mentioned. Rice called Snow "a football marvel, hurdler, jumper and shot putter and one of the best ball players Michigan ever knew."

In 1960, he was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.

Head coaching record