Willis Glassgow

Willis Allen "Bill" Glassgow (April 21, 1907 – November 1, 1959) graduated from Shenandoah Iowa high school. Willis was an American football player and attorney. He played halfback for the University of Iowa from 1927 to 1929, was selected as a first-team All-American in 1929, and received the 1929 Chicago Tribune Silver Football as the best football player in the Big Ten Conference. He played two seasons of professional football in the National Football League for the Portsmouth Spartans in 1930 and the Chicago Cardinals in 1931. He practiced law in Iowa from 1933 to 1959, including two terms as the Page County Attorney (1935–1939) and three terms as the Linn County Attorney (1951–1957).

Biography

Early life Glassgow was born in Wheeling, Missouri, in 1907. He was the son of Franklin and Nellie (Williams) Glassgow and lived on a farm west of Wheeling for the first ten years of his life. He moved with his family to Shenandoah, Iowa, in 1916 and attended Shenandoah High School where he was selected as Iowa's all-state quarterback as a sophomore in 1922.

College athlete

Nebraska Glassgow enrolled at the University of Nebraska in 1925.

1928 As a junior in 1928, Glassgow helped lead Iowa to six straight victories, including a 14–7 win over Ohio State in which Glassgow ran for 153 yards. He placed fourth in the voting for the Chicago Tribune Silver Football trophy as the most valuable player in the Big Ten Conference in 1928 and was elected by his teammates as the captain of the 1929 Iowa Hawkeyes football team. In reporting on his election as Iowa's 1929 captain, one Iowa newspaper described his as the team's "Dancing Master": "Glassgow is commonly known as Iowa's Dancing master because of his shiftiness on the gridiron and because he is manager of the most popular ball room in Iowa City." At the end of the 1928 season, The Des Moines Register wrote:

The new leader is something more than a triple threat man. His off-tackle dashes and ability in an open field are supplemented by his accomplishments as a place kicker, punter, and forward passer. Weighing only 160 pounds, Glassgow's 5 feet 9 inches of height ranked him as one of the shortest men on the squad. He was apparently immune to injury, and despite the fact that he was the target of every defense the Hawkeyes encountered, he almost never called for time out. He also scored the first touchdown in the official dedication game against the University of Illinois. In the Illinois game, Glassgow ran for a 78-yard touchdown on the first play from scrimmage. The touchdown was Iowa's only score in a 7–7 tie game against Illinois. Glassgow wore a protective face mask in the 1929 Illinois game (pictured above) to protect a broken cheek bone suffered in an earlier game. Glassgow also kicked a game-winning field goal in Iowa's 9–7 win over Minnesota on November 9, 1929.

At the conclusion of the 1929 college football season, Glassgow was selected as a first-team All-American by Grantland Rice for Collier's Weekly, the Newspaper Editors Association (based on a poll of 100 coaches and football writers), The New York Sun, and sports writer Lawrence Perry. He was also named the outstanding back in the country by The New York Sun and received the Chicago Tribune Silver Football trophy as the most valuable player in the Big Ten Conference. Glassgow was also honored by being selected to play for the East team in the 1930 East-West Shrine Game. He scored one of the East's touchdowns in a 19–7 win but also suffered a shoulder injury in the Shrine Game that hampered his professional baseball career.

At the end of 1929, officials of the University of Iowa athletic department selected Glassgow as one of the 12 greatest Iowa athletes of all time in all sports. Glassgow graduated from Iowa with a bachelor of arts degree in 1930. Glassgow attended spring training with the Cardinals but was released to the minor leagues at the end of March 1929. He played in 1930 for the Cardinals' Western League club in St. Joseph, Missouri and also for the team in Moline, Illinois. He was a teammate of Dizzy Dean at St. Joseph in 1930.

Legal career Glassgow attended law school at the University of Iowa College of Law while playing professional football, using the money he earned in the NFL to pay for his legal education.

Glassgow received his law degree in 1933 and began practicing law in Shenandoah, Iowa. In 1939, Glassgow moved his law practice to Cedar Rapids, Iowa. He was thrice elected as a Republican to the position of Linn County Attorney in 1950, 1952 and 1954. He died of leukemia in November 1959 at age 52. He was survived by his wife, Hansetta, two children, Willis Glassgow, Jr., and Nancy Glassgow Cooper. He was a member of St. John's Episcopal Church in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, the Elks Club, the Cedar Rapids Country Club, the Tri-Centum Lodge of the Antient Free and Accepted Masons, the Iowa Consistory, the El Kahir Shrine, the Pickwick Club and the American, Iowa and Linn County Bar Associations. thumb