Wylie G. Woodruff

Wylie Glidden Woodruff (March 4, 1866 – June 21, 1930) was an American football player and coach. He played guard at the University of Pennsylvania under his older brother, George Washington Woodruff. He was selected to the 1896 College Football All-America Team during his senior year. After graduation, he served as the head coach at the University of Kansas from 1897 to 1898, compiling a record of 15–4.

Early life and playing career alt=Wylie Glidden Woodruff holding a football in his 1893 Penn football photo. Woodruff was born on March 4, 1866, in Tecumseh, Nebraska to Lewis Harlow Woodruff (June 9, 1836 – December 27, 1871) and Melissa Cormella Woodruff (née Glidden; December 16, 1841 – December 17, 1866). His family moved to Tecumseh, Nebraska from Friendsville, Pennsylvania in 1865 where his father was a dry goods dealer. His mother died at Tecumseh in 1866. Sometime after February 1868 his family moved back east briefly to Binghamton, New York and then to his mother's hometown of Friendsville, Pennsylvania where Woodruff spent most of his childhood. After attending and graduating from public schools in Friendsville, Pennsylvania he moved on to the Mansfield State Normal School in Mansfield, Pennsylvania. The 1880 Census has him living with Dr. Henry P. and Sarah E. née Glidden Hasting (his mother's sister) at Culver Township, Ottawa County, Kansas. He attended Wyoming Seminary in Kingston, Pennsylvania, from which he graduated in 1883. In 1889 he married Cora E. Bragdon, of Beloit, Kansas, in Kansas City. As a result of the 1890–91 recession he lost his business in the oil industry. Later he was hired as a traveling pickle salesman, a job he held until the fall of 1893. Woodruff graduated from Pennsylvania with a degree in medicine in 1897.

Coaching career

Kansas After graduating from Penn, Woodruff received an appointment to the United States Army as a contract surgeon at Fort Riley, Kansas, but three months into this assignment he received a leave of absence to become the head football coach for the University of Kansas Jayhawks located in Lawrence, Kansas. When he first arrived at Kansas, he moved in with the players in their training quarters and enforced strict codes of conduct. and he was active in trying to raise troops amongst KU students for the Spanish–American War in 1898. Upon his departure as head football coach at Kansas, Woodruff set up practice as a physician in Lawrence, opening an office at 709 Massachusetts Street in January 1898. He specialized in skin diseases and the removal of moles and other skin blemishes. He remained in Lawrence, practicing medicine until May 1901.

Controversy In the Fall of 1900 Woodruff filed for divorce from his wife, Cora, but then retracted the filing soon afterwards. Despite the retraction of his divorce filing, he moved out of his home at this time. It was alleged he had been carrying on an affair with another man's wife who had been a patient of his when Woodruff abruptly left Lawrence, Kansas to visit his mistress, Mrs. Edith Moyer, in Kansas City, Missouri. He then met up with his mistress and her daughter in Chicago, Illinois where they departed for his new home in Portland, Oregon. Mr. Ray Moyer, the husband of his mistress realizing that both his wife and daughter had fled town filed a police report claiming his daughter had been kidnapped by Woodruff and his wife. The Lawrence Chief of Police, chief Hayes, Woodruff and Mrs. Edith Moyer later married.

Later life and death Woodruff and his new wife made Portland, Oregon their home for the rest of their lives. Upon arrival in Portland, he again set up his medical practice, this time specializing in gynecology, obstetrics, and abdominal surgery. With his zest for athletic competition still not squelched, he competed on occasion in local wrestling matches, including a well known match against local professional wrestler, Joe Action. Woodruff famously won the match. Woodruff also played football for seven years for the Multnomah Athletic Club. He founded and operated the Oregon Sanitorium, a private in-patient treatment center. He was active in several clubs and associations in Portland, including the Loyal Order of Moose and the Knights of Pythias, both of which he was a lifetime member, and was an active member of the Alderwood Country Club. Woodruff died in Portland on June 21, 1930. He was survived by his wife, Edith I. Woodruff (née Green), daughter Mrs. Cormella Glidden Yenney (1904 – April 30, 1950), son George Walter Woodruff (November 8, 1906 – October 6, 1987), and grandson George Wylie Yenney (May 23, 1926 – November 16, 1994).

Head coaching record