Wyllys Terry

Wyllys Terry (c. 1864 – April 21, 1949) was an American football player and businessman. He holds the record for the longest run from scrimmage in college football history.

Athletic career Terry was a back on the undefeated 1882, 1883, and 1884 Yale Bulldogs football teams that compiled a three-year record of 24–1–2 and have been recognized as national champions all three years. On November 5, 1884, in a 46–0 victory over Wesleyan, he set a college football record with the longest run from scrimmage in American football history. The Guinness Book of Superlatives and other sources also register the length of Terry's record run at 115 yards. Other sources do not include the yardage behind the goal line and record the run at 110 yards, or 109 yards.

Terry also had an 85-yard touchdown run against Harvard in 1883.

He was also the middleweight and heavyweight intercollegiate boxing champion and a sparring partner of Gentleman Jim Corbett at the Crescent Athletic Club. He was also captain of the Yale baseball team.

Terry worked in the warehousing business and later still operated an insurance firm, Terry & Company, in New York City. He was the senior warden at St. Bernard's Church in Bernardsville, New Jersey. He was also a director of several companies, including the New Netherland Bank, Sterling Salt Company, Van Brunt Street and Erie Basin Railroad, Terminal Warehouse Company, and Depard and Company.

He died in 1949 at age 84 at his home on Park Avenue in Manhattan.