Dana X. Bible

Early life

Bible was born in Jefferson City, Tennessee. He graduated from Jefferson City High School in 1908 and received a B.A. degree from Carson–Newman College in 1912. Bible played football while in college and was a member of Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity, Iota chapter.

He is also noted to have allegedly been a member of the Ku Klux Klan. Klan robes embroidered with "X. Bible" are housed at Texas A&M University's Cushing Memorial Library and attributed to Bible.

Career

Bible began his coaching career at Brandon Prep School in Shelbyville, Tennessee. Mississippi College recruited him to coach in 1912, and he was recruited to coach for Texas A&M University in 1916.

In his college football coaching career, Bible compiled a record of 198–72–23. His teams had winning records in thirty of the thirty-three seasons he coached. Bible twice won ten games in a season. Bible also coached baseball and basketball at Texas A&M. During his hiatus from Texas A&M in 1918, Bible served as a pilot in World War I.

Bible's 1917 Texas A&M Aggies football team was undefeated, untied, and did not surrender a single point all season, outscoring opponents 270–0. His 1919 Texas A&M Aggies football team repeated the feat, outscoring the opposition 275–0. The 1919 team was retroactively named a national champion by the Billingsley Report and the National Championship Foundation. Texas A&M football under Bible is the only college football program to hold all opponents scoreless in two separate seasons.

In ten seasons at University of Texas at Austin, Bible brought the Longhorns football program to national prominence, winning three Southwest Conference championships, making three appearances at the Cotton Bowl Classic—two victorious, and placing in the final AP Poll rankings five times.

While at Texas, University of Chicago coach Clark Shaughnessy contacted Bible to organize a clinic on the T formation. Along with Frank Leahy of the University of Notre Dame, they helped create the T formation revolution. Bible was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame in 1951, the Texas Sports Hall of Fame in 1959, the Longhorn Hall of Honor in 1960, and the Texas A&M Athletic Hall of Fame in 1966. He was the 1954 recipient of the Amos Alonzo Stagg Award.

Bible served on the National Collegiate Football Rules Committee for 25 years, and was president of the American Football Coaches Association. His book, Championship Football, was published in 1947.

Family

Bible was the son of Jonathan David Bible (October 9, 1863 in Cocke County, Tennessee – November 23, 1942) and Cleopatra I. Willis (October 19, 1870 – January 25, 1954). The couple married on June 20, 1889. Jonathan was a college professor at Carson–Newman College in Jefferson City, Tennessee; he could quote biblical scripture and was a Greek and Latin scholar.

Bible married Rowena Rhodes on December 19, 1923. They had two children, William and Barbara. Rowena died in 1942. Dana married Agnes Stacy in 1944, and they would later divorce in 1950. He married Dorothy Gilstrap on February 2, 1952.

Death

Bible died on January 19, 1980, and is interred at Austin Memorial Park Cemetery in Austin, Texas.

Head coaching record

Football

References

References

1. "LSU Year-by-Year Records". lsusports.net.
2. "Texas A&M recruiting letter from 1919 surfaces authored by Dana X. Bible". sportsday.dallasnews.com.
3. "RESI Race & Space Tour – Race & Ethnic Studies Institute".
4. "Bible, Dana Xenophon". Texas State Historical Association.
5. (January 22, 1961). "Dana X. Bible to Retire Sept. 1". [[The New York Times]].