A salute to the military veterans of Texas Longhorns football

If you visited Burnt Orange Nation during the week of Memorial Day earlier this year, you might have seen and read a pair of posts honoring the lives and sacrifices of the Texas Longhorn football lettermen who died while in military service during World War I and World War II.

For Veterans Day, I have compiled a list of Longhorn lettermen who are known to have served in the military at some point. There’s far too many of them to go into great biographical detail, but in a few instances I’ll put a hyperlink on a name when there is a story about that one’s life that can be found elsewhere on the web.

There were well over 600 former students or staff members of the University of Texas who died while serving in World War II, and at least 75 who perished while serving in World War I. If one were to list every ex-UT student who served in the military it would number into the several thousand just for those two wars alone. Very few of them are still living, and we owe all of them our thanks and much more.

This site’s focus is on UT’s athletic teams, and since my own historical research into Longhorn sports has been focused most keenly on its football teams and players, it is the military veterans in that sport on whom I have the most extensive notes. So the list below will include only military vets (and one or two whose service was adjacent to the military, such as teaching at a school for military dependents) who have earned football letters at the University of Texas. It is extensive but likely far from complete, and will be updated as new information is received.

The following list will proceed alphabetically by last name. I’ll include (in parentheses) the year(s) that these men lettered at UT, along with either their hometown or city where they attended high school (in Texas unless otherwise noted), and theater of war and branch of service (if known). Several Longhorn team captains and at least a handful of All-Americans are included in the list, though for purposes of this post the notes will strictly pertain to their military service and not their athletic accomplishments.

If there is inconsistency in the labeling of some of those services — such as World War II vets serving in either the “Air Force”, “Army Air Force”, or “Army Air Corps” — that’s because different names for some units were often used interchangeably in contemporary articles, and what was called the Army Air Corps in the early 1940s was sometimes called the “Air Force” when one’s service in it was mentioned decades later in a veteran’s obituary. For the most part I’ve labeled their branch of service as it was labeled in whatever source I found it mentioned.

If you know of anyone not named on the list who should be included, please send me an email or mention them in the comments. And please try to keep the comments politics-free.

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Ben “Stookie” Allen (1924) — Corsicana — WWII, Army

Leroy Anderson (1944) — Wilmot, Wisconsin — Navy

Kenneth Anglin (1952) — Groom — Korean War, Marines

Judson Atchison (1935-37) — Baird — WWII

Thomas Adam Austin (1916) — Laredo — Army colonel; later began the ROTC program at Lanier High School in Montgomery, Alabama

Robert Baldridge (1931) — Clifton — WWII

John Gaddis Bass (1913) — Houston — WWI

James Henry “Jack” Beall, Jr. (1916) — Sweetwater — WWI, Army

Maxie Bell (1944-45) — Vernon — Navy

Kearie Lee “K.L.” Berry (1912, 14-15, 24) — Denton — Army; WWII, survived the Bataan Death March at age 48 and spent over 3 years in a prisoner of war camp, retired from active duty as a Brigadier General

Cade Bethea (1897-99) — Seven Oaks — Spanish-American War

Dana X. Bible (head football coach 1937-46) — Jefferson City, Tennessee — WWI, Air Corps

Robert Blaine (1915-16, 19) — Houston — Army

William Bartlett Blocker (1904-05) — San Antonio — WWI

Ralph “Peppy” Blount (1945, 47-48) — Big Spring — WWII, Army Air Corps

Edwin Bluestein (1922-23) — Port Arthur — WWI, Navy

Daniel Philip “Phil” Bolin (1943-44) — Wichita Falls — WWII, Navy

Nate Boyer (2012-14) — El Cerrito, California — Army, Green Berets; Iraq, Afghanistan

Edward Young “E.Y.” Boynton (1916) — Waco — WWI, Army

Dewey Bradford (1917) — Austin — WWI, Marines

Fred Brechtel (1945) — New Orleans, Louisiana — Navy

Wilson Brennan (1917-19) — Denison — WWI, Army

Clinton Giddings Brown (1901) — San Antonio — WWI

Shelby Buck (1938-39) — Crosbyton — WWII, Royal Canadian Air Force and U.S. Air Force; killed in a plane crash in England in May 1943

Max Bumgardner (1942, 46-47) — Wichita Falls — WWII, Army Corps of Engineers

Edmond Franklin Butler (1943) — Lubbock — Navy

Jerome Buxkemper (1945) — Ballinger — Teacher and coach at Department of Defense Dependents schools in Japan and Germany

James Ross Callahan (1943) — Wink — Navy

Paul Campbell (1948-49) — Breckenridge — WWII, Army Air Corps

Jim Canady (1943, 46-47) — Austin — WWII, Navy

David C. “Bobby” Cannon (1919) — Crockett— Navy

Henry James Casey (1916) — Sherman — WWI artillery captain

John Edward “Jack” Chevigny (head football coach, 1934-36) — Hammond, Indiana — Army, Marine Corps; killed at the Battle of Iwo Jima on February 19, 1945

James Stewart Clarke (1896-97) — Boerne — Army

Howard “Hank” Clewis (1930-32) — Austin — WWII, Army

Donald Cohenour (1940-41) — Orange — WWII

Joe Coleman (1943) — Ballinger — Navy

William Harold “Spot” Collins (1941-42, 46) — Breckenridge — WWII and Korean War

William Zuehl Conoly (1941-42) — Corpus Christi — Navy

Jack Cowley (1926) — Paris — WWII

Jack Crain (1939-41) — Nocona — WWII, Navy

Ed Crane (1903, 05) — Dallas (or possibly Cleburne) — WWI

Franklin “Sandy” Crow (1944) — Taft — WWII, Navy

Ward Dabney (1895) — Bonham — Army colonel

Chal Daniel (1939-41) — Longview — WWII, Army Air Corps; killed in 1943 plane crash near New Braunfels

Milton Enoch “M.E.” Daniel (1916) — Waco — WWI

Doug Dawkins (1952) — Alexandria, Louisiana — Marines

Ted Dawson (1938-40) — Hondo — WWII

Gustav “Pig” Dittmar (1913-16) — Houston — Army

Walter Doell (1929-31) — Mason — Coast Guard

Harry Dolan (1916) — Taylor — WWI, Air Corps

Noble Doss (1939-41) — Temple — WWII, Navy

Addison Baker Duncan (1915) — Waco

John Franklin Easter (1902) — Itasca — Spanish-American War

Robert Lee Edge (1944) — Dallas — WWII, Army

James Archibald “Pete” Edmond (1913-15) — Waco — WWI, Army; killed in action in October 1918

Joseph Ferguson Ellis (1920) — Lockhart — WWI

Joseph Henry Ellis (1918) — San Saba — Army

Gover “Ox” Emerson — Orange — WWII, Navy

Bernie Esunas (1936-38) — Washington, DC — Air Force

Don Fambrough (1942) — Longview — WWII, Army Air Corps

Elmo Felfe (1945) — Thorndale — Navy

Jackie H. Field (1941-42) — Mission — Navy

Robert Franklin “Bob” Finn (1953-54) — Taft — Army

Harold Joe Fischer (1941-42, 44) — Austin — WWII, Marines

Preston Flanagan (1940-41) — Longview — Air Force, served in WWII, Korea and Vietnam

Jack Freeman (1939, 41-42) — Mexia — WWII, Air Force

Floyd Garrett (1931) — China Spring — WWII, Marines

Frank Gerling (1944) — Austin — Navy

Audrey Gill (1941-42, 46) — Sweetwater — WWII, Army Air Force

John Ellis Gill (1938-40) — Amarillo — WWII, Army Air Force

William Gohmert (1919) — San Antonio — WWI

David Gonzalez (2016) — Chicago, Illinois — Marines

James William “Red” Goodwin (1939-40) — Amarillo — WWII, Army Air Corps, killed in action in April 1944

Edwin Ghent Graves (1917-19) — Galveston — naval reserve

Archie Gray (1920-22) — Baileyville — WWI

Lewis Gray (1937-39) — Gorman — WWII, Air Force

Ralph Greear (1932-33) — Clovis, New Mexico — WWII, Army, killed in action in November 1944

Charles Lawless Green (1917) — Cameron — WWI

John Bachman Greer (1917-19) — Waco — WWI and WWII, Navy; died in a Navy hospital in New York on June 10, 1944.

Marcel Gres (1943) — San Francisco, California — WWII, Navy

Harold Griffin (1934-35) — Breckenridge — Army

James Robert “Jimmie” Grubbs (1939-40) — Houston — WWII

Hal Halbert (1914) — Coleman — WWI

Ahmard Hall (2004-05) — Angleton — Marines; Kosovo, Afghanistan

Robert Kittrell Hanger (1916) — Fort Worth — WWI

Henry Harkins (1941) — Marshall — WWII, Navy

Rube Lee Harkins, Jr. (1939-41) — Marshall — WWII

Thomas Harrell (1945) — Norman, Oklahoma — WWII

Henry “Demp” Harris (1941-42, 46) — Camden, Alabama — WWII

Richard Coke Harris (1894) — Comanche — Spanish-American War

Thomas Maxey Hart (1916, 19-20) — Austin — WWI

Clyde Harville (1943) — Ballinger — WWII, Navy

Samuel Harwell (1916, 19) — Corsicana — Army

Charles Hawn (1929, 31) — Athens — Naval Air Corps

Jesse Hawthorne (1940) — Port Arthur — Army Air Corps

Bertram Hedick (1916, 19) — Mineral Wells — WWI

Ed Heap (1945-46) — Temple — WWII

Walter Heap (1941, 46) — Taylor — WWII, Coast Guard

Hans Richard Frantz Helland (1910) — Waxahachie — WWI

James Higginbotham (1912) — Dublin — Naval reserve flying corps, died after a plane crash in Fort Worth in 1918

Henry Lewis Hook (1944) — Houston — Navy

Fred Walter Householder (1904-05) — Charlie — WWI

Kyle Hrncir (2018) — San Antonio — Army

Billy Hughes (1935-36) — Van Alstyne — WWII

Simeon Hulsey (1920) — Bonham — WWI and WWII, doctor

Glenn Jackson (1937-38, 40) — Corpus Christi — WWII, Army Air Force

John Andrew Jackson, Jr. (1902) — Austin — Spanish-American War

Ransom Jackson (1945) — Little Rock, Arkansas — Navy

Gillis Johnson (1915-16) — Fort Worth — WWI

Woody Johnson (1941) — Tyler — WWII, Army

James “Snakey” Jones (1895-96) — Bastrop — WWI, army; also a Judge Advocate in National Guard

Murray Brashear Jones (1908-09) — Houston — Army

Louis Jordan (1911-14) — Fredericksburg — WWI, Army, killed in action in March 1918

Harold Jungmichel (1940-41) — Thorndale — WWII, Navy

Hubert “Buster” Jurecka (1933-35) — Robstown — WWII, Army Air Corps

Bothwell Kane (1912) — Fort Worth — WWI, Army, killed in action in July 1918

Nathan Kaspar (2001) — Ganado — Navy

Ray Keck (1914) — Cotulla — WWI

Raymond Keeling (1935-37) — Dallas — WWII, Army

Arthur Kelleher (1910) — Austin — WWI, Army

Raymond Keller (1899) — San Antonio — Spanish-American War

Winchester Kelso (1915) — San Antonio — WWI, Army

Thurman August “T.A.” Kinder (1900) — Marble Hill, Missouri — WWI

George Kindley (1904) — Graham — WWI

Clarence Waldman King (1896) — San Antonio — Spanish-American War

Arnold Kirkpatrick (1909-11) — Brownwood — WWI

James Shiro Kishi (1943) — Houston — Army, WWII and Korean War; later spent a decade as director of research and development for the Army Aviation Test Board at Fort Rucker, Alabama

Ernest Koy (1930-32) — Sealy — WWII

Malcolm Kutner (1939-41) — Dallas — WWII, Navy

Tom Landry (1947-48) — Mission — WWII, Army Air Corps

William Allyn “Rip” Lang (1916) — Corsicana — WWI, Navy

Wallace Lawson (1936-38) — Cleburne — WWII, Army

Pete Layden (1939-41) — Dallas — WWII, Army Air Corps

Charles Holland Leavell (1896-98) — Georgetown — Spanish-American War

Bobby Coy Lee (1943, 48-49) — Austin — WWII, Army Air Corps

George Luhn (1923) — Taylor — WWI, Navy

Joe Magliolo (1942-43, 47) — Galveston — WWII, Navy

William Main (1943) — Danville, California — WWII, Navy

Keifer Marshall (1943) — Temple — WWII, Marines

Vernon Martin (1940-41) — Amarillo — WWII, Army Air Force

Martin Luther “Happy” Massingill (1909-10) — Midlothian — WWI, Air Corps

Julian Mastin (1919) — Fort Worth — WWI, Army

Frederick John Maurer (1943) — Eureka, California — WWII

Ray Mayfield (1944) — Galena Park — WWII, Army

George Howard “Hook” McCullough (1920-21) — Fayette, Missouri — WWI

George Wendell McCullough (1919) — Waco — WWI and WWII

William Emmet McMahon (1900-01) — Savoy — WWI

Allen McMurrey (1915-16) — Cuero — WWI, hospital apprentice; WWII, Board of Examining Physicians

Kenneth Merritt (1944) — Dallas — WWII, Navy

Thomas Milik (1944) — Carteret, New Jersey — WWII, Navy

Murray Moore (1924-26) — Electra — WWII, Marines

Glen Morries (1942) — Temple — WWII, Army, killed in action in November 1944

William Murray (1911-13) — Floresville — WWI

Park Myers (1937-39) — Caldwell, Kansas — WWII, Army

Horace Neilson (1914) — Ladonia — WWI

Grady Niblo (1911, 13) — Dallas — Army

Robert Read Nunn (1917) — Corsicana — WWI

Guy Nunnelly (1945) — Port Arthur — WWII

Jim Pakenham (1949) — Longview — Air Force

Joe Parker (1941-43) — Wichita Falls — WWII, Navy

Arlis Parkhurst (1956-58) — Colorado City — Marines

Paul Parkinson (1952-54) — Baytown — Army

Rasmus Black Patrick, Jr. (1939) — Olney — WWII, Marines

Marshall Pennington (1933-34) — Georgetown — WWII

Rufus Perry (1910-11) — Brownwood — Army

Derwood Pevetto (1939, 41) — Port Arthur — WWII, Army Air Corps

Henry Charles Pfannkuche (1924-25) — San Antonio — Army

Brad Poronsky (2005) — Universal City — Air Force, Judge Advocate General’s Corps

Billy Porter (1950) — Tyler — Marines

Melvin Preibisch (1933) — Sealy — Navy

Ben Proctor (1948-50) — Austin — WWII, Navy

Leslie Proctor (1942) — Temple — WWI and Korean War, Marines

Nelson Puett Sr. (1911-12) — Temple — WWI, Army

Walton Roberts (1941-42) — Tyler — WWII, Army

Darrell Royal (head football coach 1957-1976) — Hollis, Oklahoma — WWII, Army Air Corps

Clarence Rundell (1926) — Austin — Navy

Perry Samuels (1948-49) — San Antonio — Army, Navy

Orban “Spec” Sanders (1940-41) — Temple, Oklahoma — WWII

Mack Saxon (1925-26) — Temple — WWII, Navy

Richard Schulte (1957-59) — Hondo — Air Force

Joe Schwarting (1941-42) — Waco — WWII, Navy

Dale Schwartzkopf (1945-48) — La Crosse, Kansas — Navy

Wallace Scott (1941-42) — Tyler — WWII, Navy

Charles Lee Sens (1916, 21) — Cameron — Army

Ney “Red” Sheridan (1934-36) — Sweetwater — WWII, Army Air Corps

Sylvan Simpson (1915) — Llano — WWI and WWII; Army

Joe Brevard Smartt (1933-35) — Austin — WWII

Pete Smith (1917) — Austin — WWI, Army Air Force; WWII, Navy

Pablo David Soliz (1986) — Falfurrias — Marines

Sonny Sowell (1951) — San Antonio — Army

James Michael “Mike” Sweeney (1938, 40-41) — Amarillo — WWII, Army Air Force, killed in a plane crash in August 1944

David Thayer (1939-40) — Houston — WWII, Army Air Corps

Algernon Thweatt (1899) — Austin — Spanish-American War

Herbert Tigner (1926-28) — Houston — Army

Jim Tolbert (1933, 35) — Farmersville — WWII, Army Air Corps

Mike Trant (1954-46) — Tyler — Navy

Jake Verde (1934) — Beaumont — Army

Morgan Vining (1910) — Austin — WWI

Homer Waits (1916-17) — San Antonio — Marines

Bert Walker (1914-15) — Azle — WWI

Jack Carpenter Wallace, Sr. (1945) — Edinburg — WWII, Navy

Jimmie Watson (1944) — Midland — WWII, Army

Don Weedon (1939, 46) — Bryan — Army Air Corps

Woodrow Weir (1933-35) — Georgetown — WWII, Navy

Tom Wetzel (1933) — Comanche — WWII, Navy

Theron Wilbanks (1928) — Greenville — Army Air Corps

Hugh Wolfe (1934, 36-37) — Stephenville — WWII

Stuart Wright (1924-25) — Dallas — WWII, Korean War, Army Air Force, retired as a major general