Tom Harmon vs. The Drunk (90th Birthday Special Edition)
A big happy birthday to Michigan’s legendary Heisman Trophy winner Tom Harmon. Old 98 would have been an old 90 today and all the maize and blue faithful should rejoice.
What a perfect time to roll out a special edition of my now dusty “Tom Harmon vs. The Drunk Fan” video, published a couple years ago after finding a wonderful page of Life Magazine depicting this awesome incident. Coincidentally this happened 69 years ago today as well, on Harmon’s 21st birthday!
I updated it with fresh text frames, new quotes and a little bit of Varsity and The Victors to spice it up. Enjoy and share with your Meeecchigan friends:
Update 9/29: Funny thing happened. At around 00:57 seconds in, the choir sings the words "Down the Field" in Varsity just as the #2 photo from Life appears with the caption "Down the Field." Creepy weird, man. Wizard of Oz and Dark Side of the Moon weird.
Update 9/30: Got a note from reader ‘Roger’ who added that Brennan and Harmon "became friends and he sent Harmon a birthday card every year after that." That’s great.
Update 9/30 #2: The great WolverineHistorian posted a video clip of the incident (I’m still partial to mine) but it’s excellent – click here.
Related Posts:
* Harmon and Old Number..Six?
* Tommy’s the BMOC
* Tom Harmon says ‘Vote Heston’
* Old 98’s Son Faces Michigan, MSU
* Harmon Goes for the Gusto
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Great Post !!!!!!
What a special player he was. I wish that I knew more about him. Did he play offense and defense? I think he did. What position did he play on defense? Or did he just line up anywhere?
I think I have an old Life magazine around here with him in it.
Do you know if he appeared in Life magazine more than once?
Thanx, Brad
fantastic work. I never heard that story before.
There’s a great story about Harmon’s record at UM and in World War Two in the Michigan Today archives (click here)
@John Lofy
Thanks guys – and thanks for the link John.
From the video:
“Michigan visits the California Berkley Stadium”.
Berkley? I’m pretty sure it’s spelled Berkeley. LOL
Thanks Stan – there’s actually two typos on that slide. I don’t have an editor. Glad you got a LOL out of that.
Harmon was great – he was great to watch. I lived in Ann Arbor at that time – saw every home game. He played both offense and defense. The “two platoon” system came later. He had help – We must not forget Forest Eveshevsky (sp) who blocked for him. He too was great. On more than one occasion I saw him block three at a time. He was a part of Harmon’s success.
Fantastic, thanks for that piece of comedy history that I absolutely would have missed if not for your site.