Remembering Vault's Glory Years

By: Jimmie McDowell
Willie Richardson, the legendary Jackson State football player, called to say that of all the All-American Football foundation Banquets he had attended the 99th Banquet of Champions was the best.
Willie received the Foundation's Charlie Conerly Outstanding Pro Football player award. The Foundation honored Johnny Vaught's field generas of the Glory Years when Ole Miss competed for national and sectional honors between 1947 and 1963, starting with Conerly and ending with Glynn Griffing.
In between were fearless Faley Salmon, Herman Sidney (Eagle) Day, Raymond Brown, Bobby Ray Franklin, Jake Gibbs, and Doug Elmore, who is deceased as are Conerly, Day, and Elmore.
Conerly,who is in the College Football Hall of Fame, is a glaring ommission in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. The Old Timers Committee meets in August to review the Pioneer category. One problem is that some of the younger members have no idea of how great Conerly was for 14 seasons with the New York Giants.
When the Ole Miss Centennial plans were announced Conerly was listed as a quarterback which he wasn't in College Football. He was a triple threat tailback and superb safety man. Against LSU in1946 I saw Conerly make tackles near the line of scrimmage. He was a superb diagnoser of plays.
His college career as interrupted by World War II where he served in the South Pacific for three years and participated in invasions. He has his rifle shot out of his hand. He was a superb athlete and if he had not gone into Pro Football he Football he would have played Pro Baseball as a center fielder. The Giants gave Conerly a $100,000 contract to get him. This was spread over four years, which was big money in 1948.
When I volunteered for the Navy at 17 in 1944 I made $21 a month and sent five dollars home to my Momma. I wanted to send her an allotment which was turned down,. She wrote President Roosevelt and voiced her objection. The allotment was approved and Blanche Leroy Byrd McDowell sent FDR my stamp collection.
Conerly, Eagle Day and Elmore are deceased. Jimmy Lear wants Farley Salmon to take care of himself. He does not want to be Ole Miss' oldest living field general. When the Centennial team was announced by Ole Miss Archie Manning was picked as the quarterback. Eagle Day expressed the thought that how was this decision reached and wondered if winning back to back SEC championships, which he did, should have something to do with it. Archie , who made the Football News All-America team twice,never made as many All-America teams as Jake Gibbs or Griffing.
The Foundation also honored several truly great running backs for its Creighton Miller Award, including three from Mississippi Southern, Bucky McElroy, Hugh Laurin Pepper, and Sammy Winder. None ever fired a pistol on the campus as the current USM running back did recently. The end of Athletic Dormitories is one reason why there is a lack of discipline on all campuses today.
If house Father Wobble Davidson ever caught an Ole Miss player with a gun he would have stuffed the gun where the sun does not shine of that lad.
Archie, who never led Ole Miss to a SEC title, saw most of his records broken by his son, Eli.
John Vaught was not pleased when Peyton Manning chose to go to arch-rival Tennessee rather than Ole Miss.
The AAFF wanted to honor Charlie Flowers and Billy Ray Adams, a couple of All-Americans at the Jackson dinner, but Flowers was in Colorado and Adams' dear wife's Mother was on her death bed and has since passed away.
The All-American Football Foundation members have voted and selected its All-America teams and Michael Oher and Peria Jerry were included. Oher was also one of the ll Colonel Red Blaik Leadership Scholarships honorees. Ole Miss will receive S$500 from the Blaik fund to help another deserving youngster, which the University selects.
At the Ole Miss spring game April l8 Houston Nutt will receive the Foundation's Johnny Vayght Outstanding Head Coach Award. Nutt was in Jackson to address the M Club at a special luncuheon at the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame. He explained that he signed over 35 high school seniors, knowing that perhaps eight can not qualify academically and will attend Junior College and hopefully come to Oxford in two years.
And now Spring Football practice begins. Both State and Southern will also have their spring game on April l8.
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