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Notre Dame Coach Ed McKeever sent
a telegram after his 1944 team was devastated, 59-0, by Army:
"Have just seen Superman in the flesh. He wears No. 35
on his Army jersey. His name is Felix 'Doc' Blanchard."
The son of a doctor, who had played football at Tulane and Wake
Forest, Blanchard was nicknamed "Little Doc" as a
boy. After starring at St. Stanislaus College, actually a prep
school in Mississippi, he entered the University of North Carolina
in 1942. Blanchard joined the Army after his freshman year and
was appointed to the U. S. Military Academy in 1944. A fullback,
he teamed with halfback Glenn Davis to help lead Army to three
undefeated seasons. The only game Army didn't win during that
period was a scoreless tie against Notre Dame in 1946. Although
Davis was known as "Mr. Outside" and the 6-foot, 208-pound
Blanchard was "Mr. Inside," he was almost as fast
as Davis was. In 1945, he ran the 100-yard dash in 10 seconds
flat in a dual meet against Cornell. He also won the IC4A shotput
championship that year. Blanchard scored three touchdowns, one
on a 52-yard interception return, in Army's 32-13 win over Navy
in 1945, when he won the Heisman Trophy as the nation's best
college football player and the Sullivan Award as the outstanding
amateur athlete of the year. He was the first football player
to win the Sullivan. An outstanding place-kicker and punter,
Blanchard was also a fine pass receiver. He missed the first
two games of the 1946 season with torn knee ligaments, but returned
to action against a strong Michigan team. Blanchard made a leaping
catch of a pass from Davis to score a 41-yard touchdown and
he ran for another in Army's 20-13 victory. He returned a kickoff
92 yards for a touchdown against Columbia and, in a 21-18 victory
over Navy, he scored on a 53-yard run and caught a 27-yard touchdown
pass from Davis. After graduating from West Point, Blanchard
entered the Air Force and became a jet pilot. While he was stationed
in England in 1959, his plane caught fire near London. Rather
than abandoning the aircraft in a heavily populated area, he
brought it down safely at an airfield and was cited for bravery.
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