Ernie Davis biography
Ernie Davis, byname of Ernest R. Davis, additionally referred to as the Elmira Express, (born Dec. 14, 1939, New Salem, Pa., U.S.—died May 18, 1963, Cleveland, Ohio), American collegiate gridiron soccer participant who was the primary African American to win the Heisman Trophy.
As a scholar at Elmira (N.Y.) Free Academy, Davis was a high-school All-American in soccer and basketball. Widely recruited to play operating again in collegiate soccer, he selected to attend Syracuse University, partially as a result of it was the varsity of his idol, Jim Brown. Davis wore Brown’s quantity 44 at Syracuse, and in his sophomore yr there he led the Orangemen to an undefeated season and a nationwide championship. Syracuse clinched the nationwide title with a 23–14 victory over the University of Texas within the 1960 Cotton Bowl. The sport was highlighted by Davis’s two touchdowns, which earned him Cotton Bowl Most Valuable Player honours. He was named an All-American in each his junior and senior seasons at Syracuse, and in 1961 he was awarded the Heisman Trophy as probably the most excellent participant in American faculty soccer—the primary African American so honoured.
Davis was chosen with the primary general choose of the 1962 National Football League draft by the Washington Redskins, who then traded him to the Cleveland Browns, whose proprietor Art Modell deliberate to pair Davis with Jim Brown within the workforce’s backfield. Davis by no means performed a sport for the Browns, nonetheless, as he was recognized with leukemia earlier than the College All-Star Game in July 1962. He underwent a wide range of therapies in an try and return to soccer, however they had been all unsuccessful; he died in a Cleveland hospital in 1963. Davis was posthumously inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1979.