Innis Brown (March 31, 1884 – January 23, 1961) was a

college football College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football in the United States, American football rules first gained populari ...

player,

referee A referee is an official, in a variety of sports and competition, responsible for enforcing the rules of the sport, including sportsmanship decisions such as ejection. The official tasked with this job may be known by a variety of other tit ...

, sportswriter, and

civil engineer A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering – the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructure while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing ...

. His sports articles were nationally known, writing for the New York Sun and Hearst newspapers.

Early years

Innis Brown was born on March 31, 1884 in

Franklin, Tennessee Franklin is a city in and county seat of Williamson County, Tennessee, United States. About south of Nashville, it is one of the principal cities of the Nashville metropolitan area and Middle Tennessee. As of 2020, its population was 83,454 ...

to Enoch Brown, Sr. and Lucinda Allen. Innis's younger brother Enock "Nuck" Brown was captain of the

1913 Vanderbilt Commodores football team The 1913 Vanderbilt Commodores football team represented Vanderbilt University in the 1913 Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association football season. The 1913 season was Dan McGugin's 10th year as head coach. Members of the Southern Interc ...

. Both attended Mooney School.

Vanderbilt University

Innis was a prominent

guard Guard or guards may refer to: Professional occupations * Bodyguard, who protects an individual from personal assault * Crossing guard, who stops traffic so pedestrians can cross the street * Lifeguard, who rescues people from drowning * Prison gu ...

for

Dan McGugin Daniel Earle McGugin (July 29, 1879 – January 23, 1936) was an American football player and coach, as well as a lawyer. He served as the head football coach at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee from 1904 to 1917 and again from ...

's Vanderbilt Commodores football teams of

Vanderbilt University Vanderbilt University (informally Vandy or VU) is a private research university in Nashville, Tennessee. Founded in 1873, it was named in honor of shipping and rail magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt, who provided the school its initial $1-million ...

. He was also a

Rhodes Scholar The Rhodes Scholarship is an international postgraduate award for students to study at the University of Oxford, in the United Kingdom. Established in 1902, it is the oldest graduate scholarship in the world. It is considered among the world' ...

1905

1905 As the second year of the massive Russo-Japanese War begins, more than 100,000 die in the largest world battles of that era, and the war chaos leads to the 1905 Russian Revolution against Nicholas II of Russia ( Shostakovich's 11th Symphony ...

Brown was

captain Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police department, election precinct, e ...

and selected All-Southern of the 1905 team. One publication claims "The first scouting done in the South was in 1905, when

and Captain Innis Brown, of Vanderbilt went to

Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,7 ...

to see Sewanee play

Georgia Tech The Georgia Institute of Technology, commonly referred to as Georgia Tech or, in the state of Georgia, as Tech or The Institute, is a public research university and institute of technology in Atlanta, Georgia. Established in 1885, it is part of ...

Mexico

Upon graduation, he went to

Mexico Mexico (Spanish language, Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a List of sovereign states, country in the southern portion of North America. It is borders of Mexico, bordered to the north by the United States; to the so ...

as a

Referee

By 1912 he was a referee throughout the South, chosen by the ''

Atlanta Constitution ''The Atlanta Journal-Constitution'' is the only major daily newspaper in the metropolitan area of Atlanta, Georgia. It is the flagship publication of Cox Enterprises. The ''Atlanta Journal-Constitution'' is the result of the merger between ...

'' to pick its All-Southern team that year.

Sportswriter

Having served as editor on Vanderbilt's campus newspaper, the Hustler, Brown began his writing career on the old Nashville American in 1906. He eventually took charge of the sports section of the ''Atlanta Journal'', succeeding his personal friend

Grantland Rice Henry Grantland "Granny" Rice (November 1, 1880July 13, 1954) was an early 20th-century American sportswriter known for his elegant prose. His writing was published in newspapers around the country and broadcast on the radio. Early years Rice wa ...

Golf

Brown was also an avid

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping wi ...

er, being the managing editor of ''American Golfer'' in 1919 with Rice.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Brown, Innis 1884 births 1961 deaths American football ends American football guards College football officials Vanderbilt Commodores football players All-Southern college football players People from Franklin, Tennessee Players of American football from Tennessee People from DeLeon Springs, Florida