Howley

SHEPHERDSTOWN — When Chuck Howley came from Warwood High School to play football for Art “Pappy” Lewis at WVU, he had been recruited as an offensive lineman.

He was an able offensive center and guard for the Mountaineers from 1955 through the 1957 season, when athletes could be varsity players for only three seasons.

The Mountaineers had an overall record of 21-8-1 in Howley’s three seasons that came to be marked by his nagging list of injuries.

As a senior, Howley was accorded third-team All-American honors.

In his athletic tenure in Morgantown, Howley did more than just play on winning football teams.

He actually earned letters in five sports — football, wrestling, gymnastics, swimming and track and field.

When his football-playing career was over, he was drafted in the NFL’s first round by the Chicago Bears, going to training camp with the so-called Monsters of the Midway and Coach George “Papa Bear” Halas. Howley sustained a leg injury in his first NFL training camp and unfortunately missed two full seasons.

After eventually playing in an alumni football game in Morgantown, he was ready to try playing again.

Coach Tom Landry of the Dallas Cowboys signed him and converted Howley to an outside linebacker, a position he played for 13 seasons for that team.

He was named all-pro for six straight seasons.

In one of the two Super Bowls he played in, Howley was named the game’s MVP despite a 16-13 loss to Baltimore in the game following the 1971 regular season.

To this day — after 57 Super Bowls — Howley remains the only player from a losing Super Bowl team to be named the game’s MVP.

After his retirement from professional football Howley owned a uniform rental business in Texas and then began breeding quarter horses on his ranch.

West Virginia University has further honored his achievements by inducting him into the school’s Academy of Distinguished Alumni.

Recruited by Pappy Lewis as an offensive linemen in an era when linemen did not have to be 6-foot-5 and weigh in the neighborhood of 300 pounds, Howley showed his athletic measure by changing positions in the professional ranks. And then he played in two Super Bowls and for 13 seasons that had him accorded all-pro honors for those six consecutive seasons — quite an accomplishment for the college gymnast, swimmer and wrestler!