Felix ‘Doc’ Blanchard dies at 84; 1945 Heisman Trophy winner

Felix “Doc” Blanchard, the 1945 Heisman Trophy winner and Army’s Mr. Inside in college football’s most famous running-back combination, died Sunday.

He was 84.

Blanchard’s daughter, Mary Blanchard, told the Associated Press late Sunday night in a phone interview that her father, the oldest living Heisman winner, died of pneumonia at home in Bulverde, a small town in central Texas, earlier in the day.

Mary Blanchard said her father had been living with her and her husband for about the last 20 years, and he had been in good health until recently contracting pneumonia.

“He’s been strong all his life,” she said.

The bruising Blanchard and Glenn Davis, a.k.a. Mr. Outside, helped Army win consecutive national titles in 1944-45 and finished a close second to Notre Dame in 1946.

The year after Blanchard became the first junior to win the Heisman Trophy, Davis won it and Army went undefeated again.

Blanchard, who also played linebacker and handled place-kicking and punting for Army, capped his Heisman Trophy season by scoring three touchdowns in a 32-13 victory against Navy.

He became the first football player to win the Sullivan Award, given to the nation’s top amateur athlete.

In November 1945, Davis and Blanchard, widely known as “the Touchdown Twins,” shared the cover of Time magazine.

Blanchard scored 38 touchdowns and gained 1,908 yards in his three seasons playing at West Point.

He was drafted by the Pittsburgh Steelers with the third overall pick, but because of his commitment to active duty after graduation he never played professional football.

He served a long career as a fighter pilot in the Air Force, retiring with the rank of colonel.

He was inducted into the National Football Foundation and College Hall of Fame in 1959.

Blanchard was born in McColl, S.C., on Dec. 11, 1924. He attended prep school in Mississippi before enrolling at the University of North Carolina in 1942, and played freshman football.

He was drafted the next year and later appointed to the U.S. Military Academy.

Davis died in 2005 at the age of 80.

Information on services was not immediately available.