LANDRY, Thomas Wade ("Tom")

(b. 11 September 1924 in Mission, Texas; d. 12 February 2000 in Dallas, Texas), Hall of Fame coach who guided the National Football League (NFL) Dallas Cowboys to five Super Bowls and two championships, winning 270 games in 29 years.

Landry was one of two children born to Ray Landry, an auto mechanic and volunteer fire chief, and Ruth Coffman, a homemaker. As a child, Landry overcame both a speech impediment and a near-fatal car accident, and was a high achiever in both scholastics and sports. Landry was class president and a member of the National Honor Society at Mission High School and played several positions on the football team, which went undefeated and unscored upon during his senior year of 1941. He entered the University of Texas at Austin in 1942, shortly before his older brother Robert was killed during World War II. Interrupting his studies, Landry enlisted in the U.S. Army, and flew thirty missions over Europe in three years, including one in which his plane ran out of fuel and crash-landed, fortunately without injuring Landry.

Following Landry's discharge in 1945 at the rank of first lieutenant, he returned to the University of Texas. In 1947 he was introduced to freshman Alicia Wiggs, a model whose picture had appeared in Seventeen magazine. As a junior at Texas, Landry was a star defensive back for the Longhorns when they beat the University of Alabama in the 1948 Sugar Bowl. That same year he made the all-Southwestern Conference second team. A Longhorn co-captain his senior year of 1948, Landry led Texas past the University of Georgia in the Orange Bowl in January 1949 by a score of 41–28, rushing for 117 yards while substituting at fullback in addition to his defensive duties. At the height of this triumph, he married Wiggs on 28 January 1949; they later had three children. Landry graduated with a Bachelor's degree in business in the spring of 1949, and joined professional football by signing with the New York Yankees of the All-America Conference.

When that league folded a year later, Landry joined the NFL's New York Giants, where he would become an All-Pro defensive back in 1954, and a player-coach. He retired as a player after the 1955 season to devote all his time to coaching the Giants defense from 1956 to 1959 under coach Jim Lee Howell. Landry introduced the 4–3 defensive alignment to football—featuring four linemen, three line-backers, and four defensive backs. He also began wearing his infamous fedora during games at this time to cover his balding head. In 1956 the New York Giants won the NFL championship, beating the Chicago Bears. The Giants again advanced to league title games in 1958 and 1959, losing each time to the Baltimore Colts. Landry committed himself to Christianity in 1958, and between seasons lived in Dallas, Texas, with his wife and three children.

Although Landry had never planned on a career coaching football, his work with the Giants was impressive enough that he had a choice of where to coach for the 1960 season. Although he could have been promoted to head coach for the New York Giants, or with the American Football League (AFL) Houston Oilers, Landry signed a five-year contract on 27 December 1959 to become the first head coach of the Dallas Cowboys, an NFL expansion team. "I decided to give it a shot for a while and just see how things worked out," Landry once said. It would "work out" for twenty-nine years. Winless in 1960, and just 13–38–3 after four seasons, Landry was nonetheless given a ten-year contract extension by Cowboys owner Clint Murchison, Jr. on 5 February 1964. He went on to post twenty consecutive winning seasons from 1966 to 1985, including eighteen playoff appearances, and thirteen division titles. Dallas reached its first Super Bowl following the 1970 season, but suffered a 16–13 loss to the Baltimore Colts on 17 January 1971 in Super Bowl V.

Combined with earlier post-season losses to the Cleveland Browns and Vince Lombardi's Green Bay Packers, the Cowboys had by then developed a reputation as a team unable to win big games, but that changed after Landry made Roger Staubach his number one quarterback midway through the 1971 season. With help from the "Doomsday" defense, the Staubach-piloted Cowboys defeated the Miami Dolphins in Super Bowl VI on 16 January 1972, by a score of 24–3. "Everyone felt a great sense of relief along with the satisfaction," noted Landry of the win. Although he rarely showed outward emotion, that day he wore a big smile.

Landry led the Cowboys to three more Super Bowls in the 1970s, losing twice to the Pittsburgh Steelers, but beating the Denver Broncos in Super Bowl XII on 15 January 1978 by a score of 27–10. The Cowboys became so popular nationwide they were dubbed "America's Team." However, after Staubach retired in 1980, Dallas began a slow decline that ended with Landry's dismissal on 25 February 1989, following a 3–13 season. The Cowboys new owner Jerry Jones replaced Landry with Jimmy Johnson, and two days later, the former coach gave a tearful farewell speech to his players.

During his tenure with the Cowboys, Landry was credited for inventing the multiple offense and the "flex" defense. He also reintroduced the "shotgun" formation to football, where the quarterback lines up several yards behind center to provide better protection in passing situations. Landry called all the offensive plays, relaying them either by hand signals or by shuttling players in and out of the game. The Cowboys were the first to rely heavily on computerized scouting. In addition, several of Landry's assistants became NFL head coaches, most notably Mike Ditka, who coached the Chicago Bears to a Super Bowl victory, and Dan Reeves, who took both the Denver Broncos and the Atlanta Falcons to Super Bowls.

Aside from his trademark fedora and stoic demeanor, Landry was also recognized for his deep religious beliefs, as he worked with the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and the Billy Graham Crusades. After his career, Landry maintained little connection with football. Despite all his success, the sport had never been top priority in his life. Nevertheless, Landry entered the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1990, and was inducted into the Cowboys Ring of Honor in 1993, where his name is displayed beside a replica of his hat. He died on 12 February 2000 at the Baylor University Medical Center several months after being diagnosed with acute myelogenous leukemia, and is buried at Sparkman-Hillcrest Cemetery in Dallas (the same cemetery as Murchison).

Landry's autobiography, Tom Landry: An Autobiography, written with Gregg Lewis, was published in 1990, and a comprehensive biography entitled Landry: Legend and the Legacy, written by Bob St. John and Roger Staubach, was published shortly after his death in 2000. The Book of Landry: Words of Wisdom from and Testimonials to Tom Landry, Former Coach of America's Team (2000), compiled by Jennifer Briggs Kashi; and I Remember Tom Landry by Denne Freeman and Jaime Aron (2001), are also of interest. Obituaries are in the Dallas Morning News (13 Feb. 2000), and the New York Times (14 Feb. 2000).

Jack Styczynski