71 Years Later, Behm Still Follows Huskers

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Seventy-one years ago, on Jan. 1, 1941, Nebraska played its first bowl game ever, in the Rose Bowl, no less ... the Granddaddy of them all and still the ultimate goal of everyone who pulls a Husker football jersey over his head. So please consider today an important history lesson on what is probably the most inspirational walk-on story you will ever hear.

Remember how your mom or dad would take you aside and tell you "that one important thing" you absolutely had to know so you could understand and appreciate what life is all about? Well, listen up, because today we are relying on two of Nebraska's most popular tour guides to tell this story: Don "Fox" Bryant, Nebraska's Sports Information Director Emeritus, and Barry Moore, a retired Lincoln high school administrator.

Whenever Bryant and Moore lead their guests past the wall of first-team Husker All-American pictures right outside the Nebraskalocker room, they always make sure they focus attention on what they consider a must-stop-and-see picture of Forrest Behm and then explain the folklore behind his photo.

By the time both tour guides explain Behm's legendary status and provide the context he commands in Nebraska's rich football history, you can almost close your eyes and imagine Behm in his adolescence as a serious-minded academic because he couldn't walk properly, let alone run onto a football field.

So what a sight it must have been 71 years ago when Forrest Behm, Nebraska's All-America tackle, played in his alma mater's first bowl game ever - a 21-13 loss to Stanford before a Rose Bowl crowd of 92,000 fans.

A Protective Dad Saved His Son's Leg

If we were making a movie, we'd hire Sally Field to play his mother so she could yell "Run, Forrest, Run!" the second he sprints onto Pasadena's fabled Rose Bowl field.

The reason Behm may be the most inspirational walk-on story in the history of the University of Nebraska is based on Bryant's and Moore's historical research. Both give stirring accounts of how Forrest's leg was so severely burned in a brush fire at age 5 that doctors suggested amputation. Tour guides tell us that Behm's dad was so determined to help little Forrest come out of this distressing ordeal that he swooped him off the hospital bed, wrapped his arms around him and took him home so he could begin a long, painful rehabilitation process.

"No one's cutting off my boy's leg," Moore said his father told the medical staff on his way out of the hospital.

NU's tour guides describe how Forrest's father ended up enlisting the help of a veterinarian and asked his wife and any other females in the house to leave, so they wouldn't have to hear how tortuous it was to rewrap, salve and stretch Forrest's crippled leg on a daily basis.

Apparently, it took years upon years for a father and a cooperative veterinarian to work on that leg and bring it back to full function. The process was so painful that Behm told Lincoln Journal-Star writer Ken Hambleton he would bite on a piece of white pine so the neighbors wouldn't hear him scream.

Football Success Followed Basketball's Failure

Years of massages, combined with incredible perseverance, helped Behm build his strength back up, but he didn't regain full mobility in his leg until his senior year at Lincoln High School. Amazingly, the only reason Behm even tried out for football his last year in high school and later walked on at Nebraska was because he couldn't make his prep basketball team.

The rest of the Forrest E. Behm story continues to read like something straight out of a Hollywood script. Yes, Forrest, you can walk on here at your home state university, but only if you agree to buy your own size 15 pair of football cleats. That's the way it was during the Depression in the late 1930s when Forrest became living proof that tough times never last, but tough people do.

How else can you explain someone who never played football until his senior year in high school? Here was a talented and motivated young man that could barely plant his foot in high school, yet went on on to letter three years (1938-39-40) at a school that has won more college football games than every university except Michigan, Notre Dame and Texas. This is one remarkable story about someone who can't even try out out for his junior high or high school team, yet makes his college team and then never misses a single practice until a hip injury sidelines him right before the Huskers play in their first bowl game ever.

A 1940 first-team All-American, Behm still played in Pasadena. I remember talking decades ago to Ed Schwartzkopf, Forrest's high school and college teammate, about how much Behm inspired the Huskers. Listening to Schwartzkopf describe his presence, Behm was everything that was good about Nebraska rolled into one ... honest, hard-working, inspirational, unselfish, smart and extremely dedicated in everything he did.

As our own bio on Huskers.com points out, Behm was more than just a football player. He was also class president, an ROTC Cadet Colonel, an honor student and a recipient of a Harvard Fellowship for graduate study. He served in the Army Signal Corps and rose to the rank of Major. In 1946, he joined the Corning International Corporation and just like the walk-on he was, he started at the bottom and worked his way to the top, becoming a foreman, then sales manager and plant manager and eventually, the New York company's president.

From Humble Roots to Corporate America's Peak

Behm landed in New York because he became an assistant football coach at the United States Military Academy in West Point. A consummate multi-tasker, even after retiring, he became a management consultant to six companies and two non-profit organizations. He was a man who experienced life from both sides down. In 1937, he started on one of Nebraska's worst teams ever, a team that started 0-4-1, but thanks to his kind of leadership won three of its last four - at Kansas, at Iowa and against Kansas State in the season finale.

The late Bob Devaney and Tom Osborne aren't the only Nebraska football coaches enshrined in the College Football Hall-of-Fame, a status that Behm achieved in 1988. Biff Jones was Behm's coach at Nebraska, and Jones also made the College Football Hall-of-Fame, resurrecting Nebraska after previous head coaching stints at Army, LSU and Oklahoma.

Jones, well known for bringing the legendary Earl "Red" Blaik to West Point, established himself as "a serious, sound, hard-working mentor with a gift for organization." Sounds just like a description that could apply equally to Behm, who once said Jones was "a hell of a coach" because he turned "just regular guys" into a "team" that made the Rose Bowl.

Even though Behm was hurt from age 5 until graduating from high school in 2½ years, he was only hurt once at Nebraska and never missed a game. The Huskers didn't have dumbbells or weight machines, but they were strong and they could run. They worked hard all summer, and Behm once said there were no fat guys on the field. At 6-4 and 225, he was, in fact, Nebraska's All-America tackle and the biggest guy on the team.

According to Hambleton, back in 1939, after Nebraska beat Baylor, 20-0, in Lincoln, a Baylor player asked Behm how much he was paid. "He didn't believe me when I said 'nothing.' He even brought over a teammate and had me repeat that," Behm said.

At Age 92, Behm Still Follows the Huskers

We promised up front this was an inspiring walk-on story, and we hope you understand why.

Now 92 years old, Behm still lives in the same house he built 57 years ago when he became president of Corning Glass in Corning, N.Y. A widower, he still tries to follow Nebraska every chance he gets because "there's a lot of tradition there".

Tradition, quite frankly, that started when Nebraska beat Notre Dame's Four Horsemen twice in the 1920s and then reached its zenith when Forrest and his teammates played in the Rose Bowl. Behm and his buddies were trailblazers, pathfinders and determined to bring Nebraska football to national prominence, and they did just that, laying the foundation for everything that has followed since.

Happy 71st Anniversary, Forrest! And as the oldest of eight living Nebraska Cornhuskers that have reached College Football's hallowed Hall-of-Fame, we salute you today, tomorrow and always!

Send a comment toryork@huskers.com (include residence)

Voices from Husker Nation

I just have to send my comments. I am a 91-year-old WWII veteran. I was raised on a farm near Malcolm, Nebraska, and attended all of Nebraska's home games during my high school days (in the 1930s).  Went in the service and could not attend college. However, I have followed the Big Red all of these years. Tomorrow, Jan 2nd, I am attending the Nebraska-South Carolina game here in Orlando, Florida. I have handicap seats assigned to me in the end zone and asked for them to be as close to the Nebraska side as I can get. My regards to Behm. What a story. I didn't know about his problem as a youth. Keep up the Good Life, Behm. Sincerely yours, Wayne R. Smith, Clermont, Florida

Thanks for the article about Forrest Behm. I attended the Rose Bowl Game in 1941. It's hard to believe it was 71 years ago. What a thrill it was for me, a young farm girl from Lexington. I can still remember Al Zikmund being injured after a nice run up the sideline. The pennant I proudly waved at the game now hangs in the trophy case at the stadium. I continue attend the games in Lincoln and look forward to more years of Nebraska Football because I am a faithful Big Red Fan. Bonnie S Alexander, Bellevue, Nebraska

I knew Forrest Behm was a Husker legend, but I had no idea why until I read this New Year's Day column. Great read. With Nebraska getting ready to celebrate 50 consecutive years of sellouts, it would be nice to find a way for Husker fans to thank our oldest living Hall-of-Famer for being such a special part of Nebraska history. If Mr. Behm is physically up to it, he deserves to hear Husker fans applaud what he's accomplished. Even if he can't make it back to Lincoln, he deserves it. Ri Edwards, Yuba City, California

Reading how a former Rose Bowl player still follows the Huskers after playing his last game seven decades ago is the reason I always check out Huskers.com before any other website. Great player. Great man. Great idea. Great story. Go Big Red! Dale Johnson, London, England

Forrest Behm is just one more reason for the world to know why there is no place like Nebraska. What an intriguing story, one I believe would be worthy of a documentary on NETV. Jim Thomas, Omaha, Nebraska

Great story on Forrest Behm. Thanks for sharing it with us Husker fans. Can't imagine someone that played in the 1941 Rose Bowl still following his favorite team. Amazing. Steve Christensen, Lee's Summit, Missouri

I have enjoyed reading your pieces for years, and I certainly appreciate your insights into Husker football, especially the historical perspective you achieve by seeking out the lesser-known facts. All the best and Happy New Year. Jud Rose, UNL School of Journalism, Class of 1981, Woodbridge, Virginia