Pat O'Dea
- Category : 1872-births
- Type : MGE
- Profile : 4/6 - Opportunistic / Role Model
- Definition : Single
- Incarnation Cross : RAX Eden 1
Biography
Australian 'Aussie rules' and American football player and coach, who was nicknamed 'Kangaroo Kicker.' An Australian by birth, O'Dea played Australian rules football for the Melbourne Football Club in the Victorian Football Association (VFA) from 1893 to 1895 then transferred to Essendon. In 1898 and 1899, O'Dea played American football as a fullback at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in the United States, where he excelled in the kicking game. He then served as the head football coach at the University of Notre Dame from 1900 to 1901 and at the University of Missouri in 1902, compiling a career college football record of 19–7–2. O'Dea was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as a player in 1962.
On 3 January 1888, as a 15-year-old, he received a bronze medallion from the Royal Humane Society of Australasia for recovering a drowned woman from the sea.
After coaching in the U.S., he disappeared from public view in 1917, having decided that he didn't like being treated as a celebrity. In 1934, he was discovered living under an assumed name in California and came back to Wisconsin to a hero's welcome. He later appeared on Bob Hope's All-American football team announcement shows.
Pat O'Dea was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame on 3 April 1962. He died at 2:15 PM the next day at the University of California, San Francisco Medical Center at the age of 90 after an illness.