Art Donovan, a Behemoth of Modesty, Dies at 89, Art Donovan, a 300-pound tackle for the Baltimore Colts whose nimble brutality helped propel him to the Hall of Fame and his team to two championships in the 1950s, and whose humor-laced tales about himself and the game won him an equal helping of celebrity, died on Sunday in Baltimore. He was 89.
The Baltimore Ravens, the city’s current football team, announced the death.
Donovan was an All-Pro defensive tackle, played in five Pro Bowls and in 1968 became the first Colt and the first pure defensive lineman inducted to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio. A 12-year National Football League veteran, he was one of the Colts’ “Magnificent Seven,” led by quarterback Johnny Unitas, who together helped make the 1958 league championship showdown against the Giants at Yankee Stadium the greatest game ever played, in the opinion of many football historians.
The Colts won the game, 23-17, on a Unitas-led drive in the league’s first sudden-death overtime championship game. A national television audience of 40 million watched the game as it spilled into the night. Suddenly, baseball was no longer America’s indisputable national sport.
Other members of the Magnificent Seven may have been better known than Donovan: Unitas, Lenny Moore, Raymond Berry, Jim Parker, Gino Marchetti and Coach Weeb Ewbank. But Donovan’s smack-down belligerence, coupled with astounding agility for a 6-foot-3, 300-pound behemoth, was at the center of the Colts’ effort. Donovan made a key tackle to help set up their final drive. But always self-deprecating, he volunteered in his autobiography that at another point in the game, he had ended up flat on his back.
Donovan practically made a second career of talking, and joking, about his weight and his battles to reduce it, gamely using his nickname in the title of his autobiography, “Fatso: Football When Men Were Really Men” (1987). In the book, he wrote that he was a light eater.
“I never started eating until it was light,” he said.
He barely hid his distaste for calisthenics: he said he did 13 push-ups in 13 years of training camps.
Donovan became a darling of late-night talk shows. Promoting his book on “Late Night with David Letterman,” he confessed that he had not exactly read it but knew most of the stories. Mr. Letterman asked if he would recommend it. “I don’t know, I guess so,” Donovan responded.
Despite his modesty, his peers were quick to praise him. He was in the sixth class admitted to the Hall of Fame, vaulting over a backlog of players going back to the 1920s waiting to get in. One opponent, Stan Jones, a Chicago Bears lineman, likened his agility to a matador’s. Ewbank said nobody could fool Donovan twice with the same play. Buzz Nutter, a Colts center who played with him, said, “One man alone could not knock Artie off his feet.”
Donovan came from a blue-collar era of football, played, he said, by “oversized coal miners and West Texas psychopaths.” He wondered how today’s players deal with continual meetings and films and dietitians — all of which he experienced as little as possible. He thought hot dogs and cheeseburgers and full-contact practices twice a day were good enough.
He played much of his career without a face mask, prompting a writer to observe that he had more stitches than a football. Donovan spoke warmly of the time Norm Van Brocklin, a quarterback for the Los Angeles Rams and the Philadelphia Eagles, was tired of his pass rush and threw a bullet pass right into his unprotected face.
“I couldn’t believe he’d just waste a play like that,” Donovan wrote. “I guess he was mad. You have to respect a guy like that.”
Arthur James Donovan Jr. was born, weighing 17 pounds, on June 5, 1924, in the Bronx. His grandfather, Mike Donovan, was a world middleweight champion and taught boxing to Theodore Roosevelt. His father, Arthur Sr., was a boxing referee who officiated at 14 heavyweight title bouts, most involving Joe Louis. Both father and grandfather are in the Boxing Hall of Fame.
Art Donovan Jr. attended Notre Dame for a year before enlisting in the Marines and fighting in the South Pacific. He was the first professional football player to be admitted to the Marine Corps Sports Hall of Fame.
After his discharge, he was a standout player at Boston College, where he earned a bachelor’s degree. The Giants, his favorite team, tried to draft him as a junior and even sent him money, but he remained in college and was drafted by the Colts in 1950, signing a contract for $4,500. He was 26, having delayed his career for military service.
The Colts franchise at the time was dissolved in 1951, and Donovan was picked up by the Cleveland Browns before being injured in a scrimmage. He was soon traded to the New York Yankees football club, which moved to Dallas and became the Texans in 1952. A year later, the franchise moved to Baltimore as a new version of the Colts.
In 1959, the Colts reprised their 1958 title victory over the Giants by defeating them again for the championship. He retired from football in 1962 after the Colts cut him from the squad a few weeks into training camp. His top salary in the game was $22,000.
He later owned liquor stores and the Valley Country Club in Baltimore and was a popular sports commentator on local radio. Mike Preston, a columnist for The Baltimore Sun, wrote of Donovan on Monday, “He drank Schlitz beer and burped on the airwaves.”
Donovan is survived by his wife, the former Dorothy Schaech; his daughters Kelly Donovan-Mazzulli, Debbie Donovan Smith, Christine Donovan and Mary Donovan O’Hern; his son, Arthur III; his sister, Joan Elizabeth Donovan; and seven grandchildren.
“Take me for what I am,” Donovan once said. “I’m a nobody, like you or anyone else. I was lucky enough to play football, and everyone liked me. That’s it.”
The Baltimore Ravens, the city’s current football team, announced the death.
Donovan was an All-Pro defensive tackle, played in five Pro Bowls and in 1968 became the first Colt and the first pure defensive lineman inducted to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio. A 12-year National Football League veteran, he was one of the Colts’ “Magnificent Seven,” led by quarterback Johnny Unitas, who together helped make the 1958 league championship showdown against the Giants at Yankee Stadium the greatest game ever played, in the opinion of many football historians.
The Colts won the game, 23-17, on a Unitas-led drive in the league’s first sudden-death overtime championship game. A national television audience of 40 million watched the game as it spilled into the night. Suddenly, baseball was no longer America’s indisputable national sport.
Other members of the Magnificent Seven may have been better known than Donovan: Unitas, Lenny Moore, Raymond Berry, Jim Parker, Gino Marchetti and Coach Weeb Ewbank. But Donovan’s smack-down belligerence, coupled with astounding agility for a 6-foot-3, 300-pound behemoth, was at the center of the Colts’ effort. Donovan made a key tackle to help set up their final drive. But always self-deprecating, he volunteered in his autobiography that at another point in the game, he had ended up flat on his back.
Donovan practically made a second career of talking, and joking, about his weight and his battles to reduce it, gamely using his nickname in the title of his autobiography, “Fatso: Football When Men Were Really Men” (1987). In the book, he wrote that he was a light eater.
“I never started eating until it was light,” he said.
He barely hid his distaste for calisthenics: he said he did 13 push-ups in 13 years of training camps.
Donovan became a darling of late-night talk shows. Promoting his book on “Late Night with David Letterman,” he confessed that he had not exactly read it but knew most of the stories. Mr. Letterman asked if he would recommend it. “I don’t know, I guess so,” Donovan responded.
Despite his modesty, his peers were quick to praise him. He was in the sixth class admitted to the Hall of Fame, vaulting over a backlog of players going back to the 1920s waiting to get in. One opponent, Stan Jones, a Chicago Bears lineman, likened his agility to a matador’s. Ewbank said nobody could fool Donovan twice with the same play. Buzz Nutter, a Colts center who played with him, said, “One man alone could not knock Artie off his feet.”
Donovan came from a blue-collar era of football, played, he said, by “oversized coal miners and West Texas psychopaths.” He wondered how today’s players deal with continual meetings and films and dietitians — all of which he experienced as little as possible. He thought hot dogs and cheeseburgers and full-contact practices twice a day were good enough.
He played much of his career without a face mask, prompting a writer to observe that he had more stitches than a football. Donovan spoke warmly of the time Norm Van Brocklin, a quarterback for the Los Angeles Rams and the Philadelphia Eagles, was tired of his pass rush and threw a bullet pass right into his unprotected face.
“I couldn’t believe he’d just waste a play like that,” Donovan wrote. “I guess he was mad. You have to respect a guy like that.”
Arthur James Donovan Jr. was born, weighing 17 pounds, on June 5, 1924, in the Bronx. His grandfather, Mike Donovan, was a world middleweight champion and taught boxing to Theodore Roosevelt. His father, Arthur Sr., was a boxing referee who officiated at 14 heavyweight title bouts, most involving Joe Louis. Both father and grandfather are in the Boxing Hall of Fame.
Art Donovan Jr. attended Notre Dame for a year before enlisting in the Marines and fighting in the South Pacific. He was the first professional football player to be admitted to the Marine Corps Sports Hall of Fame.
After his discharge, he was a standout player at Boston College, where he earned a bachelor’s degree. The Giants, his favorite team, tried to draft him as a junior and even sent him money, but he remained in college and was drafted by the Colts in 1950, signing a contract for $4,500. He was 26, having delayed his career for military service.
The Colts franchise at the time was dissolved in 1951, and Donovan was picked up by the Cleveland Browns before being injured in a scrimmage. He was soon traded to the New York Yankees football club, which moved to Dallas and became the Texans in 1952. A year later, the franchise moved to Baltimore as a new version of the Colts.
In 1959, the Colts reprised their 1958 title victory over the Giants by defeating them again for the championship. He retired from football in 1962 after the Colts cut him from the squad a few weeks into training camp. His top salary in the game was $22,000.
He later owned liquor stores and the Valley Country Club in Baltimore and was a popular sports commentator on local radio. Mike Preston, a columnist for The Baltimore Sun, wrote of Donovan on Monday, “He drank Schlitz beer and burped on the airwaves.”
Donovan is survived by his wife, the former Dorothy Schaech; his daughters Kelly Donovan-Mazzulli, Debbie Donovan Smith, Christine Donovan and Mary Donovan O’Hern; his son, Arthur III; his sister, Joan Elizabeth Donovan; and seven grandchildren.
“Take me for what I am,” Donovan once said. “I’m a nobody, like you or anyone else. I was lucky enough to play football, and everyone liked me. That’s it.”
