Ben Crosby

Ben Crosby

Benjamin Lewis Crosby, Jr. was an American football player, coach, and law student. He was invited in 1892 to serve as head coach of the United States Naval Academy football program. He led the team to a 5–2 record, culminating in an upset victory over rival Army in the Army–Navy Game. Crosby died from typhoid fever in late December, at the age of 24.

About Ben Crosby in brief

Summary Ben CrosbyBenjamin Lewis Crosby, Jr. was an American football player, coach, and law student. He was a two-year starter on the Yale football team and a backup on the crew team. Crosby was invited in 1892 to serve as head coach of the United States Naval Academy football program. He led the team to a 5–2 record, culminating in an upset victory over rival Army in the Army–Navy Game. Crosby died from typhoid fever in late December, at the age of 24. He is buried in Mount Sinai Cemetery in New York City, where he was a member of the Phi Kappa Epsilon fraternity and the secret undergraduate society Skull and Bones. He also had a cousin, James Parkman Crosby, who attended the institution in the early 1870s. Crosby’s father, David J. Crosby, was the second person in his family to attend Hopkins Grammar School in New Haven, Connecticut.

Crosby graduated from the school in 1888, and the following year, he began classes at Yale University. In October 1892, he was invited by former Yale coach Walter Camp to live in Annapolis, Maryland to serve in the role of coach for the Navy football team. The team finished the season with a perfect record and would be retrospectively named national champions. Crosby remained popular through his senior year at the university, and he was one of three graduates presented with a class award. He later enrolled in the New York Law School and joined a law office in NYC. He died in December 1894, aged 24, after suffering a heart attack and a stroke while in the middle of his third year of law school. He leaves behind a wife and three children. He had a son, David Crosby, and a daughter, Elizabeth Crosby.