Willie Thrower
American football player (1930–2002)
Willie Lee Thrower Sr. (March 22, 1930 – February 20, 2002) was an American professional football player who was a quarterback for the Chicago Bears of the National Football League (NFL). Born near Pittsburgh in New Kensington, Pennsylvania, Thrower was known as "Mitts" because of his large hands and arm strength, which stood in contrast to his 5' 11" frame. He was known to throw a football 70 yards. Thrower played college football for the Michigan State Spartans, who won a national championship in 1952. He became the first NFL African American quarterback in the modern era, playing for the Bears in 1953.
Early life
Thrower played halfback in the single-wing formation for New Kensington High School (present-name: Valley High School) as a freshman just after the end of World War II, in 1945. Single wing halfbacks received a direct center snap, and then had run, handoff or pass options. The team lost two games in 1945. In subsequent seasons head coach Don Fletcher installed the T formation and moved Thrower to quarterback.
“Willie Thrower” enters the record as american football player (1930–2002). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Willie, Thrower and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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“Willie Thrower” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Willie, Thrower and American provides the most credible route into that argument.
The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 28, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q8021855. The first chronological checks are 1930, 2002, 1952 and 1953.
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This entry incorporates text from “Willie Thrower” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.