OWEN FAMILY.

BEN OWEN.

RKW found this article in 1928 Arkansas City Traveler.

Owen Field house is named for a boy who played football for the Arkansas City High School.

The Traveler of 10/20/1928 reprinted items from a 1901 Traveler which said; “Football practice is to be held at 5 sharp tomorrow evening on the tennis ground. Ralph Dixon, Ben Owen, Frank Layne, Jay Love, Jay Faircloe, R. O. Waite, George Webb, Ralph Oldroyd, Will Webster, Frank Mitchell, Fred Eaton and Ed Love are asked to take notice.”

Ben Owen was reared on a farm 20 miles west of Arkansas City. He attended school at Arkansas City Grade and High School. He starred on the Tigers Football team. There is no record of his graduation from the High School. He then attended and graduated from Bethany College at Lindsborg, Kansas. He was hired by Bethany College as an instructor and coach with the Swedish students (Terrible Swedes) for several years before going to Norman, Oklahoma.

Ben went to Stillwater and coached football for one year when he had an accident. While on a hunting trip in Oklahoma, he dragged a shotgun out of his buggy and it went off. He lost his arm as a result. Later the Board of Regents told him “We don’t need your arm; you still have your head and can use it.” In the years that have intervened Ben Owen has directed many winning football teams for the University of Oklahoma and become widely known as a coach and general athletic director.

He married and had two daughters. His mother, Mrs. Ollie Owen, and two brothers, William and Ted, lived at Norman. Another brother. Arthur, farmed in Washington State. His only sister married Mr. Frank Weekley and lived in Sumner County.

When the football stadium at Norman was built, it was named Owen Field in Ben Owen’s honor.

Kay made the following note...

Arkansas City Traveler, Tuesday, March 14, 1922. Page 8.

RECAP: WILL OWEN, BROTHER OF BEN, VETERAN SOONER MENTOR, WHO HAS CHARGE OF THE DIAMOND ATHLETICS...BASEBALL TEAM!

[BEN G. OWEN, DIRECTOR OF ATHLETICS, OKLAHOMA UNIVERSITY.]

Arkansas City Traveler, Thursday, March 30, 1922.

Norman, Okla., March 30.—The athletic council of the University of Oklahoma here was today quizzing members of the university track team in an effort to find out if they knew that Harold Hufbauer, captain of the Sooner track squad in 1920 was an ineligible member of the team which defeated Baylor Univesity at Waco, Texas, in a dual meet last Monday.

Hufbauer was expelled from school yesterday and Grover Jacobsen, university track coach, was discharged as a result of the offer.

On the findings of the athletic council will depend whether the entire track team will be declared ineligible at the university, according to Ben G. Owen, director of athletics.

Hufbauer conferred with Owen this morning and tried to take all the blame for his entry into the meet with Baylor, Owen announced after the conference. Hafbauer, according to Owen, said he had made the suggestion that he be taken along to fill the place of Raymond Moore, who was left behind because of a wrenched back. Hufbauer was noted in the summaries at the meet as “Moore.”

A telegram accepting the apology of Director Owen for the affair but declining to accept forfeiture of the meet was received today by Owen from Frank C. Bridges, director of athletics at Baylor. Bridges expressed appreciation of the honesty of the Oklahoma athletic officials and voiced the hope that the relations between the two institutions would continue the same. Owen had wired an apology last night and offered to forfeit the meet, won by Oklahoma 69 to 48.

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The January 2, 1925, issue of Arkansas City Traveler stated: “When Bennie Owen, as a slender Arkansas City Youth, established an athletic reputation, first at home, then at K. U., then as coach with the ‘Terrible Swedes’ at Lindsborg, then as assistant at Michigan University, and finally as coach and director of athletics at the University of Oklahoma, he established an example that is being followed by a worthy line of successors.”