The Arcane Texas Fact of the Day:
Both the iconic "steerhead" logo of the Texas Longhorns athletic teams and the burnt orange color worn by them were the result of the work of one man: William "Rooster" Andrews.
In 1961, coach Darrell Royal talked to Andrews, who at at time was a salesman for C&S Sporting Goods, about ways to improve the Longhorns uniform. Back then, the Longhorns' helmets were white with orange numerals on the side and a thin orange stripe down the center. Andrews told Royal he had an idea and would work on it that night. He found a Longhorn head in a book, traced it and colored it in with crayon, and then found a distributor to make decals of the logo. They were added onto the helmets of the 1961 Longhorn football team and have remained there ever since.
One year later, Royal and Andrews worked together to change the uniform color from the bright orange that was then used to the burnt orange in use today. Royal wanted the color to be darker, closer to the color of the football, the way the practice uniforms looked when they were stained with sweat after a hot, hard practice. Andrews soaked a uniform in water and showed it to a manufacturer who was then able to make uniforms with the burnt orange color.
Andrews, who stood all of 4'11", was a colorful character. From 1941 to 1945 he was both the team manager for the Longhorns football team and a roommate with future Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback Bobby Layne. In 1943, during World War II when many schools suspended their football programs due to lack of men, Texas had trouble finding a kicker. Andrews showed off his drop kick style in practice, an unusual style at the time, and earned a chance to play by winning a kicking contest in practice. His first chance came against TCU when he kicked two extra points and had a third attempt blocked, enraging TCU coach Dutch Meyer who saw the use of the team's water boy as an insult. Meyer dared coach Dana X. Bible to use Andrews the following week against Texas A&M and Bible did, with Andrews kicking two more extra points and having a field goal blocked.
Rooster continued to play in the 1944 and 1945 seasons. On a few occasions he faked the kick and instead threw passes to Bobby Layne, a play that succeeded once against Oklahoma in 1945 and once in his final game, the 1946 Cotton Bowl. Twice he connected with Layne for touchdowns. But Andrews primary job was to keep his roommate, hard-partying, hard-drinking quarterback Bobby Layne, out of trouble.
In addition to managing the football team, Andrews played seven different positions for the UT baseball team as a part-time player in 1944–45, and was a manager in 1946. Once sent in to draw a base on balls, he hit a game-winning home run instead.
His nickname, "Rooster," came from a college incident in which he broke an arm trying to retrieve a chicken from a tree.
In 1971, Rooster opened a sporting goods store in Austin. In 1971 he opened the first of his own sporting goods stores in Austin. At its peak, Rooster Andrews Sporting Goods had four retail locations across Austin and employed more than 70 people.
Rooster Andrews died in 2008 at the age of 84, having been friends with just about everybody who ever was anybody in Texas during his lifetime. He was one of those people who always had a smile on his face when you'd visit one of his stores. I still have a football he sold to me in 1994.
Shown here: Rooster Andrews (center) during his time as a player/manager for the Longhorns football team and the Longhorns logo he invented. In 2013, Athlon Sports named the steerhead logo that Andrews developed as the nation's best college football logo.
