Tom Landry: A Story from “America’s Coach”

On this episode of Our American Stories, before he ever wore his trademark hat on the sidelines, Tom Landry was a young man trying to build a future during the hard years of the Depression. He joined the University of Texas football team, flew combat missions in World War Two, and returned home to begin a professional career that brought both recognition and pressure.

But even as the wins piled up, he felt a quiet emptiness he could not ignore. When a friend invited him to a Bible study, he went reluctantly—and left with a sense of clarity he had been searching for since childhood. Here’s Tom Landry’s story of faith and football in his own words.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib and this is our American Stories,
the show where America is the star and the American people.
He was one of the greatest coaches of the twentieth century.
Behind a stone face and beneath his trademark Badora was
a brilliant football mind. As head coach of the Dallas
Cowboys for twenty nine years, Tom Landry compiled an impressive

(00:32):
record of thirteen Division titles, five Super Bowl appearances, and
two championships. The Cowboys would eventually be dubbed America's team.
Here he is with his own story.

Speaker 2 (00:45):
I was raised at Mission, Texas, which is right up
from Brownsville there about sixty miles, and I was raised
during the depression years in the thirties. My dad was
an automobill mechanic on his own drive. She was fire
chief of Mission Volunteer Fire Department for about forty years,
a great civic leader, and we had six in our family.

(01:08):
And my family really they taught me values. We were
just about a half a block from the Methodist church.
My dad was superintendent Sunday schools, so I had to
go to Sunday school every Sunday. I didn't care to go,
but we didn't really. We didn't pray you in our
home except maybe when we had company or Thanksgiving or something.

(01:29):
We didn't ever read the Bible. I never read the Bible,
but my parents taught me to go to church, that
that was important, and I always went to church. But
you know, when you're in the thirties, i'd never been
out of the Rigrand Valley but one time, by the
time I was a senior in high school. Because when
you're in depression years, anybody's been through the depression, you know,
you don't travel for it because you don't have much money.

(01:51):
But I knew to get out of the valley that
I had to use if I ever wanted to climb
that ladder success that I think America offers everybody. I
was gonna have to do it in football. And so
I started planning and thinking about football and doing everything
I could to be a football player. And I got
a chance to go to University of Texas and I
made the team, and I was really excited. First time

(02:13):
I've ever been on campus at the University of Texas.
And then I went into service. I flew b seventeens
over Europe for thirty missions during World War Two before
I came back to the University of Texas, and we
had some great teams there at the University of Texas
with Bobby Lane was our cornerback.

Speaker 1 (02:28):
You know.

Speaker 2 (02:29):
We beat Alabama and the Sugar Bowl, beat Georgia and
Orange Bowl. But the thing I discovered at that time
was that I wasn't reaching the fulfillment and the peace
of mind that I thought you ought to have after
you have that kind of success, because we had some
good football teams, and I was kind of felt like
I was climbing to the top of the world. And

(02:49):
my only rationalization was I hadn't been to the top yet.
And so when I went in professional football with the
New York Giants, I became a player, and I made
All Pro even one year, and we won the World's
Championship in nineteen forty at fifty seven against the Cargo Bears,
beat in forty seven to seven in Yankee Stadium, and
there we are on the top of the world, you know,

(03:10):
and I still, after all the excitement, I still had
that emptiness, in that restlessness, and I couldn't understand why
that was. So I wanted to get out of football.
I had gotten another degree at the University of Houston.
While I was playing with the Giants. I went to
school during the off season. I got an industrial engineering degree,
and so I wanted to go into management. And a
Christian met me, a friend of mine, on the street,

(03:31):
and I told him what I was going to do.
I'm gonna get out of football, and you know it
wasn't fulfilling. I want to get into business. Well, he
knew immediately what was wrong with me when I told
him the story, and he said, how about attend the
Bible study that meets at the hotel. And my first
reaction was where I knew the Christmas story in the Eastern story.
You know, I didn't go. I didn't have to go
study the Bible, and I've been to church every Sunday.

(03:52):
But he was very persistent and he and I went,
and I never forget it because we were studying in
Matthew the someone on the amount and Jesus was saying,
do not be anxious about your life, what you should
eat or drink about your body, what you should put
on is not life more than food, and body more
than clothing. Seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness,
and all these things will be given to you. Well, boy,

(04:13):
I got excited. That's the first time that I ever
had any inkling of even what the gospel was all about,
you know, And even in my young years in the Bible,
just that time I realized I didn't know that you
were say by faith, you know. I went through the
Romans there of the and boy talked about everyone's sin

(04:35):
and fall ashore of the glory of God, and we're
dead in sin, and Christ died on the cross. Well,
finally I came to what the gospel of Jesus Christ
is all about. In first Christians fifteen three and four
would say that Christ died on the cross, he was buried,
and he rose again. And I accepted Christ right there.
I realized right then that that life was really a

(04:55):
matter of priorities. Unless God is first in your life,
and your family, of course, is going to come very
close when that happens, and your business is in third place,
you're not a Christian. So I had football all those
years that I was trying to climb that ladder success
to get the peace of mind and all, and only
when I accepted Christ did that come to me. The

(05:18):
peace was there, and Saint Augustine said it this way,
says heart's are restless o God until they find their
rest in thee. Well that was my story, and I
tell you I've heard many athletes have conversion stories and
they all follow the same pattern. Football becomes everything. They
think that's what life's all about. If you reach the top,

(05:38):
you have everything. But when you reach your top, you
don't have everything. It doesn't mean you shouldn't achieve. There's
nothing wrong with achieving and being the best that you
can be. But boy, it's a lot different when Christ
is number one and you succeed, because that's what the
whole life's about. And so that was tremendous for me.
And I was thirty four years old then. Year before

(06:00):
I took over the Dallas Cowboys as a head coach
was when that took place. And it had really nothing
to do with success. I had great success before I played,
and great success act. But it's a peace of mind
that you have. And even when I took over the Cowboys,
when I didn't think I was gonna make it, you know,

(06:20):
I still it was still God's way. When Clinton Meerkson
gave me that ten year contract, I knew that that's
where God wanted me to be a coach, and from
then on it was set. I was a coach from
then on. I never even give it a second thought
after that and there, and He's blessed me in so
many ways.

Speaker 1 (06:38):
Had a great job on the editing and production by
Iron Greg Hengler and a special Thanks Division video where
you can find stories like that, go Division video dot com.
Hundreds and hundreds of beautiful stories, many of them about faith,
and we don't shy away from telling people's faith stories
when it's a part of their life story. And my goodness,
it was a fundamental part of Tom Landry's personal transformation.

(07:02):
He had chased success. He had thought, the next mountain top,
that's what will make me happy. Gotta go play ball.
Flu missions in Europe be seventeens. There's nothing he didn't do.
Into the pros. One's a championship. Still that feeling of restlessness,
and then he bumps into that Christian who says, come
to a Bible. Study the story of Tom Landry, the

(07:24):
story of his personal spiritual journey. Here on our American Stories,
Lee Habib here, and I'm inviting you to help our
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coming soon. If you want to help inspire countless others
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(07:48):
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