Who was the last "coolest man in America"?

Fee Republic ^ | 1/29/2011 | Krankor

[Krankor]

There was a time, maybe thirty or forty years ago, before cable TV and cell phones, where one man could be so impressive in his accomplishments and force of personality, he would almost universally be recognized as the coolest man in America. His field could range from medicine, science, sports, politics or entertainment. Since the advent of the internet, though, this is no longer possible. Who, in your opinion, was the last "coolest man in America"?

[FreedomPoster]

I love those ads.

[FreedomPoster]

+1

That is a spot on assessment.

[FreedomPoster]

I’ve been saying for years now that we desperately needed a Feynman to cut through the AGW bull****.

He definitely makes the Pantheon of Cool.

[machman]

Mike Ness Still rockin after 30 years with the same fire, clean and sober, family man, can make his new song "Machine Gun Blues" still sound punk wether full on

electric

or

acoustic.

Looks great in a fedora and tie.....

Looks great wthout fedora.....

Or in jeans and cowboy hat....

[jocon307]

Well that I did not know, fascinating!

Ok, I might have to re-think my cool rankings...

[wendy1946]

I liked the little speech about the pistol with the rifled barrel myself...

[Farmer Dean]

Now THAT’S a man.Some football player rated cooler?Pleeese....

[wendy1946]

There would be no shortages for a candidate for superstar amongst all-time football heroes.

My candidate for all-time football hero would be Jack Mildren, the man often called the "Godfather of the Wishbone".

That was the most major attempt ever undertaken to make a science out of American football. The NFL variety is basically crude by comparison.

[AGreatPer]

Al Bonach (My Dad)

[runninglips]

DiMaggio followed Marilyn Monroe around like a puppy and his reputation as a nice guy was a front. I wouldn’t even think of him as being on a list of cool people. He seemed to me to be a phony man, quite frankly sort of a prick..JMO

[BronzePencil]

I dunno-along with his baseball accomplishments, he flew jets in the Korean War as John Glenn’s wingman and also set records in fishing. Pretty cool if you ask me.

[SevenofNine]

I got another suggestion

How about Deadliest Captain captains like Hillistrand Brothers and Sig Hansen and late Capt Phil Harris

[yarddog]

I had forgotten about Jack Mildren.

I remember him running the wishbone to absolute perfection against a really good Auburn team.

Auburn had a very aggressive defense which was just what the wishone performed best against.

[BronzePencil]

I though McQueen was a drunk, druggy and beat his wives? The characters he played were cool though.

[wendy1946]

You're right, it was Auburn. You still have to be able to back defenses out of nine or ten man fronts and in the mid 80s the Okies forgot how to throw the ball and couldn't do that. Mildren was able to do that by dint of inheritance having been a passing quarterback in a previous life and Bear Bryant's teams developed a passing game which was keyed to the wishbone and their offense became undefensible. What the Naval Academy is doing now is similar to the Alabama version of the wishbone, which strikes me as the best version.

Mildren should have had the Heisman trophy in 71. He was an absolutely super athlete and the most major figure in a game said to have been THE game of the 20'th century, despite the Okie defense having lost it. Mildren and leon Crosswhite ran roughshod over the Auburn squad whose quarterback actually was given the Heisman.

[yarddog]

Steadman Shealy who ran the Alabama national championship wishbone back around 1979 was a member of our church.

The year before he won the national title, he was recovering from knee surgery. He mentioned that they were working on having a much better passing game. Shealy was not a real passing QB but he learned to be a pretty good one.

[wendy1946]

The kicker was that a wishbone quarterback never had to deal with a zone pass defense, i.e. that’s what the wishbone ground game was for. That’s the reason you see all those 80 and 90 year old quarterbacks in the NFL i.e. it takes em that long to learn to throw against pro zones. The first NFL team which ever went to the Tide’s version of the wishbone wouldn’t NEED geriatric quarterbacks.

[RedwM]

Robert Mitchum was pretty cool.

[LifePath]

There are more than one:

Neil Armstrong
Buzz Aldrin
Pete Conrad (deceased)
Alan Bean
Alan Shepard (deceased)
Edgar Mitchell
Dave Scott
Jim Irwin (deceased)
John Young
The Reverend Charley Duke
Gene Cernan
Harrison Schmitt

If you want real cool, real accomplishment, then walk on the Moon.

My humble opinion.

[Brucifer]

Lee Marvin... now he was a man’s man!