Indiana University of Pennsylvania Athletics

Indiana University of Pennsylvania, by whatever name it has been known through the years, has always strived for the national and international spotlight in everything it has done, athletically and academically.
And there have been few individuals who have achieved more in that regard than Frank Mount Pleasant, who nearly 90 years ago coached three Indiana Normal School football teams (in 1911, '12 and ' 13) to standing as one of the top such entrants 10 the nation.
The true native American, a member of the Tuscarora Indian nation, had competed in the 1908 Olympics in London, where he placed sixth in both the broad and triple jumps. Later he set French records in the Paris Games, where he defeated the Olympic champion in the broad jump.
Prior to that (1905-07), Mount Pleasant had played three seasons as an All-American at quarterback and halfback at what was known as the Carlisle Indian School for the famous coach "Pop" Warner. It was said he ran just as well as the Immortal Jim Thorpe when the two teamed in the same backfield, and he was known as one of the fastest 440-yard sprinters 10 the world.
Mount Pleasant 's three INS teams posted a combined record of 23 wins, four losses and a tie. In 1912 it was undefeated at 9-0, outscoring its opponents 346- 13 and shutting out eight foes. In 1913 it finished 9-1. Both teams were acclaimed Pennsylvania normal school champions.
From Indiana, the 1910 Dickinson graduate and accomplished pianist went on to coach at West Virginia Wesleyan for a year, then served in the Army in World War I as a lieutenant. He was decorated for bravery.
A Dickinson publication included the tribute, "As a man, Mount Pleasant is a frank, openhearted gentleman, quiet and courteous. To meet Frank Mount Pleasant is to like him, to know him is to admire him; to live in the same little world with him is to appreciate his sterling qualities and his noble nature."
Little is known of him in the years after the war, except that he coached football for a time at Franklin and Marshall and that he resided in his native New York until being killed by a hit-and-run driver in Buffalo in 1937.
IUP is not the first to honor Mount Pleasant as we, joined by nieces Rose Farnham and Joan Chapman and grandnephew Ed Farnham, do today. In 1973, he was inducted into the American Indian Athletic Hall of Fame in Lawrence, Kansas.
Nor will we be the last, as retired IUP librarian Richard Chamberlin, responsible for the research that made Mount Pleasant more than a name to us, will head west tomorrow to present a duplicate of our IUP Hall of Fame induction plaque to Haskell Indian National University, which houses the Indian Hall of Fame.