Alan Page

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Alan Page
Date of birth	August 7, 1945 (age 61)
Place of birth	Canton, Ohio
Position(s)	Defensive tackle/end
College	Notre Dame
NFL Draft	1967 / Round 1/ Pick 15
Career Highlights
Pro Bowls	9
Awards	1971 AP NFL MVP 1971 AP Defensive Player of Year 1971 UPI NFC Player of the Year
Honors	NFL 1970s All-Decade Team
Stats
Statistics	Pro Football Reference DatabaseFootball
Team(s)
1967-1978 1978-1981	Minnesota Vikings Chicago Bears
College Hall of Fame
Pro Football Hall of Fame, 1988

Alan Cedric Page (born August 7, 1945 in Canton, Ohio) is a former professional American football player who starred as a defensive lineman in the NFL, primarily with the Minnesota Vikings as a member of the "Purple People Eaters", and then went on to have a distinguished legal career, serving as a current Associate Justice of the Minnesota Supreme Court. He is the only person in NFL history to have both worked on the construction of the Pro Football Hall of Fame and inducted into the Hall of Fame.

[edit] Football career

After graduating from Central Catholic High School (Canton, Ohio), Page received a B.A. in political science from the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana. He was an All-American in football in 1966, and was selected by the Vikings in the 1967 NFL Draft. Although he had played defensive end in college, he was moved to defensive tackle with the Vikings. He played for Minnesota from 1967 until the middle of the 1978 season when he was released by the team. The Chicago Bears signed him and he played with the Bears until the end of the 1981 season.

In 1979 Page became the first NFL player to finish a marathon.

In 1988 he was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame and is the first native of the Hall's home city of Canton to have been inducted. A street is named for him there. In 1993 Page was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame and in 2002 he was inducted into the International Scholar-Athlete Hall of Fame.

During Page's tenure the Vikings won one NFL (1969) and 3 NFC (1973, 1974 and 1976) title games.

Page was named the NFL's "Most Valuable Player" in 1971, the third defensive player to be accorded that honor since the inception of the award in 1938 (the Colts' defensive end Gino Marchetti was the AP MVP in 1958 and Lions' Joe Schmidt was co MVP in 1960). Page was joined on this short list in 1986 by New York Giants linebacker Lawrence Taylor. The four remain the only defensive players to win the league's top regular season award.

He was also named the NFL's Defensive Player of the Year in 1971 and 1973. Page earned All-Pro honors 6 times and was voted to 9 straight Pro Bowls.

Page's playing style was based on his quickness and his ability to shed blocks with his agility and beautiful arm work (like that of Deacon Jones). He had an uncanny knack to get in the backfield and was great in pursuit. He was also adept at intercepting passes at the line. At the conclusion of his career opponents had averaged only 3.4 yards per carry against him. (cite?)

In 1999, he was ranked number 34 on The Sporting News' list of the 100 Greatest Football Players, the highest-ranking Viking player.

[edit] Legal career

Page received a Juris Doctor (J.D.) from the University of Minnesota Law School in 1978 while at the same time playing professional football full-time. He was a lawyer in private practice in Minneapolis from 1979 to 1984 with the law firm Lindquist and Vennum [1]. In 1985, Page was appointed a Special Assistant Attorney General and was soon promoted to Assistant Attorney General. In 1992, he was elected to an open seat as an Associate Justice of the Minnesota Supreme Court. He was re-elected in 1998, becoming the biggest vote-getter in Minnesota history also re-elected in 2004. "Justice Purple People Eater" shares fame as a former football player with Justice Whizzer White of the U.S. Supreme Court, now deceased.

He is married to the former Diane Sims and they have two children, Justin and Kamie. Page also has two children from a previous marriage, Nina and Georgi. In 1988, he and his wife founded the Page Education Foundation, which helps minorities go to college. Justice Page has also expressed interest in becoming a public school teacher for a year or two upon retirement from the bench.

At Notre Dame's 2004 commencment ceremony, Justice Page was honored with an Honorary Doctorate in Humane Letters, and gave that year's commencement address. He had previously received an honorary Doctorate of Laws from Notre Dame in 1993.

In January 2007, Justice Page was honored by the Trumpet Award Association as their 2007 recipient of the Trumpet Award in Law.

[edit] External links

Preceded by John Brodie	NFL Most Valuable Player 1971 season	Succeeded by Larry Brown
Preceded by Donna de Varona	Theodore Roosevelt Award (NCAA) 2004	Succeeded by Sally Ride