Portrait of Bum Phillips

Birthday profile

Bum Phillips

Bum Phillips, American football player and coach (died 2013)

Born
September 29, 1923
Died
October 18, 2013
Zodiac sign
Libra
Birth year
1923

About Bum Phillips

Oail Andrew "Bum" Phillips Jr. (September 29, 1923 – October 18, 2013) was an American football coach at the high school, college and professional levels. He served as head coach in the National Football League (NFL) for the Houston Oilers from 1975 to 1980 and the New Orleans Saints from 1981 to 1985. == Early football career == Phillips played football at Lamar University in Beaumont, Texas, but enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps on September 30, 1942. He became one of the elite Marine Raiders. After he returned from the war, Phillips completed the remaining year on his degree at Lamar (a junior college at the time), and enrolled at Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas, lettering in football in 1948 and 1949 and graduating with a degree in education in 1949. During the 1950s and 1960s, Phillips coached high school football in various Texan cities including Nederland, Jacksonville, Amarillo, and Port Neches–Groves. His college coaching stints included serving as an assistant coach at Texas A&M University (for Bear Bryant), the University of Houston (for Bill Yeoman), Southern Methodist University (for Hayden Fry), and Oklahoma State University with Jim Stanley. He was the head coach at Texas Western University (now the University of Texas at El Paso) for one season in 1962. == NFL coaching career == In the late 1960s, Phillips was hired by Sid Gillman to serve as a defensive assistant coach for the San Diego Chargers.

Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.

Career and life highlights

Bum Phillips timeline

  1. In 1973, Gillman became head coach of the Houston Oilers, and he brought Phillips with him as his defensive coordinator.
  2. In 1983, his Saints went into the final week needing one more win to secure the first winning season and playoff berth in franchise history.

The world when Bum Phillips was born

Bum Phillips was born in 1923. The year snapshot below places that birthday in its cultural and historical setting: the music and films people were following, the headlines shaping public life, and the everyday prices families encountered.

Culture in 1923

  • #1 song"Yes! We Have No Bananas"
  • Top movieThe Ten Commandments (Cecil B. DeMille)
  • Best-selling bookBlack Oxen – Gertrude Atherton

Headlines and milestones

  • Major sports momentFirst 24 Hours of Le Mans race
  • Top headlineTime magazine publishes its first issue
  • Technology milestoneFirst neon signs appear in the United States
  • Defining fadDance marathons
  • Notable inventionFrozen food process (Clarence Birdseye)
  • World population1.93 billion

United States snapshot

  • U.S. leaderWarren G. Harding / Calvin Coolidge
  • Sports championNew York Yankees (World Series)
  • U.S. population111.9M

1923 versus 2026

These figures put everyday life in Bum Phillips's birth year beside the site's latest United States snapshot.

Measure19232026
Gas$0.22$3.45/gal
Average home$5,700$435,000
Average income$3,380$67,500
Movie ticket$0.15$11.95
Postage stamp$0.02$0.73
Population111.9M341 million

Sources and editorial standards

This profile combines a biographical source with structured birthday and historical context. Sources recorded for this profile: Wikipedia, Pro Football Reference, Wikidata. See our editorial policy for sourcing, corrections, and review standards.

Read the source biography on Wikipedia. Wikipedia text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.