The family of All-time NFL running back Jim Brown confirmed he passed peacefully at his Los Angeles home Thursday night with his wife Monique by his side. He was 87.
Brown, a social activist and NFL pro football Hall of Famer, was known for being an unstoppable running back, who retired at 30 after leading the Cleveland Browns to their last NFL title in 1964 to become an actor and civil rights advocate.
Brown was chosen as the NFL’s Most Valuable Player in 1965 and shattered the league’s record books in a short career spanning 1957-65, USA Today reported.
In 1967, Brown organized a meeting in Cleveland of the nation’s top Black athletes to support boxer Muhammad Ali’s fight against the war in Vietnam.
Among those players were Bill Russell and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
He then went on to help fight gang violence in LA and created Amer-I-Can, a program to help disadvantaged inner-city youth and ex-convicts.
During his acting career, Brown appeared in over 30 films, including “100 Rifles,” “Mars Attacks!” Spike Lee’s “He Got Game,” Oliver Stone’s “Any Given Sunday,” and the satire “I’m Gonna Git You Sucka.”
In 2002, HBO released a doc about the football star titled “Jim Brown: All-American.”
Brown was an eight-time All-Pro and went to the Pro Bowl all nine years of his career. He held the league’s records for 12,312 yards and 126 touchdowns.
He never missed a game, playing in 118 straight.
