It’s not that Dan Blocker disliked football, baseball, or basketball — it’s just that he would have much rather boosted his brains over his biceps. And that’s coming from a guy who not only looked like he could play football but actually did play the sport and was successful at it.
By now, we know that Blocker was so much more than his character Hoss Cartwright in Bonanza (1959). Blocker was a gentle giant, a teacher, a veteran, and a family man.
He graduated with a master’s degree in education and earned a living as a teacher before becoming an actor. His role as a teacher may have even topped his role as Hoss Cartwright. Blocker often spoke in interviews about the impact teaching had on him as a person.
According to a 1965 interview with the Chicago Tribune, Blocker agreed that physical education and fitness programs were important in schools, but said he would do away with competitive sports during school hours.
“The community should sponsor football or baseball teams after hours and on weekends,” Blocker said. “That way the school heroes would be the kids who learned the most, not the kids who run fastest or jump the highest. Some of the country’s future greats are being destroyed because American high school students worship athletes more than scholars.”
If there was anything more to Blocker besides being large, it was his intelligence. Much like his character in Bonanza, who was known for being gentle, warm, and down-to-earth, Blocker saw the problems in education and wanted to be part of the solution.
“I’ll bet that in every major city in the United States has one or two little skinny fellows who have the potential brain power to find the cure for cancer when they grow up,” Blocker said. “But we put them in a school where all the attention goes to the guy who can knock down the most kids while carrying a football, even if he can’t spell some words the same way twice.”
With his experience as a teacher, Blocker saw firsthand some of the smartest students go unnoticed for getting an A+ in tough subjects. He believed they deserved more. Even for the kids who weren’t as blessed as Blocker in height and size, he believed that every student could succeed in their own way.
“The moose who can run fast, throw far, and leap high struts around school wearing a fancy sweater with an honorary letter and stripes on it, and the scholar is ignored as a square,” Blocker said. “I say we should get competitive sports out of school and hand out those fancy sweaters and stripes to the student who can maintain a 90 grade average for the year.”
All of this was said by a former football hero who worked as a coach while teaching and was even offered a job on a pro football team. Blocker’s goal was to teach students what he learned along the way.