Edward Joseph Salem (August 28, 1928 – December 21, 2001) was an

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with ...

quarterback The quarterback (commonly abbreviated "QB"), colloquially known as the "signal caller", is a position in gridiron football. Quarterbacks are members of the offensive platoon and mostly line up directly behind the offensive line. In modern Ame ...

and

defensive back In gridiron football, defensive backs (DBs), also called the secondary, are the players on the defensive side of the ball who play farthest back from the line of scrimmage. They are distinguished from the other two sets of defensive players, the ...

. He was a

1950 College Football All-America Team The 1950 College Football All-America team is composed of college football players who were selected as All-Americans by various organizations and writers that chose College Football All-America Teams in 1950. The eight selectors recognized by the ...

selection from the

University of Alabama The University of Alabama (informally known as Alabama, UA, or Bama) is a Public university, public research university in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Established in 1820 and opened to students in 1831, the University of Alabama is the oldest and la ...

Crimson Tide and played one season for the

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...

(NFL)'s

Washington Redskins The Washington Commanders are a professional American football team based in the Washington metropolitan area. The Commanders compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) N ...

and one season for the

Canadian Football League The Canadian Football League (CFL; french: Ligue canadienne de football—LCF) is a professional sports league in Canada. The CFL is the highest level of competition in Canadian football. The league consists of nine teams, each located in a ci ...

(CFL)'s

Montreal Alouettes The Montreal Alouettes (Canadian French, French: Les Alouettes de Montréal) are a professional Canadian football team based in Montreal, Quebec. Founded in 1946, the team has folded and been revived twice. The Alouettes compete in the Canadian F ...

. Salem was born in

Tucson, Arizona , "(at the) base of the black ill , nicknames = "The Old Pueblo", "Optics Valley", "America's biggest small town" , image_map = , mapsize = 260px , map_caption = Interactive map ...

and arrived in

Tuscaloosa, Alabama Tuscaloosa ( ) is a city in and the seat of Tuscaloosa County in west-central Alabama, United States, on the Black Warrior River where the Gulf Coastal and Piedmont plains meet. Alabama's fifth-largest city, it had an estimated population of 1 ...

to play for

Harold Drew Harold Delbert "Red" Drew (November 9, 1894 – October 20, 1979) was an American football, basketball, and track and field coach for over 40 years. He was the head coach of the Alabama Crimson Tide football team from 1947 to 1954, compiling a r ...

's Crimson Tide at a time when they were still rising to national prominence. He starred on all sides of the ball. As a quarterback he was the team's top passer in 1948, 1949 and 1950. He was also the Tide's leading rusher in 1948 and top scorer in 1948 and 1949, a season in which he also led the team in interceptions. In 1950, he was the Tide's top punt returner. In Alabama's 55–0 victory over rival

Auburn University Auburn University (AU or Auburn) is a public land-grant research university in Auburn, Alabama. With more than 24,600 undergraduate students and a total enrollment of more than 30,000 with 1,330 faculty members, Auburn is the second largest uni ...

in the 1948

Iron Bowl The Alabama–Auburn football rivalry, better known as the Iron Bowl, is an American college football rivalry game between the Auburn University Tigers and University of Alabama Crimson Tide, both charter members of the Southeastern Conferenc ...

he threw for three touchdowns, rushed for another, and kicked seven extra points. Alabama's athletics staff named him one of the Tide's 50 best players in history in 1992. The Washington Redskins made Salem the 15th player selected overall in the second round of the

1951 NFL Draft The 1951 National Football League Draft was held January 18–19, 1951, at the Blackstone Hotel in Chicago. The Baltimore Colts folded after the 1950 season, and the NFL placed their players in the 1951 NFL draft. This was the fifth year that th ...

. He played one year for the Redskins, recording five interceptions on defense. For the following season he signed with the Montreal Alouettes, making his mark there by kicking what was then a league record field goal of After leaving professional football, Salem moved to

Birmingham, Alabama Birmingham ( ) is a city in the north central region of the U.S. state of Alabama. Birmingham is the seat of Jefferson County, Alabama's most populous county. As of the 2021 census estimates, Birmingham had a population of 197,575, down 1% fr ...

and opened the first "Ed Salem's Drive-In" on what became a noted cruising strip on the section of the Bee Line Highway between Birmingham and

North Birmingham North Birmingham is a community of Birmingham in Jefferson County, Alabama, United States. Currently the North Birmingham community is further subdivided into six neighborhoods: Acipco-Finley, Collegeville, Fairmont, Harriman Park, Hooper City, ...

. He later expanded with additional locations in the Lakeview neighborhood. Ed Salem's Drive-In #3, formerly Eli's Drive-In, was the site of WSGN's famed "Sky Castle" deejay booth, where the station's "Good Guys" evening rock and roll deejays would take live requests. In addition to his restaurants, Salem opened a travel agency and several bowling alleys and acted as a real estate developer. He died in 2001 from complications from

diabetes Diabetes, also known as diabetes mellitus, is a group of metabolic disorders characterized by a high blood sugar level ( hyperglycemia) over a prolonged period of time. Symptoms often include frequent urination, increased thirst and increased ap ...

and was buried at Birmingham's Elmwood Cemetery. Salem was inducted into the

Alabama Sports Hall of Fame The Alabama Sports Hall of Fame (ASHOF) is a state museum located in Birmingham, Alabama, dedicated to communicating the state’s athletic history. The museum displays over 5,000 objects related to athletes who were born in Alabama or earned fame ...

in the Class of 2010.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Salem, Ed 1928 births 2001 deaths Players of American football from Tucson, Arizona Players of American football from Birmingham, Alabama American football quarterbacks Alabama Crimson Tide football players All-American college football players Washington Redskins players Montreal Alouettes players Burials at Elmwood Cemetery (Birmingham, Alabama) Ramsay High School alumni

See also

References