Princeton University Athletics
Thacher Longstreth '41: Citizen Athlete Award
March 31, 2000 | General
Citizen Athlete Award
Presented by the Princeton Varsity Club for selfless and noble contributions to sport and society.
Thacher Longstreth '41
Yale 29, Princeton 5. If it seems like an odd football score, considering that it was from a game played three years before the Wright Brothers taxied down their runway for the first time. The year was 1900, and Thacher Longstreth's mother was in attendance.
Now, 100 years later, Thacher Longstreth is still in attendance at Princeton football games. In fact, Longstreth has not missed a Princeton football game, home or away, since 1949.
He is a highly visible sight at Princeton football and basketball games. What isn't as visible on the surface is that he is also a true American hero.
Thacher Longstreth played football and was an All-America in track before graduating from Princeton in 1941. He then enlisted in the Navy as an ensign in 1942 and served until eight months after World War II ended. He saw action in eight major engagements during the war, and he was twice awarded the Bronze Star for bravery.
He established himself as a successful businessman after the war, but he has left his largest mark in public service. Longstreth, a Republican in the largely democratic city of Philadelphia, has run successfully for four-year terms on the city council five times. He served as president of the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce from 1964-83, and he was the Republican nominee for mayor in 1955 and 1971.