Education
Gallarneau attended Morgan Park High School in Chicago, Illinois, but did not play high school football, opting instead for swimming, track, and baseball.
officer gridiron football player
Gallarneau attended Morgan Park High School in Chicago, Illinois, but did not play high school football, opting instead for swimming, track, and baseball.
He played college football at Stanford, where he was an All-American. After high school, he was accepted to Stanford University on an academic scholarship, and decided to try out for the football team for the 1938 season and made the team In 1938, Stanford"s team was 3-6, and the next year, fell to 1-7-1.
Gallarneau, along with quarterback Frankie Albert, halfback Pete Kmetovic, and fullback Norm Standlee, were the core of a team known as the Wow Boys, which went undefeated and beat Nebraska 21-13 in the 1941 Rose Bowl.
In that game, Gallarneau scored two of Stanford"s touchdowns, on a 10-yard run and a 40-yard pass reception. In the 1941 NFL Draft, Gallarneau was selected in the third round by the Chicago Bears.
He played for the Bears for the 1941 and 1942 seasons. Gallarneau still holds the Bears" record for the longest punt return in a postseason game, returning a punt 81 yards for a touchdown against the Green Bay Packers in the divisional playoffs to help lead the Bears to the 1941 NFL Championship game.
The return also remains the third-longest in NFL postseason history.
In 1943, Gallarneau joined the Marine Corps to fight in World World War II, where he fought in the Pacific Theater and rose to the rank of Major. After leaving football, Gallarneau remained in Chicago, working for Marshall Field"s and Hart, Schaffner & Marx, where he retired as a vice president in 1985. He died in Northfield, Illinois in 1999.
He was a member of an Air Warning Squadron during the Battle of Okinawa and was responsible for directing night fighters to intercept incoming Japanese aircraft He returned to the Bears for the 1945 season, and played three more seasons before retiring in 1947. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1982 and is a member of the Stanford Athletic Hall of Fame and the Chicagoland Sports Hall of Fame.