Jim Tatum James M . " Big Jim " Tatum ( July 22 , 1913 – July 23 , 1959 ) was an American football and baseball player and coach . Tatum served as the head football coach at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill ( 1942 , 1956 – 1958 ) , the University of Oklahoma ( 1946 ) , and the University of Maryland , College Park ( 1947 – 1955 ) , compiling a career college football record of 100 – 35 – 7 . His 1953 Maryland team won a national title . As a head coach , he employed the split - T formation with great success , a system he had learned as an assistant under Don Faurot at the Iowa Pre - Flight School during World War II . Tatum was also the head baseball coach at Cornell University from 1937 to 1939 , tallying a mark of 20 – 40 – 1 . Tatum ' s career was cut short by his untimely death in 1959 . He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as a coach in 1984 . Early life and college playing career . Tatum was born in McColl , South Carolina on July 22 , 1913 . He attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill , where he played college football as a tackle under head coach Carl Snavely . Tatum was named to the All - Southern Conference team as a senior in 1935 . Tatum played minor league baseball as a catcher for the Kinston Eagles . The 6 feet , 3 inches and 230 pounds Tatum had the nicknames " Big Jim " . and " Sunny Jim " . In September 1935 , Tatum participated in training camp with the New York Giants of the National Football League at Blue Hill Country Club . Coaching career . Cornell . In 1936 , Tatum followed his football coach at North Carolina , Carl Snavely , to Cornell where he became Snavely ' s assistant football coach and also the head baseball coach for three seasons before returning to North Carolina in 1939 . During this time , Tatum played minor league baseball in the class " D " Coastal Plain League with the Tarboro Serpents in 1937 and the Snow Hill Billies in 1938 and 1939 . Military service . Tatum enlisted in the United States Navy after one season as the head coach at North Carolina following Raymond Wolf ' s departure for naval service in 1941 . He was assigned to the Iowa Pre - Flight school where he was an assistant coach for Don Faurot , the Missouri Tigers head coach and the inventor of the Split - T offense . Tatum used this offensive scheme with great success throughout his later career . Oklahoma . After World War II , Tatum accepted a position as the head coach at the University of Oklahoma . He compiled an 8 – 3 in 1946 record before accepting the head coaching position at the University of Maryland . Bud Wilkinson , a fellow assistant coach at the Iowa Pre - Flight School , was one of his assistants at Oklahoma and was promoted to head coach when Tatum left for Maryland . Maryland . At Maryland , Tatum compiled a 73 – 15 – 4 record for an . 815 winning percentage . Maryland was undefeated in the 1951 season at 10 – 0 , upsetting the top - ranked Tennessee Volunteers in the 1952 Sugar Bowl , 28 – 13 . Tatum ' s 1953 team won a national championship . That season , Tatum was voted AFCA Coach of the Year . His Maryland teams won conference co - championships in 1951 in the Southern Conference and in 1953 and 1955 in the Atlantic Coast Conference . In additional to playing in the Sugar Bowl , Maryland also played twice each in the Gator Bowl and the Orange Bowl during Tatum ' s tenure . North Carolina . In 1942 and from 1956 to 1958 , Tatum served as the head football coach at his alma mater , the University of North Carolina . There he compiled a 19 – 17 – 3 record ; two 1956 wins were later forfeited for use of an ineligible player . Tatum had originally returned to North Carolina to coach the freshmen football team in 1939 after spending time as an assistant at Cornell University . He left his first tenure as head coach after the 1942 season to enlist in the Navy during World War II . His second tenure at North Carolina was cut short due to his untimely death . Tatum died on July 23 , 1959 in Chapel Hill , North Carolina at the age of 46 . He had contracted an infection on July 13 , and entered the hospital on July 18 . On the day of his death , he fell into a coma in the afternoon and never regained consciousness . He was declared dead at 11 : 40 p . m . His ailment was later determined to be a rickettsial disease " similar to typhus and Rocky Mountain spotted fever " . He was buried in Old Chapel Hill Cemetery . Family . Tatum was the son of Walter Robert Tatum ( February 22 , 1874 in Marlboro County , South Carolina – July 13 , 1925 in McColl , South Carolina ) and Agnes Jessamine Carmichael ( 1876 in Dillon , South Carolina – 1956 ) . They were married in 1895 in McColl , S . C . Jim was married to Edna Reid Sumrell ( September 13 , 1911 in Ayden , North Carolina – November 18 , 2004 in Chapel Hill , North Carolina ) in 1938 at the Little Church Around the Corner in New York City . Edna was the daughter of Barnes Staton Sumrell ( February 12 , 1874 in Pitt County , North Carolina – December 12 , 1954 in Greenville , North Carolina ) and Rebecca Minnesota " Minnie " Dixon ( August 30 , 1879 in Pitt County , NC – November 12 , 1968 in Greenville , NC ) . They had three children : Rebecca Tatum Hilstad , b . 1945 in Kinston , North Carolina ; James Moore Tatum , Jr . , b . in Kinston , NC , and Edna Reid Tatum , b . 1952 in Prince George ' s County , Maryland . Legacy . Himself a pupil of split T innovator Don Faurot , Tatum ' s coaching tree included the following assistants who later held head coaching positions of their own : A number of Tatum ' s players also went on to become head coaches :