BLUFFTON, OHIO (WLIO) - A Bluffton Beaver known for helping the team drive down the football field now has a drive named in his honor.
A Bluffton Beaver known for helping the team drive down the football field now has a drive named in his honor.
Village officials renamed a section of Bentley Road for Elbert Dubenion, who played for Bluffton University from 1955 to 1959 and then played 9 years in the NFL for the Buffalo Bills. Bubenion is the only Beaver athlete to play professionally, and he was placed on the Bills’ Wall of Fame after he retired. Elbert Dubenion Drive runs in front of the football field. His quarterback, while at Bluffton, remembers him best for what he did off the field.
“He was my teammate, my mentor, and my friend, and when he was my mentor, if I always got down a little bit, he would always pump me back up, and he was just that kind of a guy. You never knew that Dubenion was an athlete, if you were someplace else, because he never talked about himself unless someone asked him, and then he was happy to do that. Just a fantastic individual,” says Jim “Spike” Berry, teammate of Dubenion.
Organizers hope to put a plaque along the drive to celebrate Dubenion and his accomplishments.
Family members say that Dubenion's mind set was “Love First," and his life has inspired them.
“It’s incredible. I go back on YouTube all the time, trying to find videos, try and find clips. Downstairs in my house, I have a little Hall of Fame for him, of course too. Overall, it’s really incredible and inspiring in whatever I do in terms of like, I am in the business field, but in the same time it's motivation and drive and the same type of feeling of love and care for people,” says Tyler Dubenion-Smith, grandson.
Organizers hope to put a plaque along the drive to celebrate Dubenion and his accomplishments.
