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One of the most enjoyable afternoons I've spent in my 22 1/2 years with The Californian was  with Joe Shell, in his living room talking USC football with the 1939 Trojan captain, blocking back and linebacker. I'm saddened to learn of his passing and my thoughts are today with his wife Mary K. But I'm so glad Joe passed having secured the recognition from his alma mater he and his 1939 team so deserved.

Joe was one of the great characters of Kern County and among a fraternity of terrific guys who, unbeknown to a lot of people, enjoyed spectacular successes in athletics prior to making their marks in local politics, business or civic endeavors. It was always neat to hear them talk passionately about those days and then turn around and let readers know what athletes these guys were back in the day.

A reminder of Joe's football days at USC surfaced in the fall of 2004 when, nearly 65 years after Joe's 1939 team he captained went  8-0-2 and won the 1940 Rose Bowl beating previously unbeaten and unscored upon Tennessee 14-0, USC finally recognized the 1939 team as national champions, just as two ranking systems had done 65 years earlier.

For all those years, USC powers at be struggled with the fact that the Associated Press chose unbeaten Texas A&M as its champion and two other polls selected Cornell. That or the university had just forgotten all about it. Ambrose Schindler, the USC quarterback on that '39 team, and a few other '39 boys convinced USC athletic director Mike Garrett to re-examine the situation and do the right thing before none of the fellas were left.

Shell didn't need any such recognition from Garrett or the university, or to receive a giant championship ring, to know that his team was the best in the nation —  maybe the best of all time, even better than the 2004 team that dismantled Oklahoma in the national championship game.

"We would not have been worried to play them," Joe told me on that wonderful afternoon three years ago, during which I swear Mary K. had to at one point discourage him from going in the back and slipping on his USC uniform and leatherhead.  "I don't want to say we were better, but back then, we thought we were better than anybody."