A football life was just the beginning. Craig Hanneman (born July 1, 1949) has lived more life than most men or women thanks to a series of forks in the road.
A small-town kid in Turner, Craig finished his high school career at South Salem. During the 1966-67 school year, Hanneman played on three different sports teams for the Saxons that all advanced to post-season.
He was a fullback and nose guard on the football team and was recruited to play both ways at Oregon State. The Beavs were stacked at fullback, so Hanneman became a three-year fixture on the defensive line.
Known as “The Dude”, Craig had some of his best moments in the biggest games of the Dee Andros era. In his senior season in 1970, he was the Beavers defensive MVP, All-Pac-8, all-Coast and 2nd team All-America.
Selected in the 6th round of the 1971 NFL draft by the Pittsburgh Steelers, Craig was a backup on the “Steel Curtain” defense, where he was a witness the “immaculate reception” in the 1972 playoffs.
He finished his career in New England. The injury that ended his playing days in 1975 was just another fork in the road. A foray into of farming led to local politics which led to leadership of the Oregon Forest Resources council.
The next fork in the road, led up a mountain. Actually, lots of mountains. Over the last 30 years, Craig has become an avid climber. Starting in the Cascades, he became obsessed with climbing the “Seven Summits”, the tallest mountain on each continent. That included a 2-month quest on Mt. Everest, the world’s highest.
That passion survived a scary fall into a mountain crevasse and a motorcycle accident in South America. His love of travel and adventure endured despite living with ALS, Lou Gehrig’s disease, for over a decade.
Three of those seven mountain summits came after that diagnosis, a tribute to his fitness, willpower, and confidence.
Craig Hanneman is a member of the Oregon State University Athletics Hall of Fame.