Former Southeast Missouri State football player, athletic director John Schneider dies

John Schneider was an integral part of Southeast Missouri State from the time he started playing football for the university in 1949 to his retirement in 1990.

"He did a lot of things for the school," said former Southeast director of athletics Marvin Rosengarten, who both played and coached football with Schneider at Southeast.

Schneider, an inaugural member of Southeast's Athletics Hall of Fame, died Wednesday in Cape Girardeau. He was 82.

Schneider was named to the Associated Press Little All-America team as an offensive end in 1955. He served as an assistant football coach then became the university's director of athletics and later was chairman of Southeast's department of physical education.

"He was an all-around athlete and a very good student," said Rosengarten, also a member of Southeast's first Hall of Fame class in 2002. "He was a great guy. We were close and so were our families."

Schneider, a St. Louis native, played football at Southeast in 1949 and 1950. He then spent four years in the Navy before finishing his Southeast football career in 1954 and 1955.

The 1955 squad that Schneider starred on, which went 9-0, was inducted into the Southeast Hall of Fame in 2003.

"He was one of the great players in Southeast history," said Ron Hines, the university's former longtime sports information director.

Schneider put in a plug for his former squad during his induction ceremony in 2002.

"Everybody thinks their team might have been the best, but I'm voting for the 1955 team, no matter what era it was," Schneider said in 2002.

Visitation will be 4 to 8 p.m. Sunday at Old St. Vincent's Catholic Church. The funeral will be at 10 a.m. Monday at the church.