Football Official and Sporting Good Businessman
After retiring from professional football, Goebel worked in his sporting good business in Grand Rapids, and also worked during football season as a game official for the Big Ten Conference. For 16 years between 1935 to 1952, he was a Big Ten football official. He also officiated in Rose Bowl, Notre Dame, and Army-Navy games.
Goebel played a role in a famous Ohio State-Illinois game on November 13, 1943. The game was Paul Brown's last game as coach of the Buckeyes. With the score tied 26-26, Ohio State threw an incomplete forward pass into the end zone as the gun sounded. The game appeared to have ended in a tie, the teams left the field, and the stands emptied. However, Ohio State assistant coach Ernie Godfrey had noticed Goebel, who was the head linesman, drop a handkerchief to signal a penalty. On hearing the gun sound, Goebel had picked up the handkerchief and put it back in his back pocket. Godfrey confronted Goebel, who conceded that Illinois was offsides. Twenty minutes later, the teams came back onto the field and the Buckeyes kicked a 33-yard field goal to give Coach Brown a 29-26 win in his final game.
During World War II, Goebel served in the U.S. Navy as Lieutenant Commander on an aircraft carrier. His final game as an official was the 1952 Rose Bowl between Illinois and Stanford, in which he was the head linesman.
Goebel was also a fisherman, winning the title of Trout King at the National Trout Festival in 1949.
Read more about this topic: Paul G. Goebel
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