News-Info-Alerts

Re: Another Bataan Survivor Passes

From: POW-MIA InterNetwork

Date: January 03, 2003

"Former Cardinals FB Tonelli, Bataan survivor, dead at 86

SportsTicker
Jan. 8, 2003


TEMPE, Arizona (Ticker) - Former Chicago Cardinals fullback Mario "Motts" Tonelli, who emerged from the Bataan Death March weighing 90 pounds but returned to the NFL, died Tuesday of a parasitic infection contracted during World War II. He was 86.

A 215-pound rookie with the Cardinals in 1940, Tonelli was drafted into the U.S. Army the following year. Taken prisoner in March 1942, he was one of 76,000 soldiers forced on a seven-day, 70-mile march without food or water.

Tonelli was imprisoned for 42 months and weighed 90 pounds when freed in 1945. He was treated for malaria, dysentery, scurvy and beriberi at hospitals in Okinawa, the Philippines and Chicago.

In Chicago, Tonelli was offered a contract by Cardinals owner Charles Bidwill and dressed for the final four games of the 1945 season while weighing 140 pounds.

His playing career ended the following year with the Chicago Rockets of the fledgling American Football League, but Tonelli was presented with the Gene Autry Courage Award in 1986. He was elected to the National Italian American Sports Hall of Fame last year.

"He was a true American hero," Cardinals owner William V. Bidwill said. "


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