He founded the Rams along with player-coach Damon "Buzz" Wetzel (who was an AlI-America back from Ohio State who had played for the Chicago Bears) in 1936, when it played one successful yet financially disastrous year in the American Football League, then acquired a National Football League franchise for the team on February 13, 1937.
We invited Bill Reynolds, Dave Inglis, Bob Gries, Dean Francis, John F. Patt, Burke Paterson and a few others, all prominent Clevelanders.
They agreed it should be a short name, ‘One that would easily fit into a headline,’ they said.“Fordham was a big football school at the time and its nickname was the Rams.
In June 1941, Marshman and his partners sold the Rams to grocery magnate Daniel Reeves and Frederick Levy Jr. for about $100,000.
In January 1946, after the team finally was successful on the field and just had won the 1945 NFL Championship, Reeves, a New York City native, moved the Rams to Los Angeles.
This marked the second time Marshman, unintentionally, helped to facilitate out-of-town ownership of a Cleveland NFL team that ultimately left the region.
Married twice, first to Beatrice Noyes and then Ina Mae, he was survived by his two sons, Edward and Homer Jr., and one daughter, Jane Guthrie.