George Dickson

George Charles Dickson Jr. (September 27, 1921 – November 25, 2020) was an American gridiron football player and coach was the head coach of the Hamilton Tiger-Cats of the Canadian Football League (CFL) for the first two games of the 1976 season.

Early life
Dickson was born in September 1921 in Boston, Massachusetts and grew up in South Pasadena, California. He was a star quarterback at South Pasadena High School and in 1940 joined the Notre Dame Fighting Irish football team.

Military
After his freshman season, Dickson enlisted as a paratrooper. He saw extensive action during the war, including combat in Normandy on D-Day. Following the fighting in Normandy, Sgt. Dickson and his unit moved to the Ardennes. There, they were battered by constant bombing by German artillery during the Battle of the Bulge.

He returned to Notre Dame in 1946, but dropped out in order to work full-time. He returned to Notre Dame again in 1948 and spent his final two seasons of eligibility as a reserve quarterback behind Frank Tripucka and Bob Williams.

Sgt. George Dickson received the Admiral Thomas J. Hamilton Award from the All-American Football Foundation in 2006.

Coaching career
Dickson began his coaching career in 1952 as an assistant at NYU. The football program was disbanded after his first season there and after spending the 1953 season as an assistant at Mount Carmel High School in Chicago, Dickson rejoined his NYU boss Hugh Devore at Dayton. Dickson's time at Dayton was short-lived as one month later he left Dayton to become the backfield coach at his alma mater, Notre Dame. After only one season, Dickson left Notre Dame and returned to Dayton.

After stints at Marquette, USC, Pacific, and Tulane, Dickson joined the pro ranks as an assistant with the Oakland Raiders of the American Football League. He returned to college football in 1962 as an assistant at Oklahoma.

In 1976, Dickson received his first head coaching position when he was hired by the CFL's Hamilton Tiger-Cats. After the Tiger-Cats lost all four of their preseason games and their first two regular season games under Dickson, General Manager Bob Shaw fired him and succeeded him as head coach.

After his firing, Dickson served as an assistant coach at San Bernardino Valley College. He returned to the NFL in 1978 as the Washington Redskins' offensive backfield coach.

Dickson died in California in November 2020 at the age of 99.