Interference by Dan E. Moldea

known among sports figures in the Motor City. Former Detroit Lions star Dick “Night Train” Lane, who says that Dawson was a friend of his, told me, “Don is a good operator. He hung around gamblers all of his life, and that’s what he wanted to be. But he is a very likable guy and always fun to be around.”
    Dawson is the son of a wealthy and respected Detroit Chevrolet car dealer. When young Dawson was thirteen, he was the water boy for the Detroit Lions, then owned by gambler Dick Richards. Dawson began gambling at an early age and in high school earned his nickname, Dice, because of his crap-shooting abilities. He attended Holy Cross, through which he became acquainted with other alumni, including attorney Edward Bennett Williams who would later become president of the Washington Redskins. Dawson also was in the Marine Corps and served in the South Pacific during World War II.
    Upon his release from military service, Dawson went to work for his father, selling Chevrolets. He also started betting heavily on sporting events. During my interview with Dawson,he said, “I wasn’t an actual bookmaker. But I used to get the guys from the country club where I belonged in Detroit. They used to bet through a guy with me. I bankrolled it. I booked it all—but indirectly. I gave the booker twenty-five percent of what we won.”
    Dawson admitted to me that he did business with Lions quarterback Bobby Layne. “It was Bobby Layne who was the bettor, who I bet for,” Dawson says. “I knew him better than [I knew] my own brothers. And he did plenty. He’d be playing in his own game, and he’d be betting all over the board. He’d bet five, six, seven games on a Sunday.”
    Like Night Train Lane, quarterback Bobby Layne is a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He is viewed as being among the best pressure players ever to play the game of football. Layne was born in Santa Ana, Texas, and grew up in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. A graduate of Texas University, he played his first year in the NFL with the Chicago Bears and with the defunct New York Bulldogs, which was owned by singer Kate Smith, in his second. In 1950, he joined the Detroit Lions and led his team to three NFL championships.
    Layne was thought to have shaved points or participated in the fixing of several NFL games, according to several bookmakers and law-enforcement officials. One was the final game of the 1956 season in which the 9-2 Lions played the 8-2-1 Chicago Bears on December 16. Layne left the game in the second quarter supposedly with a concussion. The Bears won the game, 38-21, and the Western Division title.
    Lions receiver and 1955 Heisman Trophy winner Howard “Hopalong” Cassady told author Bernie Parrish of the Cleveland Browns that Layne “had faked his injury” during the 1956 Bears game. However, Parrish added that “other players discounted the story because of the enmity between Hoppy and Bobby Layne.” 2
    Don Dawson told me, “I wasn’t involved in that game. He [Layne] was then with a bookmaker in Odessa, Texas. Bobby was whacked pretty good in the 1956 Bears game. He really was. If he was doing anything, like betting against himself, the last thing he would’ve wanted to do was get injured. He would’ve wanted to continue in the game to control it. I would say that Bobby did not throw that particular game. It was not fixed.”
    However, Layne did fix games and shave points on other occasions. “I used to go down and play golf with Bobby in atournament and would stay at his house,” Dawson recalls. “Bobby was shaving, and he was doing all the betting. When I got to know Bobby, he blew the other guy [in Odessa] off. And then he started betting with me. He came to me. He bought a couple of cars from me when I first met him.” 3
    When I asked Dawson what the mechanics of the fixes were, Dawson replied, “Layne would come to me and