Willie Lanier-Pro Football Hall of Fame-Family Dinners

Willie Lanier won Super Bowl IV with the Kansas City Chiefs in 1969. He was the first black middle linebacker in pro football history and was inducted in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1986. Willie and I had worked in the same office - we had talked a lot about sports, but I had never asked about his early years. So I called Willie to find out what his family did for dinner. He had 3 other brothers and sisters, so there were 6 at the dinner table at 6 pm. His Dad was almost as good a cook as his Mom- "He made the best hot rolls...umm..hot rolls and butter and the house smelled so good. My Mom's favorite meal was navy bean soup with ham. From a very age, we all sat down to eat. It was part of our culture...Ginny I hadn't thought about this in a while...there was a song by Guy Labardo and his Royal Canadians that came on TV every night (he hummed the tune for me) - even in high school, we had dinner together...didn't talk much about football, we just shared ...seems simple but family dinner can get confusing with people in motion...it mean't something more than you realized...just to have the smell of those rolls again...think of the young people today who have no idea how fresh-baked rolls smell." For Willie, dinner was more than mealtime.