Dick Hyland

Dick Hyland was a legendary figure whose life was bigger than the legend. He was a star in rugby football, playing from 1916-25, including at the 1924 Paris Olympics. Hyland went to those Games shortly after enrolling at Stanford but stayed in France and coached the Stade Français rugby squad, until his father told him to return to the States and get back to school.

At Stanford Hyland starred on the football, baseball, and track teams, playing halfback on the football team, where he was nicknamed “Tricky Dick” because of his open field running. In 1926 against Cal, on the first play from scrimmage, he raced 48 yards for a touchdown, which triggered Stanford to a 41-6 upset victory. He played in both the 1927 and 1928 Rose Bowl Games, and was elected to the Stanford Hall of Fame in 1961. Newspaper reports also had him running 100 yards in 9.9 on the track team.

After graduating Stanford, Hyland entered the movie business, serving as the technical director for the movie “The Drop Kick,” one of the first John Wayne movies. On that set he met the actress Adela Nora Rogers St. Johns, who would briefly become his first wife. Their son, Richard Rogers St. John later became President and CEO of film-making subsidiary of Guinness.

Hyland joined The Los Angeles Tribune in September 1928 as a sportswriter but had an itinerant life, despite writing a column for them for many years. In 1932 he started what became a well-known radio program in Los Angeles. He lived in Honolulu in the 1930s, where he met his second wife, Lou Lansburgh, another young starlet. He would repeat that pattern with wives three and four, with none of his marriages lasting more than a few years. Hyland had to leave the Hawaiian Islands somewhat urgently after being exposed for allegedly spying on Filipino workers on Maui for the Hawaiian Sugar Planters’ Association.

Hyland joined the US Marines in 1942 and served as a captain in World War II with the 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing, which contributed to major operations at Wake Island, Guadalcanal, Midway, Saipan, Tinian, Guam, and Okinawa. After the war, Hyland had some problems with alcoholism.