LOMBARDI, VINCE

born June 11, 1913, Brooklyn, N.Y., U.S. died Sept. 3, 1970, Washington, D.C. byname of Vincent Thomas Lombardi coach in American professional football who became a national symbol of single-minded determination to win. In nine seasons (195967) as head coach of the previously moribund Green Bay Packers, he led the team to five championships of the National Football League (NFL) and, in the last two seasons, to victory in the first two Super Bowl games against the American Football League titleholder. At Fordham University, New York City, Lombardi was one of the group of linemen known as the Seven Blocks of Granite. After completing his undergraduate education (1937), he studied law at Fordham, briefly played minor-league professional football, and then (1939) entered high-school football coaching. Afterward he served as an assistant coach at Fordham (194748), at the United States Military Academy, West Point, N.Y. (194953), and with the New York Giants of the NFL (195458). Hired as head coach and general manager of the Packers in February 1959, Lombardi imposed an unusually strenuous regimen (some critics described it as Spartan or fanatical) on his players, most of whom had been accustomed to defeat. In his second year Green Bay led the Western Conference of the NFL. Subsequently the Packers won the league championship in 196162 and 196567 and defeated Kansas City and then Oakland in the Super Bowl games following the 1966 and 1967 seasons. Retiring as coach, Lombardi served the Packers in 1968 as general manager. He then went to the Washington Redskins of the NFL as head coach, general manager, and part owner, and in 1969 he led the team to its first winning season in 14 years. He died of cancer shortly before the 1970 season.