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Former FHS Football Coach, Athletic Director, Patrick Dolan Dies At 82

Former FHS football coach and athletic director Patrick Dolan died Oct 24 at the age of 82. Photo: Mather Hodge Funeral Home.

Patrick Dolan, the long-time Franklin High School football coach and athletic director, died Oct. 24 at the age of 82.

Dolan lived in Arden Courts of Yardley, Pa. at the time of his death.

In his 10 years as the FHS football Warriors head coach, from 1962 to 1972, Dolan amassed a record of 27 wins, 58 losses and five ties. He led the Warriors to the Somerset County League Championship in the 1968-69 season, when the Warriors recorded a 4-4-1 record.

Following his decade as football coach, Dolan became the high school’s athletic director, a position he held until his retirement in 1992.

Dolan also was a teacher and department head at Franklin High School, and coached several other sports, according to his obituary.

Dolan was born in Peckville, Pa. on March 15, 1935. The family later moved to Scranton, Pa., where Dolan attended Scranton Technical High School, excelling in basketball and football.

Dolan played football for the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, In., earning a football monogram.

Dolan was part of the 1957 Notre Dame team that snapped the University of Oklahoma Sooners’ 47-game winning streak. He talked about that game in an 2012 interview.

Dolan began his coaching career after college at St. Mary’s High School in Mount Clemens, Mich. He later moved his family to Bound Brook and, then, South River.

Dolan also served as a part-time football coach at Rutgers University-New Brunswick in the early 1970s.

After he retied from the Franklin school district, Dolan and his wife, Kathryn, moved to West Windsor. Dolan moved to Yardley after the death of his wife.

Dolan’s death was mourned on Facebook by some of his former students.

“So sad. I worked in his office and he was wonderful,” wrote Michele Pretot Rupp.

“RIP Coach Dolan,” wrote Robert Edmond. “It was my life’s mission to win an award named in his honor. ALL THE WAY TO HEAVEN Coach Dolan.”

“Such a Great Teacher and Coach,” wrote Lydia Santayana-Copperthwaite. “A Warrior for life. Prayers and thoughts to the family.”

Dolan was pre-deceased by his wife, Katie; his parents, John and Mary (Walsh) Dolan; his brothers, Paul Dolan, John “Jackie” Dolan, Joe Dolan, and, Tom Coyle; his sisters, Eleanor Abrams, and, Jeanne McGlynn; and, numerous brothers- and sisters-in-law and four nephews.

He is survived by his daughter, Erin Anne Dolan, and her husband, Christopher Paladino and their children, Connor Patrick Dolan Paladino, Mary Fiona Dolan Paladino and Faelen Anne Dolan Paladino; his sister, Mary de Sales Walsh; his sister-in-law, Doris Krayer; and, countless nieces, teammates, nephews, friends, neighbors, students, athletes and friends at Arden Courts, according to his obituary.

A Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated at 1:30 p.m. Oct. 28  at Saint David the King Church, 1 Village Road West, Princeton Junction. Visitation will be held from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. at the church.

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to “The Boler-Parseghian Center for Rare and Neglected Diseases in memory of Patrick E. Dolan, Class of 1958” online at giving.nd.edu, by phone at (574) 631-5150, or by mail: University of Notre Dame, Department of Development, 1100 Grace Hall, Notre Dame, IN 46556.

 

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