Although Greco-Roman wrestling had been contested in all but one Olympic Games since Pierre de Coubertin first revived the tradition in 1896, the USA did not field a Greco team until 1956. So when Dick Wilson walked onto the mat at 114.5 pounds and won his first match in Melbourne, Australia, he was making history not just for himself, but for his country.

One of the rare wrestlers who excelled in both freestyle and Greco-Roman, Wilson, who passed away in 2009 at the age of 75, won the Olympic Trials in Greco Roman in 1956, 1960 and 1964, and in freestyle in 1960. He finished seventh in Melbourne and returned to Greco-Roman Olympic competition two more times--in Rome in 1960 and Tokyo in 1964, where, as U.S. team captain, he finished fourth.

The Washington, Penn. native won the AAU National Championship in both freestyle and Greco in 1959 and 1961. He won a gold medal in freestyle at the 1959 Pan American Games, and wrestled both Greco-Roman and freestyle in the 1961 World Championships, finishing fifth in both disciplines while serving as team captain. He was a six-time National AAU champion, winning both the Greco-Roman and freestyle titles in1959 and 1961 and Greco-Roman titles in 1957 and 1958.

Wilson was a three-time NCAA runner-up and a three-time All-American for the University of Toledo from 1959-61, and did not lose a dual match while winning three consecutive Mid-American Conference Championships. He returned to the University of Toledo as head wrestling coach from 1967-74 and led the Rockets to the MAC championship in 1969 while three of his other teams finished as runners-up.

Making history again, Wilson served as a director and organizer of the group that helped found the World Cup of International Wrestling in Toledo in 1973, working with Joe Scalzo, who was inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame as a Distinguished Member in 1987, and Dick Torio, who received the Lifetime Achievement for Officials award from the National Wrestling Hall of Fame in 1996.

Wilson earned his bachelor’s, master’s and education specialist degrees from the University of Toledo where he was a member of the campus Blue Key Honor Society. Before returning to coach at his alma mater, he taught and coached at Rogers High School in Toledo and after leaving UT was a public school administrator until his retirement in 1993. He is a member of the University of Toledo’s Varsity T Hall of Fame, and the Ohio Wrestling Hall of Fame.

In honor of his pioneering spirit that paved the way for countless other American Greco-Roman wrestlers, and his outstanding achievements at home and abroad, Dick Wilson is honored as a Distinguished Member of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame.