A Familiar Face

In reflecting on their time at Williams, former student athletes who appeared in Sports Illustrated’s “Faces in the Crowd” often noted coaches or teammates who changed their lives. Record-setting wide receiver Darren Hartwell ’13 has a different take.

Playing football introduced him to Williams Sports Information Director Dick Quinn. When Hartwell was a sophomore, Quinn offered him a job writing about men’s hockey games for the sports information website. Quinn then helped him land an internship at ESPN that summer, covering Red Sox games in Boston. 

The experiences were “a springboard for my career in sports media,” says Hartwell, now managing editor for digital at NBC Sports Boston, who credits Quinn with helping him take the first steps.

Hartwell is just one of probably hundreds of students whose lives have been shaped by Quinn, known to most as DQ. A natural mentor, Quinn teaches scores of students who work for him in the Sports Info Office each year the ins and outs of broadcasting, writing and keeping statistics for varsity games. He also serves as a one-man career-placement service, helping students and alums find internships and jobs, and connecting them to his vast global network of contacts working in and around sports.

Quinn loves to regale people about Ephs’ successes. Whether on the field, in the classroom, during students’ internships or throughout their careers, he knows all the details. “Only at Williams,” he’ll say with a smile at the end of a story.

He grew up walking distance from campus and, with his wife, Kathy, still lives in a house that’s been in his family for 100 years. His mother, Helene, worked as a switchboard operator for the college, and he attended events and games on campus. After college, jobs in sports info and athletics, and a master’s degree in communication arts, he returned home to work part time, initially, as sports information director at Williams and as sports director for WNAW radio station in North Adams, Mass.

It’s Quinn who’s largely responsible for Williams racking up so many “Faces in the Crowd” mentions in Sports Illustrated. He was quick to recommend Williams student athletes for their achievements and even took part in a few local ceremonies where the magazine, in its heyday, gave out small silver cups to recipients.

He made another important Sports Illustrated connection in 1990, when he contacted writer Frank Deford to ask permission to name a new annual award to a promising Williams sportswriter in his honor.

“I knew that Deford’s favorite color was purple,” says Quinn, who has no qualms about picking up the phone and calling a perfect stranger—but not before doing his research. “And we both had daughters with cystic fibrosis.” 

The two men clicked, and the celebration of the Frank Deford Award—along with the Aaron Pinsky ’06 Student Broadcasting Award, created in 2009—became an annual draw for students and alumni alike. Deford, who received an honorary degree from Williams in 2016, often attended the ceremony.

Only at Williams.