Obituaries : Chester Dolley; Quarterback of USC’s First Rose Bowl Team

Chester Dolley, quarterback of the first USC football team to ever play in the Rose Bowl, died Friday from an aneurysm. He was 87. Dolley helped lead the Trojans to a 14-3 victory over the Penn State Nittany Lions on Jan. 1, 1923, even though he was suffering from an injured knee. The Times reported then that Dolley “stepped into the ranks, and handled the team in a high-class manner without complaint, although every step spelled pain.”

Dolley told a biographer that “there must have been 60,000 people in the stadium, everyone of them hollering.”

He was named team captain the next season. He graduated from USC Law School, where he was student body president, in 1926 and was a practicing attorney until he founded Atlantic Oil Co. in 1933.

Atlantic is a Glendale-based oil and gas production company with 13 rigs scattered through the San Joaquin and Sacramento valleys. Dolley was president at his death.

Family members said Dolley, who was born in Long Beach, was a rugged and tough-minded man. He journeyed to Africa on 13 occasions for safaris, and his homes in Baldwin Hills and Palm Springs are decorated with his trophies.

Even though he was an avid hunter, Dolley was an active member of Ducks Unlimited, a conservation group founded to perpetuate water fowl. He also belonged to Sigma Chi fraternity and the California Club.

Services will be held Thursday at 11 a.m. at Dilday-Mottells Mortuary in Long Beach.

The family asks that contributions be sent to Ducks Unlimited in Chicago or the Long Beach YMCA, where Dolley used to practice sports.

He is survived by his wife, sister, brother, son and three grandchildren.