Football Coaching Great Edelson Dies

Harry Edelson, football coach for 31 years at Jefferson, Fremont and Los Angeles high schools, died Saturday of Parkinson’s disease at 92.

Edelson’s Fremont teams won three consecutive City championships in 1948-50, and he had an overall record of 168-30-2.

Edelson also coached track at Jefferson, where he had seven league champions in 11 years, six City titlists and a state champion.

Edelson was a blocking back on USC’s “Thundering Herd” teams in 1927-29, and scored two touchdowns in the Trojans’ 47-14 rout of previously undefeated Pittsburgh in the 1930 Rose Bowl game.

Among well-known players coached by Edelson in high school were Woody Strode, Floyd Phillips, Jerry Perry, Ron Fletcher, Clint Whitfield, Bob Levingston and Joe Zeno.

Edelson is survived by his wife, Ruth, two sons, Bruce and Roger, two daughters by an earlier marriage, Lee and Sue, nine grandchildren and six great grandchildren. Services will be private.

The family plans to establish scholarships at Fremont and Los Angeles high schools in his name.