Chicago Lions RFC

In the Fall of 1964 the City of Chicago Rugby Football Club had been together for about a year by the time Dick Smith joined in the fall of 1964. William "Hawk" Walker, along with Mike Bansley, Peter Boland, Sandy Campbell, Terry Ellis, Pat Halperin (who still turned out for the Lions in 2002) and George Kearney, formed the initial team and were getting beating regularly by 40 to 50 points by rivals such as the University of Illinois and the University of Chicago.

Dick then initiated some major player recruitment in the spring of 1965 and established a tradition that would stay with the club to the present day—"interesting characters" such as John Bellino, David Blears, Mike Flahive, John Rood and Bill "Thunder" Thornton were all recruited and formed the core of what was to become the Chicago Lions. The club adopted the name Lions in recognition of the pair of "Colossal Lions" which now stand outside the Art Institute on Michigan Avenue. John Bellino played for The Chicago Spiders and the club had to fight to get the Lions name.

As a gesture of goodwill to any visiting team that the Lions play, they are presented with a bronze replica of one of the lions, the idea being that the second lion is given to that team when the club visits them in their home country. It can obviously work the other way when the Chicago Lions visit a team abroad for the first time. To date, there have been over 50 teams honored with this tradition including Northampton RFC of England, Wrexham RFC of Wales, Melrose RFC of Scotland, Greystones RFC and Ballina RFC of Eire, and Omagh Academicals of Northern Ireland in 2002.