William Patrick "Hiker" Joy ( – September 13, 1969) was an

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

player and coach. He served as the head football coach at Boston College from 1912 to 1913 and at Canisius College from 1933 to 1938, compiling a career college football record of 32–24–5.

Early life

Joy was born in

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

and attended

South Boston High School South Boston High School was a public high school located in South Boston, Massachusetts, United States. It was part of Boston Public Schools. The school closed in 2003, and its former facility is currently occupied by Excel High School (Massach ...

. He was a member of the school's football, track, and basketball teams. He went on to attend the College of the Holy Cross, where he was a member of the member of the varsity relay team for four years and was captain of the

Holy Cross Crusaders football The Holy Cross Crusaders football team is the collegiate American football program of the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts. The team is a member of the Patriot League, an NCAA Division I conference that participates in the F ...

and

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...

teams during his senior year.

Coaching career

Joy was hired as Boston College's head coach months after graduating college. In his second season as head coach, he led BC to their first winning season of the 20th century. On December 14, 1914, Joy was named faculty coach at Hyde Park High School in

Hyde Park, Massachusetts Hyde Park is the southernmost neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts, United States. Situated 7.9 miles south of downtown Boston, it is home to a diverse range of people, housing types and social groups. It is an urban location with suburban chara ...

. He left Hyde Park following the outbreak of

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

to join the

United States Army Air Service The United States Army Air Service (USAAS)Craven and Cate Vol. 1, p. 9 (also known as the ''"Air Service"'', ''"U.S. Air Service"'' and before its legislative establishment in 1920, the ''"Air Service, United States Army"'') was the aerial war ...

. After the war, Joy scouted for the

Princeton Tigers football The Princeton Tigers football program represents Princeton University and competes at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) level as a member of the Ivy League. Princeton's footba ...

team. He returned to Boston College in 1921 as an assistant to Frank Cavanaugh. When Cavanaugh left BC in 1927, Joy followed him to Fordham where he remained as an assistant until 1932. From 1933 to 1938, Joy was the head coach at Canisius College.

Later life

In 1939, Joy retired from sports and returned to Massachusetts, where he worked as an insurance broker and was a trustee of the

Boston Elevated Railway The Boston Elevated Railway (BERy) was a streetcar and rapid transit railroad operated on, above, and below, the streets of Boston, Massachusetts and surrounding communities. Founded in 1894, it eventually acquired the West End Street Rai ...

. Joy was appointed to the Boston Elevated Railway trusteeship by Governor

Charles F. Hurley Charles Francis Hurley (November 24, 1893 – March 24, 1946) was an American attorney and the 54th Governor of the U.S. state of Massachusetts and one of its first Irish-American governors. Early years Charles Francis Hurley was born in Cambr ...

, who had played football at Boston College while Joy was an assistant coach there. In 1943,

RKO Radio Pictures RKO Radio Pictures Inc., commonly known as RKO Pictures or simply RKO, was an American film production and distribution company, one of the "Big Five" film studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orph ...

hired Joy as a technical advisor for football sequences in ''

The Iron Major ''The Iron Major'' is a 1943 American biographical film about the famed college football coach and World War I hero, Frank Cavanaugh. Directed by Ray Enright, the screenplay was written by Aben Kandel and Warren Duff, based on Florence E. Cava ...

'', a biographical film about Frank Cavanaugh. Joy died on September 13, 1969, at his home in

Milton, Massachusetts Milton is a town in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States and an affluent suburb of Boston. The population was 28,630 at the 2020 census. Milton is the birthplace of former U.S. President George H. W. Bush, and architect Buckminster Fuller. ...

. He was 81 years old.

Head coaching record

College

References

Year of birth uncertain 1880s births 1969 deaths American football ends American men's basketball players Boston College Eagles football coaches Canisius Golden Griffins football coaches Fordham Rams football coaches Holy Cross Crusaders football players Holy Cross Crusaders men's basketball players High school football coaches in Massachusetts South Boston High School alumni {{1910s-collegefootball-coach-stub