Inductees

The call came in on a Thursday night of the 1964 high school football season, with the voice on the other end of the line asking if he could fill in the next night on an officiating crew.

Having never worked a varsity high school football game, Emry Dilday agreed under understandable assumptions.

“I figured they would send me out to some small town, let me get my feet wet. But I got Springfield Central and Muskogee High School out of Oklahoma – and at Kennedy Stadium,” Dilday said, laughing. “I don’t remember much about it because I was scared to death.”

Still, that game kick-started a football officiating career that spanned 43 seasons through 2007, with his work – and the respect he gained from state and national organizations as well as coaches themselves – worthy of induction into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame with the Class of 2019.

His career encompassed more than 1,500 football games. That covered almost every conference and every team in southwest Missouri and primarily five collegiate conferences. Dilday officiated roughly 60 games in the football playoffs of the Missouri State High School Activities Association, including nine state championship games.

Additionally, he has been a football rules interpreter for MSHSAA since 1982 and was a charter member of the Officials Association of the National Federation of High Schools Associations, serving as its president in 1999-2000. In fact, Dilday remains active in the National Federation, chairing the Football Manual Committee that consists of only seven others from across the country.

He worked not only varsity but also junior varsity and middle school games. Ninety percent of his varsity games were as the referee.

In other words, he’s a pro’s pro.

“You’ve got to realize that that game is the most important game that those kids have ever played – whether it be a middle school game or college game,” Dilday said, later adding, “I know it’s not always glamorous, and there have been many Tuesday nights where you’d like to stay home by the fire. But you make the most of it.”

A graduate of Parkview High School and Drury University, Dilday was a college student when he began officiating intramurals at Central High School.

“We got paid $12 a game in cash, and three games a night two nights a week,” Dilday said. “You can imagine what $72 a week meant to a college kid.”

And after that 1964 game?

“From the get-go,” Dilday said, “I couldn’t get enough of it.”

His success is based not simply on memorizing the 10-section, 90-page rule book. He credits Bill Rowe (Missouri Sports Legend), Kent Henry, Cliff Holdren and many other officials for mentoring him for years.

Plus, as Dilday explained, it’s also about working hard at the mechanics of being a referee, of developing good people skills in order to communicate with coaches and treating them with respect.

“And when you make a mistake, you man right up and vow never to make it again,” Dilday said. “If they chew on you, you’ve got to accept it.”

For years, his crew consisted of Bill Rainey, Larry Stineburg, Ron Snodgrass, Craig Kelley, Dave Sturdivant and Guy Weiland.

Dilday was a heads linesman in charge of the chain crew in that 1964 game and held other roles for years, such as line judge and umpire before ultimately holding the prestigious role of referee – the one wearing the white hat – for 41 years in high schools, 25 in college football.

And because he also worked college games, he had to know two different sets of penalty enforcements. His college coverage includes NCAA Division II, NAIA and juco football. And, as college football added a back judge, field judge, side judge and center judge, Dilday had to know their roles, too.

He also has been the Executive Director and Game Assignment Manager for the Southwest Missouri Officials Association since 1971. So it’s no wonder that he was recommended for the National Federation roles.

“I feel pretty honored that my picture is in the manual as the chairman of that committee,” Dilday said.

Dilday has been inducted into the NFHSA and Springfield Area Sports halls of fame and received the 2005 Irwin A. Keller Award from MSHSAA.

Dilday, now in his 38^th year as a track & field and cross country official, said his wife Betty and their children Bill, Missy and Bob made the longevity of his career possible.

“You couldn’t do what we do if you didn’t have that support of your family,” Dilday said.