Joseph "Dandy" Don Meredith

 Joseph "Dandy" Don Meredith (April 10, 1938 – December 5, 2010)

Meredith was a football player, sports commentator, and actor who played quarterback for nine seasons with the Dallas Cowboys of the National Football League (NFL). He played college football for the SMU Mustangs, and was selected by the Cowboys 32nd overall in the 1960 NFL Draft. Under the mentorship of head coach Tom Landry, Meredith led the Cowboys to three-straight postseason appearances from the 1966 to 1968 seasons, including back-to-back NFL Championship Game appearances in the 1966 and 1967 seasons. He was selected a second-team All-Pro in 1966 and made three-straight Pro Bowls from 1966 to 1968. Meredith was named to the Pro Bowl in each of his last three years as a player. He subsequently became a color analyst for NFL telecasts from 1970 to 1984. As an original member of the Monday Night Football broadcast team, alongside Howard Cosell. Meredith was also an actor who appeared in a dozen films and seven major television shows, some of which had him as the main starring actor. He is probably familiar to television audiences as Bert Jameson, a recurring role he had in Police Story.

Meredith was married three times. His first wife was former SMU cheerleader Lynne Shamburger; they were married from 1959 to 1963 and had one daughter, Mary. From 1965 to 1971, he was married to the former Cheryl King, with whom he had son Michael and daughter Heather. He met his third wife, the former Susan Lessons Dullea, as they were both walking on Third Avenue in New York City. They married in 1972. Meredith died on December 5, 2010, at St. Vincent Regional Medical Center in Santa Fe, New Mexico, after suffering a brain hemorrhage. He was 72 years old. Meredith is buried at Mount Vernon Cemetery in Mount Vernon, Texas.