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Gene Washington

Biography

Born January 14, 1947, in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Gene Alden Washington was raised in California and attended Long Beach Polytechnic High School in Long Beach, where he excelled as a multi-talented quarterback. He led the team to a league championship in 1964, earned Back of the Year honors, and was selected to the All-City team while also playing forward on the school's championship basketball team. In 1965, Washington was elected the fifty-year-old school's first black student body president, becoming an academic and athletic leader who was rated the number-one football recruit coming out of high school in Southern California.

Washington played three years of varsity football at Stanford University from 1966 to 1968, where he was one of only twenty-five black students in a population of 10,000. He became Stanford's first black quarterback, playing that position as a sophomore before moving to running back as a junior and wide receiver as a senior. As a senior in 1968, Washington led the Pacific Eight Conference with seventy-one receptions, 1,117 receiving yards, and eight touchdowns while earning All-American honors. He set Stanford career records for receptions with 122 and receiving yards with 1,785.

The San Francisco 49ers selected Washington with the sixteenth overall pick in the 1969 NFL Draft. Strengths included exceptional speed that made him a devastating deep threat, remarkable big-play ability evidenced by his career 17.8 yards-per-catch average, consistent touchdown production, and intelligent route-running that maximized his athletic gifts.

Washington's spectacular 1970 season saw him catch fifty-three passes for a league-leading 1,100 yards—averaging nearly twenty-one yards per reception—with twelve receiving touchdowns. He earned first-team All-Pro honors and his second consecutive Pro Bowl selection, helping the 49ers to a 10-3-1 record and their first playoff appearance in over a decade. In 1972, Washington again led the NFL with twelve touchdown receptions while averaging twenty yards per catch on forty-six receptions. During 1974, despite the 49ers starting four different quarterbacks, Washington led the league with a remarkable 21.2 yards-per-reception average.

Washington finished his career with 385 receptions for 6,856 yards and sixty touchdowns across ten NFL seasons. When he left the 49ers in 1977, he was the franchise's all-time leader in receiving yards, receptions, and touchdowns. He earned four Pro Bowl selections from 1969 to 1972 and three first-team All-Pro honors. Washington appeared in several films and television shows including: Black Gunn (1972), The Black Six (1974), Airport 1975 (1974), Lady Cocoa (1975), and episodes of Banacek (1972) and The Mod Squad (1972). He served as the NFL's director of football operations from 1994 to 2009.