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W. K. Hicks

player of American football

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
People and ideasInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJun 29, 2026
Entity authorityQ7945758 ↗
Source-derived summary

Wilmer Kenzie " W. K." Hicks Jr. (July 14, 1942 – May 8, 2020) was an American professional football player who was a defensive back for the American Football League (AFL)'s Houston Oilers (1964–1969), and for the National Football League (NFL)'s New York Jets (1970–1972). In 1965, Hicks led the AFL in interceptions (9) and was named second-team All-AFL. He was selected to play in the AFL All-Star Game the following season. Before his professional career, Hicks played college football for the Texas Southern Tigers. As a senior in 1963, he was named a first-team NAIA All-American and first team All-Southwestern Athletic Conference at defensive back.

Early life

Hicks was born on July 14, 1942, in Texarkana, Texas, to Jodye and Wilmer Kenzie Hicks Sr. Hicks's father had played college football at halfback for Texas College in Tyler, Texas. Hicks attended Dunbar High School in Texarkana. He was captain of the football, basketball and track and field teams at Dunbar. He was an all-star linebacker on the football team.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “W. K. Hicks” is player of American football. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Hicks, player and American, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewStrongest as a route into the people, institutions and dated events that shaped the subject’s public record. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1942, 2020, 1964, 1969—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1942-07-14. For this dossier, Hicks, player and American is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “player of American football” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 29, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7945758. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1942, 2020, 1964 and 1969.

Critical limits

A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “W. K. Hicks”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow W. K. Hicks primary sources, W. K. Hicks archive and Hicks research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “W. K. Hicks”?
  2. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
  3. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
Subject index

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “W. K. Hicks” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.