Edwin “Tip” Whitehead – Faculty

Edwin Whitehead was born on April 28, 1908, in Goldfield, Nevada. He attended the University of Nevada, Renno from 1925 to 1929. He played guard for the UNR basketball team and quarterback for the football team. In 1929, Tip was on the airplane to Los Angeles with the UNR football team when they became the first college team ever to fly to a game. After Mr. Whitehead graduated from the university, he began his coaching career at Fernley High School. He continued to coach there for seven years. Then, in 1938, Whitehead moved to Sparks where he coached football, basketball, and track at Sparks High School for eleven years. He is widely known as the greatest football coach in the history of Sparks High. Tip retains the record for most wins, including four state football championships in 1940, 1941, 1945, and 1948. He also coached a state championship basketball team. Tip and Reno’s Herb Foster epitomized the fierce Reno-Sparks rivalry. The intensity of his contempt for Reno was with him until the day he died. Edwin Whitehead also was a teacher and vice principal. He later served as principal at SHS for ten years. As principal, his trademark was his high-top tennis shoes, which he wore with his business suits as he patrolled the halls and visited the classrooms at SHS. Tip retired from Sparks High School in 1970 after a forty-year career.

In 1977, he was inducted into the Wolf Pack Hall of Fame, and in 1997, Whitehead was inducted into the NIAA Hall of Fame for his accomplishments at SHS. Moreover, the football field at Sparks High has been named the Tip Whitehead Field in honor of this great man. Tip got his nickname from an old WWI song called “It’s A Long Way to Tipperary.” As a kid, Whitehead would always whistle or sing this song, so an old judge in Sparks began calling him “Tipperary,” which quickly shortened to “Tip.”

Inducted 2002