Bob Breitbard: San Diego's Sports Keeper

About the Book

Bob Breitbard: San Diego’s Sports Keeper, chronicles the life and accomplishments of a visionary sportsman and great San Diego icons. An all-star in San Diego’s sports lineup for more than half a century, Breitbard was involved in the local sports scene as a player, coach, team owner, builder, booster and benefactor of institutions and organizations that helped make San Diego a major-league city. Breitbard followed his football playing and coaching days at Hoover High School and San Diego State College by becoming the guardian and promoter of the city’s sports scene. In 1946, he founded the Breitbard Athletic Association to honor local high school, amateur and professional athletes, and later established the Breitbard Hall of Fame. The Foundation developed into the San Diego Hall of Champions, which today is the nation’s largest multi-sport museum and a shrine to honor local high school, amateur and professional sports stars- hometown heroes of the past, present and future. Breitbard was the driving force behind the building of the San Diego Sports Arena and the owner of its original tenant, the Gulls of the Western Hockey League, and the expansion NBA Rockets. Breitbard was also one of the founding members of the Greater San Diego Sports Association, a group that helped build San Diego Stadium, bring the Chargers and major-league Padres to town, establish and support the Holiday Bowl and other first-class sports events and facilities. Much more than just a uniquely dedicated caretaker of San Diego’s sports, the kind and generous Breitbard was a local treasure that helped make San Diego the wonderful city it is today.

About the Author

Dan Fulop served as curator of the San Diego Hall of Champions from 2005-2007, and it was during this time that he got the chance to know Bob Breitbard, the museum's founder. While working on his graduate thesis at the University of San Diego, Fulop discovered no substantial written work existed about Mr. Breadboard’s lifelong accomplishments and contributions to San Diego's history. Fulop decided to write his graduate thesis on the life of Breitbard and his wide reaching impact on San Diego sports, a project which evolved into this book. Today Fulop resides in Rockville, Maryland, with his wife Stephanie and black pointer-lab Mia. He has earned degrees in history from the University of Maryland and University of San Diego, and is an amateur pro-football historian.