TRIBUTE: Don Dixon (October 1, 1947 – June 30, 2024) – much loved, never forgotten

Bangor-area football has been in mourning over the loss of one of its favourite sons.

Former Bangor City player and reserve team manager Don Dixon passed away recently, aged 76.

Adoring husband of Menai, loving father of Susan, Darren, Nicola, football brothers Paul and Lee, fond brother of Bryan and the late Gwenda, proud grandad and great-grandad, Don will be missed greatly by all who knew him.

The Dixon family have provided this heartfelt tribute to a widely respected figure in North Wales football.

Donal Dixon – Life Story

It’s 1947 and the healthcare firm BUPA is launched in the United Kingdom, it is also the year that work began to develop Britain’s independent nuclear bomb.

Now memorable though these things may be, they are nothing compared to the birth of a beautiful bouncing baby boy, Master Donal Dixon in St David’s Hospital in Bangor in beautiful North Wales.

Mum and dad, Annie and Donal John George, already had their first-born Bryan and Gwenda – Don would follow in due course.

Home for the Dixon family back then was Hirael in Bangor, down by the port. This was more than apt as Don’s dad (Don Sibol’s boy) was a sea captain and was away from home for sometimes months at a time.

Don’s educational years were completed at Central School in the town and as an extremely good football player, he was soon spotted and whisked off to Blackpool to be an apprentice at the Tangerines, Blackpool FC.

It was here that he trained and played alongside the one and only Alan Ball, the youngest player in England’s World Cup winning team back in 1966. Unfortunately, Don didn’t make it in the game as Ball did.

Returning to his mum’s house in Bangor, Don knew he would need to do something to bring the cash in and so he became an apprentice brickie. This was a move that would see Don well for the rest of his life.

Although Don didn’t make it professionally in football, he still had a great love of the game and over the next few years he was more than keen to be a great player representing several local teams in the area, Bangor Athletic, Llechid Celts, Beaumaris Town, Menai Bridge and Bangor City FC.

Come the mid 60’s and children start to make an appearance into Donal’s life with Susan, Darren and Nichola all now being a huge part of his life.

Still living in Bangor, Donal continues to work hard in life, building his skills and reputation as a first class builder.

He continued to live his life around football and his kids and in the late 70’s, Paul and Lee became part of Don’s life also.

The usual drama of family life continues for everyone, but unfortunately Don now had to give up playing football because of ongoing cartilage problems.

It was a decision Don regretted forever but there was nothing he could do about it; his knees could not take the pace any more.

A sideways move for Don, ensuring he was still involved in the game, saw him become manager of Bangor City Reserves.

He was promoted to caretaker manager of Bangor City 1st team for one game. Don, to this day, was still very proud to have a 100% winning record.

Paul and Lee were now also playing for Maes Y Bryn where you would see Don chauffeuring the teams around in the minibus.

Lee, inspired by his dad, became manager of Llangefni Town and later Caernarfon Town. winning league titles and several other trophies with both. Don was very proud and followed the teams everywhere.

Don was literally a workaholic, he was always out in the truck, either pricing a job up or on the site. It wasn’t that Don needed to chase the money constantly, the work quite happily came to him. He was well known and well regarded, and his skills were not so much on the tools now but more as a site manager.

Paul was now qualified at 19 years old and Lee also followed in his footsteps, making it a family business that Don was very proud of. He had a really laid-back attitude to almost everything and he had the patience of a saint – and with some of the lads he needed it too!

Don’s children had married and he had gained 2 sons in law and 3 daughters in law. He was the proud grandad of 12 and also a great grandad known as ‘grandad seaside’ to his great grandchildren.

A man’s man was what Don was and he loved nothing more than a pint or three in the pub after a hard day’s graft, especially after a busy week on a Friday afternoon.

Typically, Don would be down at The Union where they were always swapping stories, and the banter was going round and round. Proper times in a proper boozer, remembered by many.

Now Don knew Menai from many moons ago but 12 years ago after picking up again, they moved in together and became a fabulous couple.

Early 2017, while on holiday in Benidorm, Don reached into his pocket and out of the blue dropped an engagement ring on the table in front of Menai. Typical Don, pulling all the stops out to be very romantic.

Well that’s it, they are officially together and looking forward and loving life together.

In September of 2017, there was a surprise 70th birthday bash for Don with loads of his family and friends attending. I say a surprise, well it wasn’t really a surprise for Don, he knew all about it. The real surprise was for everyone else during the evening. Halfway through the night, the music stopped and there was a huge announcement, that Don and Menai were now already officially Mr and Mrs Dixon. They had both sneaked off together 2 weeks before and secretly got married.

As well as working at ‘work’, Don was also grafting at home too. He had set about making various alterations and extensions to his and Menai’s home too.

Late nights, evenings and weekends saw him transform their bungalow into an absolute Tardis, where you walk in the front door, and it just simply gets bigger and bigger. It was during these ‘works’ that poor Menai was aching all over, in places she didn’t know she could ache, as she too was shifting blocks, and bags of sand and cement all over the place.

During Covid, Menai had many plans and designs for the garden, and this was just the time to do it. Under Menai’s watchful eye, Don totally transformed the garden into a beautiful new easy to manage outside space that makes full use of the sun, whenever we have it that is!

The family also had a new 3rd member by now, Benjy the Cockapoo, who was an instant hit with Don. His older Dalmatian, Sam, had passed by now and Don was back in love again with the four-legged little friend.

Over the years Don was a really happy go lucky gent, so many people’s friend and he was always a font of knowledge that wanted to do things their way too. But there were a couple of things that Don really disliked.

One of them was paying the wages out on a Friday, he hated being parted from his money, especially when it was so hard-earned. Somewhere in the middle comes Manchester United too, but he bloody hated the rain, it was something that would really grind his gears. Firstly, because he couldn’t work and secondly, he loved the sun.

Don was one of those guys that only needed to peep out of the door on a sunny day and he went a couple of shades darker, I’m not saying he was vain, but he loved his tan, and he always seemed to keep it too, months after a holiday Don was still a decent colour.

Don and Menai had some favourite places for holidays, they had visited Greece, Portugal and of course Benidorm too, but their heaven on earth was Palma Nova in Majorca, Spain.

It just seemed to have everything to offer that he and Menai wanted, a chilled place to relax in, a couple of cold beers and time spent on his own with Menai.

Football was Don’s sport without a doubt, but he tried golf too. He bought all the gear, the trousers, the shirts, the right clubs and putters, but it just didn’t work for him I’m afraid. It’s now all sat in the garage at home, if anyone would care to make Menai an offer?

Every day was a good day for Don. He would start the day off with Menai at home and then it was off to the shop for his Daily Post. Next stop was at the builder’s merchants where he would pick up materials and catch up with the lads.

Over 17 years ago Don found out that he had prostate cancer, and treatment as it was then, a month of radiotherapy, was that it could never be cured, but could be managed on a day-to-day basis.

Don was more than happy with this, there was little if anything it prevented him from doing and in essence if he kept his head down and his eye on his levels then all would be good for the foreseeable future. Don continued to work during his treatment

However in the last two years his health deteriorated necessitating several visits to Ysbyty Gwynedd, until finally on the 30th of June, after seeing all his family, a few hours later Don quietly and peacefully closed his eyes for the last time.

A service to celebrate Don’s life was held on Wednesday, 17th July, 2024 at Bangor Crematorium.

RIP great man – forever missed, never forgotten.

Don’s Football Career

Played for the following:

Menai Bridge Youth FC
Bangor City FC
Llechid Celts FC
Beaumaris Town FC
Bangor Athletic FC
Blackpool FC (in his younger days)

Manager for:

Beaumaris Town
Bangor Athletic
Bangor City Reserves