At the peak of a 2025-26 Chicago Bears season that had fans thinking of a championship, John Damore dreamed of his “greatest goodbye” — that he might die soon after the Bears won the Super Bowl.
Mr. Damore — believed to be the oldest former Bears player since January 2025 — died Tuesday at home in Westmont. He was 92.
His dream didn’t come true for the Bears, eliminated by the Los Angeles Rams.
“There weren’t many people out there who didn’t just think he was the super-nicest guy,” Larry Damore said of his father. “He always had a crowd around him.”
Mr. Damore grew up in Riverside and remembered wearing a Bears jersey as a 9-year-old, long before he’d wear the team’s colors as an offensive lineman in 1957 and 1959.
An ankle injury prompted him to retire in 1959. But Mr. Damore’s love for the Bears only deepened. In an interview last year with the Chicago Sun-Times, he spoke of spending every game day on his bedroom recliner, with an unlit cigar in hand and his eyes glued to the Bears on TV.
“I don’t miss a minute,” he said. “And, if it plays twice, I watch it twice.”
Larry Damore said, as a kid, he wrestled and played football and baseball, with his father often coaching him but always there.
“He never missed a game,” he said. “He was always leading the cheers.”
John Bihun, a grandson, said he remembers a T-ball game at which Mr. Damore said he could “die a happy man” if he got to see him hit a home run.
Bihun said that, as he rounded third base after hitting the ball, his grandfather shouted, “I didn’t mean today, Lord!”
Mr. Damore, a Marine Corps veteran, formerly owned Damore Construction and Damore Builders in Riverside.
He is survived by his wife of 65 years, Joyce Damore, children Alison Bihun and Lawrence “Larry” Damore and grandchildren John Bihun and Ashley Bihun.
Visitation will be from 3 p.m. to 8 p.m. Aug. 19 at Conboy-Westchester Funeral Home in Westchester, with a service there at 10 a.m. Aug. 20. Both will be open to the public.
Contributing: Mary Norkol