Larry Wansley wasn’t sure what he was getting himself into in the spring of 1983.
He arrived for a job interview with the Dallas Cowboys wearing a black three-piece suit, armed with a résumé and confidence. Wansley worked as an undercover agent for the FBI, handling numerous high-profile cases from the kidnapping of publishing heiress Patty Hearst by the Symbionese Liberation Army, the killing of San Antonio federal judge John Wood and the arrest of corrupt Longview, Texas sheriff Tom Welch. He was also a former police officer in Compton, Calif., becoming just the sixth African-American hired by the force in 1965. The summer he was hired, riots erupted in the Watts community. The rookie cop learned on the job and did it quickly.
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His credentials in law enforcement were respected by his peers. He had basically seen and accomplished everything.

The FBI asked Wansley if he would move from its Dallas office to Monterey, Calif., and learn Arabic as part of a new undercover assignment. Wansley wasn’t feeling it. He was excited about learning a new language but the lure of moving again didn’t sit well with him.
The NFL reached out, seeking a person to handle something for the Cowboys. Wansley didn’t know what the job entailed, but he drove to Dallas’ affluent Highland Park neighborhood for a meeting at the house of Cowboys president/general manager Tex Schramm. Wansley, having played football in the Marine Corps and being a Steelers and Raiders fan, knew about the game on the field but nothing off it.
Wansley wanted to make a good impression and was ready to discuss law enforcement.
Schramm opens the door wearing a Hawaiian shirt and shorts. He was holding a drink.
“He looked like Rodney Dangerfield,” Wansley said of his first impressions of Schramm.
Wansley spent an hour telling stories of a life in law enforcement that started in 1965, as a child growing up in Festus, Mo., where black and white people were separate and not equal. He was one of the first African-Americans to integrate his own high school.
After Wansley spoke to Schramm for an hour, Tom Landry arrived. The legendary coach spent another hour with Wansley and more stories were told.
“I was really shocked and he showed up looking like a mortal man, like he had been working in his garage or something like that,” Wansley said of Landry. “We spent another hour just visiting and I’m thinking, ‘I’m sitting with two legends. One keeps offering me drinks and telling me these jokes that are kinda corny.’ But it was a good time, so then, finally, Tex said he and Tom had to speak at a function.”
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After the nearly two-hour interview, Wansley got home and told his wife, Scharrol, that he didn’t know if he got the job.
During their conversation, the phone rang. Schramm was on the line.
“Report to the office tomorrow morning, you will be on the payroll starting tomorrow,” Schramm told Wansley. “You’re going to be with us. I’ve got to go give this speech.”
Click.
“I’m standing there holding the phone and my wife looks at me. ‘What happened?’ she says.”
I just accepted a job with the Dallas Cowboys, Wansley said.
Scharrol asked what the job was. Larry, who was still in shock, did not know.
“They said they’re going to take good care of me,” Wansley said he told his wife. “It scared her to death and I come from a life of stability and numbers and all that, and here’s the great unknown. She was very apprehensive and mad and everything else.”
That job interview was on a Sunday afternoon. The next morning, Wansley retired from the FBI, his employer of 10 years, to work with the Cowboys.
Wansley’s hiring was significant because he was an African-American man being tasked with an incredible opportunity to shape a program that’s now copied by many across the NFL as well as in other sports.
At the time of his hire in May 1983, Schramm told United Press International there was a value in hiring Wansley because of off-the-field issues with the Cowboys, especially with drugs. Cowboys players Harvey Martin, Tony Dorsett and Ed ‘Too Tall’ Jones were mentioned in court testimony as being involved with convicted drug dealers, according to reports in the spring of 1983.
“But it has become such a big part of everyday life, not just in football, that we just needed a person that is knowledgeable in those areas in which we are unsophisticated,” Schramm told UPI.
After one week in the organization, Wansley still didn’t have a good idea of what to do until he met Schramm at his high-rise office overlooking Highway 75.
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According to Wansley, Schramm laid the job out: “When the players are on the field, they’re Tom Landry’s responsibility. As soon as they come off, they’re yours and it’s your job to make sure nothing is screwing with their mind or their body that prevents them from being 100 percent football player.”
The budget was unlimited and Wansley went to work. He spoke with Calvin Hill and Paul Warfield of the Cleveland Browns about their own program, called the Inner Circle. It was designed to help players with off-the-field issues. Schramm wanted something similar. As part of a player-development program, Wansley created a continuing education program so players could go back to school and get their degrees. He opened the door for players, back in the 1980s, to get offseason jobs with local companies. The biggest task Wansley had to undertake was limiting drug use. Wansley spent 28 days at Hazelden Betty Ford drug and treatment center in the Minneapolis area to get insight into what recovering addicts go through. If Wansley wanted to help players, he needed to understand what they were fighting and how to beat it.
“I lived every day with addicts, people going through all the issues related to substance abuse,” Wansley said of his visit. “It was the greatest lesson I ever learned.”
When Wansley left the facility, former Cowboys D.D. Lewis and Thomas ‘Hollywood’ Henderson approached him about helping players. Armed with the visit to Betty Ford, Wansley now had players ready to contribute away from the field.
Players began to trust him and the Cowboys even expanded his duties to the college ranks.
Wansley visited the towns of prospective draft picks the Cowboys were interested in, doing his own investigations. While scouts were on the road, so was Wansley. It’s a job he continues to this day.
He visited Lufkin, Texas, the home of former wide receiver Dez Bryant, to seek out information. Wansley said he met with Bryant’s preacher, high school teacher and next-door neighbor. He also ate dinner with the receiver’s family. When the visit was over, Wansley knew everything — good and bad — about the player. Wansley wrote up a report and gave it to the Cowboys.
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“He’s been around this game a long time,” Cowboys cornerback Jourdan Lewis said. “It’s big having him in your corner; even his son, Bryan. They are valuable. They get everything done behind the scenes that people don’t see. I will ask his son anything but the son learned from the dad, so it’s basically similar in what they do and I lean on the Wansleys for whatever I need, especially off the field. They’re one of the first people I contact.”
Bryan Wansley is currently the Cowboys’ director of player development. He’s been around the organization since his dad was hired and has also earned the trust of the players, as well as many in the organization. It was Bryan Wansley who helped rookie wide receiver Michael Gallup deal with the loss of his brother, who committed suicide in November while the team was in Atlanta. Bryan Wansley delicately arranged for Gallup’s sister to enter the visiting locker room after the game to break the news of the tragedy.
“They’re looking out for you first, it’s not putting the team first,” Gallup said. “They’re looking out for you, the human being. If you ever need anything, got to B and he’ll just let you know what it is.”
“The best thing that Larry ever did was give us Bryan,” Cowboys owner and general manager Jerry Jones said. “I’m serious about that. We got a double whammy with that family and Bryan knows how to work with all our players.”
The elder Wansley was also connected to many law-enforcement officials across the country, so when a player was involved in some trouble, he knew who to contact so the Cowboys could get the proper information regarding a possible crime. Other NFL teams began to invest in people like Wansley because of his professionalism and discretion. That training comes from his work as an FBI agent, in which he worked deep undercover.
Wansley wrote an autobiography in 1989 called “FBI Undercover: The True Story of Special Agent Mandrake.” Wansley’s reputation carried over into the entertainment world. Singer Whitney Houston hired Wansley in 1988 to handle security for her European tour. Wansley took a leave of absence from the Cowboys to handle security, and during his time with Houston, he made sure there were Cowboys hats and t-shirts nearby for Houston and her family members to wear as they traveled across Europe. Houston’s father, John Russell Houston, sought to hire Wansley full-time, but he declined, saying the lure of the Cowboys remained strong.

In 1991 Wansley left the Cowboys to work with the man who brought him to pro sports, Schramm, who had become the commissioner of the World League.
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Wansley spent nearly two years with the World League, developing American football overseas with Schramm’s help. When the NFL had its first overseas game, a preseason contest between the Cowboys and Bears, it was Larry Wansley who set up the logistics.
In 1993, the NFL called Wansley again, this time to ask that he take over as director of security for the league. The man Wansley was scheduled to replace delayed his retirement by a year, so Wansley didn’t take that job.
American Airlines reached out to Wansley and hired him to handle its security. Wansley had numerous duties in an industry he knew nothing about going in. He directed security during a flight attendant strike, also handled plane crashes and some criminal operations for American Airlines. Wansley even helped create the Federal Securities Screenings Agency in 1997, which is now called the Transportation Security Administration. At first, the screening system wasn’t adopted by the FAA because not all airlines wanted it. Former American Airlines president Bob Crandall presented Wansley’s vision to other airlines and all but one unnamed airline was down for it.
“I kept it alive, trying to twist the arm of the carrier that was reluctant,” Wansley said. “Then 9/11 happened, and as a result of that, they dug up the old program and the TSA is based on that old program.”
Following the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, Wansley’s vision became a reality. The current screening system that’s used today is essentially his.
After spending eight years as a Compton police officer, 10 years with the FBI and a little more than 10 years with American Airlines, Wansley was asked by the Cowboys to come back home to become a consultant in 2003. The TSA tried to hire Wansley as well but he chose the Cowboys instead, becoming a consultant for an organization that meant so much to him.
He picked up his old duties, this time as a veteran security consultant working with his son Bryan.
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“Growing up, I was fortunate to watch my father take on a variety of personal and professional challenges,” Bryan Wansley said. “I noticed that he was always emotionally tied to the task at hand and beyond loyal to his commitments. He taught me to love what you do and embrace a challenge. I’m thankful I have an opportunity to work with my father on a daily basis.”
In the middle of the week, Larry Wansley will head to the visiting team to double-check on the team hotel and logistics, and will reach out to local police and state police officials to make sure everything is settled when the team arrives. And after those games, maybe the less stressful part of his job is walking coach Jason Garrett across the field so he can find an opposing coach to shake his hand.
Wansley’s 6-foot-2 frame stands out as he raises his hand, signaling to opponents as Garrett walks toward midfield.
While security is the highlight of what Wansley does, teaching has also made its way into the 77-year-old’s duties. When the Cowboys visited the African-American museum last season in Washington, D.C., Wansley set up everything. As the players walked through the exhibits, they would ask Wansley questions about a different time, when segregation was part of the norm. Wansley grew up in the ’40s and ’50s, and remembers that era well.
“It was such a profound experience when we went there,” Wansley said. “We have people that need to experience this. And as a black man, we have so many of our players that don’t have a real sense of our history and that visit, I just marveled at their reactions and stand back and watch them. They didn’t have any clue about the segregation I grew up in.”
After that visit, several players asked if they could return once the season ended. They called Wansley to set things up.
“Wansley is one of the first people you meet,” Cowboys running back Ezekiel Elliott said. “Just really laid back, great dude. If you just get to know him you find out all that he’s achieved. He just makes you feel comfortable and easy to trust because he has a very important job here and he has to have the trust of the players to protect us the way he’s supposed to.”
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From that interview in Tex Schramm’s house to this day in 2019, Larry Wansley has conducted himself with the Cowboys in a way that’s admired by many inside and outside the organization. He has worked in Compton, done undercover investigative work with the FBI and handled crises in the airline industry. He’s able to relate to anyone, inside and out; and that makes him a unique person to have around.
“He’s still teaching,” Bryan Wansley said. “And I’m still learning.”
(All photos courtesy of Larry Wansley)
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