He also helped his mother with a laundry business she ran out of the home. Lane became known as "Cue Ball" and later recalled how he acquired the nickname: "I was in a pool hall in 12th street. We were playing for money, maybe a dime. As soon as I made the eight ball, the other guy took off running. He didn't want to pay. I grabbed that cue ball and just as he made the corner I threw it and hit him upside the head. The guy didn't know what had hit him." Anderson High School Lane attended L.C. Anderson High School, Austin's segregated high school for African Americans. He played basketball and football and was a member of the school's 1945 and 1946 football teams. The 1945 team was runnerup in the Prairie View Interscholastic League, an association of black schools in Texas. Negro league baseball After graduating from high school, Lane lived for a time in Council Bluffs, Iowa, with his birth mother, Etta Mae King. She had visited during Lane's youth, and the two reconciled. His mother and a man had opened a tavern in Council Bluffs. While in Council Bluffs, a baseball scout signed Lane, and he played for a time with the Negro league Omaha Rockets, a farm team for the Kansas City Monarchs. Scottsbluff Junior College In the fall of 1947, Lane enrolled at Scottsbluff Junior College in Scottsbluff, Nebraska. He played one season of college football at Scottsbluff. He was the only African American player on the team, and a clipping from the college newspaper noted, "He is outstanding for his vicious tackles, hard running and pass snatching." The Scottsbluff football team compiled a 5–3–1 record with Lane in the lineup in 1947 and finished in third place in the Nebraska Junior College Conference. Military service In 1948, Lane enlisted in the United States Army and served for four years. He served at Fort Ord on Monterey Bay in California and played on a Fort Ord football team. In 1951, he caught 18 touchdown passes for Fort Ord. He received second-team All-Army honors in 1949 and first-team honors in 1951. After his discharge from the Army, Lane worked in an aircraft plant in Los Angeles, lifting heavy sheets of metal out of a bin and placing them into a press. Pro football Los Angeles Rams Signing and nickname While working at the