George Cornell "Bubbles" Paterson (May 10, 1891 – November 29, 1945) was an American football player and engineer.

He played center for the University of Michigan Wolverines football teams coached by Fielding H. Yost from 1911 to 1913.

[3] Paterson enrolled at the University of Michigan where he played football under the school's famous coach, Fielding H. Yost.

Michigan's 1913 football team, with Paterson as captain, finished with a 6–1 record and outscored its opponents 175–21.

Yost expects his charges to have a good season, despite the unexpected defeat sustained at the hands of the Michigan Aggies.

In its profile of Paterson, the magazine wrote: George C. Patterson is the most important man at Ann Arbor.

He knows that to be leader of the varsity football club is to taste of the sweetest honors this old world has to offer.

[10]At the end of the 1913 season, Paterson selected as a third-team All-American by Walter Camp for Collier's Weekly.

Syracuse, Cornell and Pennsylvania all bowed in turn to the triumphant Michigan team with Paterson at its head.

[3] One contemporary account noted his outstanding academic achievement: Contrary to the general rule on such cases, he has not neglected his college work.

His scholastic record is so good that last year he was elected to T B H, the honorary inter-collegiate engineering fraternity.

Every college man realizes how high the standards are, which are necessary for election to T B H, and knows how infrequently athletes are found among its members.

Upon graduating, Paterson worked for two years for the Saxon Motor Car Company in Detroit.

[13] Past recipients of the Paterson award include tackle Jim Orwig (1957)[14] John Schopf in 1961.