He served as a Lieutenant (junior grade) in the United States Navy during World War II.

He coached football at Hampden–Sydney College for five years before joining the staff of Jim Tatum at the University of North Carolina in 1956 as an assistant.

Hickey was dismissed after the 1966 season and Bill Dooley succeeded him as North Carolina's head coach.

He married Agnes Pauline Small Pardue on November 14, 1976, in Sanford, North Carolina.

He died at the age of seventy-seven on December 27, 1997 and was buried at the Buffalo Cemetery in Sanford.