1936: First NFL Draft Held

The NFL’s annual draft of college talent has become a big and highly-anticipated offseason event. The brainchild of Eagles owner Bert Bell (who would go on to become league commissioner; pictured at right), the first one was held at Philadelphia’s Ritz-Carlton Hotel on February 8, 1936.

Bell’s Eagles had come into being in 1933 and were a struggling club. With teams free to sign any player coming out of college that they wanted, strong clubs had an advantage in the bidding for talent and Bell recognized that this was bad for the overall competitive balance of the league. His suggestion that the NFL organize an annual draft, in which the weaker teams would get first choice of the best talent coming out of the college ranks, was adopted by the owners on May 19, 1935. While the format of the draft has changed over the years, the basic element in which the teams draft in inverse order of their finish during the previous regular season has remained the same.

The first draft consisted of nine rounds, with the Eagles, owner of the NFL’s worst record at 2-9 in 1935, going first and the Giants, who had gone 9-3, choosing last (Detroit had won the Championship game over New York, but had a lesser regular season record at 7-3-2. Currently, the NFL champion drafts last in each round, regardless of regular season record).


With the first overall pick, Philadelphia chose the Heisman Trophy-winning back from the University of Chicago, Jay Berwanger (pictured at left). Berwanger had no interest in playing pro football, and the Eagles ended up trading his rights to the Bears, who also had no luck in signing him.

The second choice, HB Riley Smith from Alabama, did play two seasons for the club that drafted him, the Redskins, but his career was cut short by injury. The first five picks were all backs (Bill Shakespeare of Notre Dame by Pittsburgh, Iowa’s Dick Crayne by Brooklyn, and Jim Lawrence of TCU by the Cardinals). The first lineman chosen was tackle Joe Stydahar by the Bears, with the sixth overall selection, and he went on to a Hall of Fame career.


Including Stydahar (pictured at right), four of the players chosen in the 1936 draft ended up in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. The others were FB Tuffy Leemans of George Washington, taken in the second round (18th overall) by the Giants; end Wayne Millner of Notre Dame, picked by the Boston Redskins with the 65th overall choice in the eighth round; and Colgate G Dan Fortmann, another selectee of the Bears, taken in the ninth (and final) round as the 78th overall choice.

End Paul “Bear” Bryant of Alabama was selected by the Dodgers in the fourth round, but he passed up pro football for the more secure opportunity of becoming an assistant coach at the college level (he was offered $175 per game to play for Brooklyn). Of course, he would go on to have a long and outstanding career as a college head coach.

The last player chosen, G Phil Flanagan from Holy Cross, was taken by the Giants but played instead with the Boston Shamrocks of the rival AFL (second version). In total, 81 players were selected by the nine teams.

While the introduction of the draft didn’t have an immediate effect on the league’s competitive balance – the Eagles, for instance, again had the league’s worst record during the 1936 season – over time teams like Philadelphia and the Chicago Cardinals were able to contend for and win championships in the late 1940s, helped significantly by players obtained through the draft. It would become a pattern that other clubs would emulate in the decades that followed.

1926: First AFL Begins Play With Three Games

On September 26, 1926 the first organization to be known as the American Football League (AFL) commenced play with three games. The AFL came into being through the efforts of star halfback Red Grange’s agent, C.C. “Cash & Carry” Pyle. Pyle and Grange (pictured above) had created a sensation when the player known as The Galloping Ghost signed to play for the NFL’s Chicago Bears in 1925 following the conclusion of his last college season at Illinois.

The Bears had made the most of two barnstorming tours following the regular season that featured Grange. However, once the tours were over the contract was concluded. Pyle and Grange informed George Halas and Dutch Sternaman, co-owners of the Bears, that the star halfback would agree to come back for another year for a five-figure contract and part ownership in the franchise. Halas and Sternaman refused, and Pyle responded by leasing Yankee Stadium for five years with the idea of placing a team in the nation’s biggest market that would be built around Grange.

Pyle first sought to join the NFL with his new club, but when the owners finally rallied around New York Giants’ owner Tim Mara (who had purchased exclusive rights to the New York City area for his club that played at the Polo Grounds) and turned down Pyle’s request. Not to be deterred, Pyle proceeded to set up a rival league.

Eight franchises joined the AFL, in addition to Pyle’s New York Yankees. Bill Edwards, a politician and former star athlete at Princeton University, was hired as the new league’s president (at reportedly ten times the salary of his NFL counterpart, Joe Carr). In addition to the Yankees, other teams were located in Boston, Brooklyn, Chicago, Cleveland, Newark, Philadelphia, and Rock Island. There was also a club called the Los Angeles Wildcats that was actually a traveling road team based in Chicago (hence they aren’t credited with being the first Los Angeles-based pro football team).


Several NFL veterans jumped to the new league, including QB Joey Sternaman (pictured at right), brother of Dutch Sternaman, who left the Bears for the Chicago Bulls, where he was also owner and coach; Giants’ tackle Century Milstead, who joined his coach, Bob Folwell, with the Philadelphia Quakers; and lineman Al Nesser, former mainstay of the Akron Pros who went to the Cleveland Panthers. Significant rookie signings included backs Harry Stuhldreher, of Notre Dame’s “Four Horsemen”, by the Brooklyn Horsemen (no doubt influencing the choice of team nickname; he would eventually be joined by another member of that fabled backfield, FB Elmer Layden); Georgia Tech’s Doug Wycoff by the Newark Bears; and Penn’s Al Kreuz by the Quakers.

Not surprisingly, the largest crowd (22,000) of the first week turned out at Cleveland’s Luna Bowl where the Panthers faced Grange and the Yankees. If they came to root for the home team, they went home happy for the Panthers dominated the New York club and won 10-0; if they came to see Grange, they were largely disappointed. Other than a 21-yard punt return in the second quarter, The Galloping Ghost didn’t accomplish much. Most of Cleveland’s players had been with the NFL’s Cleveland Bulldogs in 1925, giving them an advantage. Tailback Al Michaels threw a touchdown pass to wingback Dave Noble in the second quarter and Doc Elliott contributed an extra point and 32-yard field goal for the Panthers. The best drive of the day for the Yankees came in the third quarter (with Grange on the bench) as they made it down to the Cleveland three yard line but came up empty.

There were far fewer fans on hand (2500) at Browning Field in Moline, Illinois where the Rock Island Independents (a charter NFL franchise that jumped to the AFL) hosted the league’s traveling club, the Wildcats. The Wildcats were so named because they featured George “Wildcat” Wilson (pictured below left), a star rookie tailback out of Washington, and he had a solid outing against the Independents. So did blocking back Jim Bradshaw. But untimely penalties and a dropped pass on the goal line kept the Wildcats from scoring any touchdowns; their only points came on an 18-yard field goal by Jim Lawson in the first quarter.


While Rock Island had difficulty moving the ball on the ground, they had success through the air in the second quarter as blocking back Johnny Armstrong threw a pass to tailback Wes Bradshaw that gave the Independents a first down on the Wildcat five yard line. Three plays later Armstrong ran around end for a touchdown, and that was all that was needed as Rock Island won, 7-3.

At Davids’ Stadium in Newark, NJ before 2000 fans, the host Bears took on Joey Sternaman’s highly favored Chicago Bulls. The Bulls started off quickly as Sternaman ran for 40 yards on the second play of the game and then followed up with a pass to end Eddie Anderson to the Newark five yard line. FB Buck White ran for a touchdown from there and, with the successful extra point, the Bulls had the early 7-0 lead. The Bears defense stiffened from that point on, however, and while the Bulls continued to move the ball, they were unable to score again.

The star rookie tailback Wycoff keyed a late third quarter drive in which he compiled 60 yards on the ground. The ball was inside the Chicago one yard line as the period came to an end, and Wycoff plunged over for the touchdown on the first play of the fourth quarter. Wycoff kicked the extra point to tie the game, and that ended up being the final score, 7-7.

For the Newark Bears, the opening tie was the high point of the season. They went 0-3-2 and never scored another point the rest of the way to finish at the bottom of the league. The Bulls went 5-6-3 to come in fifth. Rock Island won only once more as they put together a 2-6-1 tally to end up tied for seventh with Brooklyn. The Los Angeles Wildcats were 6-6-2, good enough for fourth place. The Cleveland Panthers failed to last the season, going 3-2 to finish third. Grange’s New York Yankees ended up at 10-5 and second to the league-champion Philadelphia Quakers (who opened their season on October 2).

In fact, only four of the original nine teams managed to play the full season. Fan and financial support wasn’t strong enough outside of New York City as the franchises dropped away. Afterward, the champion Quakers took on the NFL’s Giants (who had finished seventh) in a challenge game and were badly beaten, 31-0. The league folded, with the Yankees being taken into the NFL where they lasted two seasons and never finished ahead of the Giants.

Red Grange eventually made his way back to the Bears, as did Joey Sternaman. “Wildcat” Wilson played three years with the NFL’s Providence Steam Roller. Doug Wycoff toiled for six seasons with the New York Giants, Staten Island Stapletons, and Boston Redskins.

1925: Tim Mara Founds the New York Giants

Timothy J. Mara was a bookmaker in New York City – which was legal at the time – when he arrived at the office of Billy Gibson, manager of heavyweight boxer Gene Tunney. He had hopes of buying part of Tunney’s contract, but instead paid the $500 fee to gain a franchise for New York in the NFL.

NFL President Joe Carr was wooing Gibson as a potential franchise owner, but found a more willing taker in Mara. Mara, for his part, knew nothing about pro football but believed that a franchise for anything in New York City was surely worth $500. On August 1, 1925 he officially became owner of what would be named the New York Giants.

Dr. Harry March was hired to recruit talent for the new team and Bob Folwell to coach it. The club played at the Polo Grounds, which they shared with major league baseball’s Giants (hence the choosing of the same name). The assembled talent included FB Jack McBride, tailback Hinkey Haines, end Lynn Bomar, and G Art Carney, who were All-Pro selections after a season in which the Giants finished a respectable fourth in the 20-team NFL with an 8-4 record.

On-field success had not yielded off-field profits, however, and Mara found himself $40,000 in the red at the conclusion of the 1925 schedule. However, the Chicago Bears came to New York as part of the off-season barnstorming tour to exploit the talents of star halfback Red Grange. A crowd of some 65,000 fans showed up to see the player known as “the Galloping Ghost” in action against the Giants, enough to wipe out Mara’s debt.

Ironically, it was the same Red Grange who nearly destroyed the Giants in 1926 when he and his agent, C.C. “Cash & Carry” Pyle, started a rival pro football league (the first to be known as the American Football League) and placed a franchise in Yankee Stadium that featured Grange himself. To add insult to injury, the new league’s Philadelphia Quakers hired Coach Folwell away as well as highly-regarded tackle Century Milstead.

The Giants survived, however, while the AFL folded after a single season (they also gained some satisfaction in defeating Folwell’s league-champion Quakers in an interleague challenge game, 31-0). In 1927, they won their first NFL title with an 11-1-1 record. Setting the pattern for future successful Giants squads, this club succeeded with a solid but unspectacular offense and outstanding defense (they gave up a total of just 20 points over the course of the 13 games – 10 of the contests were shutouts).

Mara turned over co-ownership of the franchise in 1930 to his sons, Wellington and Jack, although he continued to control the team (the sons were only 14 and 22, respectively, in 1930). In 1946, actual control of the club went to the sons, with Wellington handling the football side of the operation and Jack the business side. The Giants were typically successful on the field - from 1933, when divisional play leading to a championship game was introduced, through 1958, the last season prior to Tim Mara’s death, the team participated in 10 of those title contests and won three of them (four championships overall counting 1927).

Tim Mara died in 1959 and was selected as a charter member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1963. Jack Mara passed on in 1965 and his son, Tim, inherited his role in the organization and settled into a long-running feud with his uncle until he sold his half of the club to Robert Tisch in 1991. Wellington Mara remained the public face of the Giants until his own passing in 2005, and after he, like his father, was enshrined in Canton.

The Mara family continues to hold a co-ownership in the club that Tim Mara founded (his grandson, John, is the current team president). The franchise that he paid $500 for in 1925 is now valued at well over $500 million.

1968: George Halas Retires as Head Coach of Bears

By the spring of 1968, George Halas was a 73-year-old man with a bad hip that was hindering his mobility (it was a legacy of his brief major league baseball career with the Yankees back in 1919). Yet it was still something of a shock to pro football fans on May 27, 1968 when he announced that he was retiring as head coach of the Chicago Bears after a total of 40 years.

It is hard to do justice to the pro football career of “the Papa Bear” in just a few paragraphs. It has been said that Halas didn’t invent pro football, it just seemed that way. His involvement extended beyond a single franchise – he was a significant figure in the development of the entire NFL. Halas was present at the 1920 organizational meeting of what would become the National Football League, representing the Decatur Staleys. From that beginning, as a player, coach, and business manager, he became a part-owner of the team in 1921, when the Staley Starch Works decided to forego operating a company-sponsored football team, and moved the franchise to Chicago.

After a year as the Chicago Staleys (A.E. Staley provided Halas $5000 in startup money with the stipulation that the Staley name be kept for a year), Halas rechristened the team the Bears after working out a lease agreement to play at Wrigley Field, home of major league baseball’s Cubs. He retired as a player in 1929 and also gave up coaching, handing the reigns to Ralph Jones while working out business matters with co-owner Ed Sternaman. After buying out Sternaman, Halas returned to coaching the team in 1933 and left for a second time in 1942 to join the US Navy during World War II. Once discharged, he again took up coaching in 1946 and retired following the ’55 season. He came back one last time in 1958, after having effectively maintained control while longtime assistant Paddy Driscoll was head coach.

While Halas had the ultimate job security of owning the team, the fact was that he was an outstanding and innovative coach, leading the Bears to a title for the first time in 1921 and the last time over forty years later, in 1963. In all, he coached the team to six championships, with at least one in each of his stints (1921, 1933, 1940, 1941, 1946, 1963). They also won championships under Jones (1932) and co-coaches Luke Johnsos and Hunk Anderson (1943), with Halas still a major presence in the running of the club.

Halas pioneered in the development of the T-formation with man-in-motion, assisted by Ralph Jones and University of Chicago coach Clark Shaughnessy. He was the first coach to hold daily practices and regularly analyze game film of opponents. He was an outstanding judge of talent, of coaches as well as players, surrounding himself at all times with able assistants (most notably Driscoll, Johnsos, Anderson, George Allen, and Jim Dooley) – and Halas also pioneered in the use of an assistant coach as an “eye-in-the-sky” during games. The results were reflected in a 318-148-31 record (.682) with a 6-3 postseason tally. The Bears had winning records in 34 of his 40 seasons on the sideline.

Off the field, Halas was a party to many rules changes and innovations that helped the league to gain appeal and improved the game (use of hashmarks, allowing passing from anywhere behind the line of scrimmage, structuring of the league into divisions with a championship game concluding the season, etc.). He also recognized the value of revenue sharing among the teams for the good of the overall competitive balance of the league and the significance of radio and television as tools for popularizing pro football.

As a coach, Halas was a strong disciplinarian and an emotional leader who was notorious for storming up and down the sideline while berating referees during the course of a game. He took criticism for being tight with money and complicit in the unofficial color line that kept African-American players out of the NFL during the 1930s and 40s. However, he also was the first coach to allow a black and white player to room together on the road (Gale Sayers and Brian Piccolo) and could be generous to players in need (during Piccolo’s ultimately losing battle with cancer, Halas reportedly paid all of his medical bills).

There were contradictions, but there could be no question that George Halas set high standards for later generations of coaches and showed farsightedness in moving the league forward. The influence of “the Papa Bear” is still felt decades after his death in 1983 – and some 90 years after he helped found the NFL.