Hello from L.A., where we had an excellent day of Uni Watch activities yesterday. I’ll try to have a report on that for tomorrow morning.
But today I want to tell you about something I found at the Babe Ruth Museum and Birthplace on Friday (part of the excellent Purp Walk ’24 roster of activities). While checking out their gift shop, I noticed that they had a shelf of used sports books available for sale, all priced at half of their original cover price. I gravitated toward a thick tome called The Pro Quarterback, which was published in the fall of 1966 — a few months before the first Super Bowl — and was filled with sensational old NFL photos. It reminded me a bit of a book I found in our house when I was growing up, called The Pros, which had a foundational effect on my appreciation of gridiron aesthetics.
The Pro Quarterback’s original price from nearly 50 years ago, printed on the dust jacket, was $12.95, so I was able to score it for just $6.50, which seemed like a good deal.
The cover is shown above. Here’s a view of the spine, which I find very satisfyingly thick and monolithic:
When I got the book back to my hotel room, I found that it included a letter, still in its original envelope, from the author, Murray Olderman, to John Steadman, who was the sports editor of The Baltimore News-American at the time:
Steadman apparently tucked the letter into the book, and then the book somehow found its way to the museum gift shop. As I’m sure you can imagine, I love finding this type of artifact!
The book has over two dozen excellent color photos and well over 100 more in black-and-white. I took pics of the color images for you. Because I’m on the road and short for time (I’m typing this on an airplane), I haven’t been able to crop or edit these shots as much I’d usually prefer to do, nor am I able to point out all of the uni-relevant details, but I think you’ll still enjoy these shots:
In addition to the photos, there are illustrations, diagrams, and reasonably decent text. A good addition to your football library! Lots of used copies are available on eBay.
Sensational find, Paul. Including that wonderful letter to the editor. Those pictures are so good: the Vikings with those huge horns on their helmets, Johnny U’s perfect flat top haircut and my favorite one: The pass of Colts number 15 seen from behind with the stadium stand in the background. Looking forward to your LA Story!
The pass of Colts number 15 seen from behind
Gary Cuozzo!
If you play Immaculate Grid online,
link
he and Norm Snead have been a couple of my go-to guys. They played for a lot of teams.
The pictures of Bobby Layne have me curious: who was the last non-kicker to play without a face mask?
Tommy McDonald
Slightly related question. Was Sonny Jurgensen the last QB to play with a viable beer gut?
Jared Lorenzen
The pillsbury throw boy!
Sonny’s replacement Billy Kilmer also had a bit of a gut, as I recall.
There’s a pic of Fran T. with the Vikes wearing a white jersey, but it doesn’t have the UCLA stripes. I guess I never noticed they wore white jerseys without them!
The UCLA stripes debuted in 1969.
Purple pants … woof.
I have that book along with Olderman’s two accompanying efforts; The Running Backs and The Defenders. All three are wonderful.
Waiting for The Kickers to be published.
Don’t hold your breath ;)
Those photos are sensational!!
The simplicity, the stripes, the sock consistency… I think I may cry.
If you ask me what year is the best looking in football history, I’d say 1972.
If you ask me what *decade* is the best looking, I’d say the 1960s. This book partly illustrates why: Properly-sized numbers, NNOB (at least in the NFL), a smattering of white plastic facemasks (Bears and Cards), and sleeves!
I also miss some of the logo-less helmets. I was saying yesterday I wish Pittsburgh would replace the Steelmark logo with Steely McBeam, but I’d be just as happy if they went back to helmet numbers. And of course the Giants never looked better than when they wore their pre-“ny” helmet.
I’d keep the Steelers’ hypocycloids but I’d put “33” on the left side of the helmet for their inaugural year.
I agree that ’72 may have been a uniform peak, but I think the overall look of the game was better in the 60s because almost every game was played on grass. By ’72 nearly half of the teams were playing on Astroturf which really detracts from the visual experience at least for me.
You’re right about the overall look being better in the 60s. 1972 was the first year of a more standardized field design, which meant no more shields on the Raiders’ field numbers and no more diamonds with San Diego’s. And no more numbers every five yards like in Buffalo. And once they put in the turf, teams like New Orleans and Dallas, who used to paint the visitors name and logo in one end zone every week, stopped doing that.
I know I am old now, I met five of those players in the photos and only Kemp was retired, the rest were still active players at the end of their careers. Wow, time flies. Ran into Johnny Unitas in an elevator in the summer of 1980 in Ocean City MD, I never mentioned to him I got his autograph after they lost to Washington 38-0 seven years earlier.
Inu Question ….
While the Colts appear to be wearing White Durene jerseys in the photo of the offence pre-snap here, In the past I have noticed the Baltimore Colts wearing long sleeved MESH jerseys, such as in the Super Bowl victory over the Cowboys.
Question: Are the Colts the only NFL team to wear long sleeved MESH jerseys?
Were the Steelers the last NFL team to regularly wear Durene jerseys (I know the
Chargers had Durene “cold weather” jerseys – some long sleeved – after going to Navy
Blue in the Fouts era.
The *current* Steelers jerseys have sleeves with the same sublimated stripes that used to be on the durene jerseys. I have both a modern Nike and 80s Sand Knit durene jersey and the sleeve material on the modern jersey still looks and feels a lot like the 80s one, although it must be some modern equivalent.
Good to see the practice of “dudes wearing the jersey/cap/jacket/etc of a team that’s not involved in today’s game” goes back to our grandfather’s generation. In the page with Frank Ryan, there’s a guy in the background wearing a ‘Skins jacket to a Browns-Cardinals game. May this practice never go out of style. :D
Amen!