The Birth of the NFL: The 1920 Origins of Professional Football

[00:00:00] On September 17, 1920, a group of football teams get together and form a league, naming it

[00:00:07] the American Professional Football Association.

[00:00:10] Focusing mainly with teams in the Midwest, in Northeast, with 11 founding members

[00:00:16] in American Sports, Icon, Jim Thorpe, elected president,

[00:00:21] this was the beginning of what would become where we now know as the NFL.

[00:00:27] Today we're going to dive into the history of how the NFL started with this one league

[00:00:32] back in the 1920s over 100 years ago on Daily Sports History.

[00:00:45] Welcome to Daily Sports History, I'm Ethan Reese and I'm going to help guide you

[00:00:49] as you learn and relive sports history to Daily Grow Your Sports Knowledge.

[00:00:55] And today's trivia question is what two original teams that played in the 1920

[00:01:02] American Professional Football Association are still in the NFL today?

[00:01:09] Now professional football actually goes back until night, goes back to win pudge,

[00:01:14] head flinger and bin sports downly. Each received money to play for different football teams,

[00:01:19] making them the first professional football athletes. A new concept at the time,

[00:01:24] in over the years as football continued to grow in popularity, so did the possibility of a football

[00:01:30] league outside of college, because at this point in the early 1900s, college was the main

[00:01:36] state for football. Everyone that was anything in football was a college player and after that,

[00:01:42] many of them went to go live regular lives or become Olympians or tried for other different sports.

[00:01:48] And some sports leagues did pop up. In 1902 there was a New York based world series

[00:01:54] of pro football tournament that disbanded after a couple years. They didn't get the interest

[00:01:58] they wanted as college football was the key at the time. Then there was an Ohio league that

[00:02:03] popped up and they were able to get athletes such as Jim Thorpe to try out. But again,

[00:02:09] it would fizzle out, especially during World War I when a lot of these players that would be playing

[00:02:14] in these leagues went to war. But after World War II is when football really started to grow

[00:02:19] at the professional level. And then in August of 1920, at a card dealership in Can't No

[00:02:25] the league was formed known as the American Professional Football Conference. And initially

[00:02:30] just consisted of teams in Ohio. So there's the Akron Pros, the Columbus Panhandlers,

[00:02:36] the Dayton Triangles and the Toledo Maroons. But less than a month later they held another

[00:02:42] conference on September 17th and re-enamed it, the American Professional Football Association. They added

[00:02:49] some other teams from New York such as Buffalo and Rochester and even Detroit and and Hammond in

[00:02:54] Indiana, which is just a suburb of Chicago. So that first season they had the Akron Pros,

[00:02:59] the Buffalo all-Americans, the Canton Bulldogs, the Chicago Cardinals, the Chicago Tigers,

[00:03:05] the Cleveland Tigers, the Columbus Panhandlers, the Dayton Triangles, the Decadors, Danlies,

[00:03:10] the Detroit Haralds, the Hammond Pros, the Muncie Flyers, the Rochester, Jefferson's and the

[00:03:17] Rock Island Independence. For a total of 14 teams that would end up playing, but a lot of these

[00:03:23] teams moved and transformed into other teams throughout the years. So at this meeting,

[00:03:28] they introduced a salary cap for teams to keep teams with richer owners from paying more than

[00:03:34] smaller teams. And they could not sign that college players had to be a graduate or not in college

[00:03:39] at all. And they could not sign players under contract with another team. And their idea was college

[00:03:46] football was so popular at the time that these players needed a place to go after college to show

[00:03:52] their skill to get even better because as we know now, your prime in your athletic career

[00:03:59] is in your late 20s and early 30s not when you're 22 or 18. So you get better play the more you

[00:04:07] do it. And so after all the teams were conducted they actually elected Jim Thorpe as the president

[00:04:12] of the league pretty much the commissioner today, although Jim Thorpe actually coached the Canton

[00:04:17] Bulldogs as well. But at the time they didn't worry about conflict of interest and each team created

[00:04:22] their own dynamic schedule, meaning there was no minimum or maximum games they needed to play.

[00:04:28] And at the end of the year, each team would vote to determine the winner of the league instead

[00:04:32] of having a play off or a championship game. So that first season in 1920 was Rocky. But on September

[00:04:40] 26 was when they very first game was held where the Rock Island independence beat the St. Paul

[00:04:46] idols 48 to zero. Now this was just the first game featuring one of the teams as you notice

[00:04:52] the St. Paul idols were not in the APFA. Now the first official game featuring two teams

[00:04:59] happened on October 3rd where the date triangles who will beat you with their geometry

[00:05:03] beat the Columbus Panhandlers who were begging for some points 14 to zero.

[00:05:08] Yes, I'm making fun of these names as they are hilarious to think about today. I'm just imagining

[00:05:13] the fans in the stands would be very different than what we have in Raider Nation or with

[00:05:18] the Packers T-Seds, which is already a little bit ridiculous. But that was just the first game.

[00:05:23] There were six other games featuring APFA teams that same day. Now some of these were playing

[00:05:29] other teams in the league, some of these were playing other teams we've never heard of. And that's

[00:05:34] really what it was is more of a collective than a league you didn't have to play or a strategic

[00:05:39] schedule. It was a lot like college where a college team can play whoever they want. It's kind of

[00:05:44] what it was like. A lot of these teams played other teams in their local area or nearby because

[00:05:49] they didn't really want to travel too far as a lot of these people were factory workers, miners,

[00:05:54] all these blue-collar jobs they had outside of this because they were not getting paid very much.

[00:05:59] And they would play out the year all the way through December playing a total of 13 weeks.

[00:06:05] And by the time the league was done, by the time the year was over, the team at the top of

[00:06:11] the standings was the Akron Pros who went 8, 0 and 3, MP6 opponents in the American Professional

[00:06:20] Football Association. And because of this, the Akron Pros were voted the championships of the leagues.

[00:06:25] And given the Brunswick bulk, Colander Cup, which was a silver trophy that was sponsored by

[00:06:31] the Balkwinn, bulk, Colander company. Which is still in existence today as now known as the

[00:06:37] Burstwick Company and is an SMPF top 400 company. Now this did what some controversy as the

[00:06:43] Dakota standings who went 10, 1 and 2 and the Buffalo, Americans who went 9, 1 and 1 had more wins

[00:06:50] so they should have been the winners but they could not make the change. And instead of each player

[00:06:55] getting rings they actually got a little fob, a little keychain type thing, a golden cheek

[00:06:59] chain that said 1920 World Champion with the first initial in their last name on it. And what's

[00:07:04] interesting is Akron actually had a non-modern perfect season as they did have ties but it didn't

[00:07:10] lose a game and this has only happened four other times in NFL history with the 1922 and 23

[00:07:17] Canton Bulldogs, the 1929 Green Bay Packers in the 1972 Miami Dolphins. And since then there have been

[00:07:26] 10 players that played in the original 1920 season that had been inducted into the pro football

[00:07:33] Hall of Fame. Now of that first season only two teams remain in the NFL today and that's

[00:07:40] the Dakota Stanlies who moved around and became the Chicago Bears and the Chicago Cardinals

[00:07:46] who are now the Arizona Cardinals. Now in June 1922 the APFA changes name to the National Football

[00:07:56] League and continue to grow as teams continue to change throughout the years. Some teams left

[00:08:03] new teams were added and it seemed like every year they got a little bit bigger and a little bit

[00:08:08] bigger and two what we know today as the National Football League, one of the most profitable

[00:08:15] sports league in the world and what we love every Sunday to watch. Thank you for listening

[00:08:21] to the day's day these sports history. If you like this please make sure you're subscribed wherever

[00:08:27] you're listening that way you don't miss a single episode and you can come back tomorrow for more

[00:08:32] day of these sports history. And the answer today's trivia question, what two original teams

[00:08:40] that played in the 1920 American Professional Football Association are still in the NFL today.

[00:08:48] The the the the the the the the Kater Stanlies which became the Chicago Bears and the

[00:08:53] Chicago Cardinals who became the Arizona Cardinals.