The Rise of the NFL
Title
The Rise of the NFL
Subject
The growth of the National Football League during the television era.
Contributor
Grant Cokeley
Collection Items
Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961
The Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961 was passed in response to the NFL's inability to cooperatively sell the TV rights of the league as a whole because of anti-trust laws. The act exempted the NFL (and other professional sports leagues) from the…
Number of TV Households in America 1950-1978
This data table shows the growth of TV ownership in American homes from 1950-1978. Home television ownership, a rarity during the 1940's, exploded in the post-war boom years of the 1950's. While only around 9% of Americans owned TV's in 1950, by…
Super Bowl Viewers: 1967-2009
The Super Bowl has become almost like a national holiday, a cultural and social phenomenon that draws the attention of casual fans and even people with no other interest in the NFL. Beginning in 1967 with viewership below 30 million, the Super Bowl…
Pro Football's Pete Rozelle: Sportsman of the Year
No man was more important for the rise of the NFL during the television era than Pete Rozelle. The "PR commissioner", Rozelle guided the league for almost thirty years. In 1964, just four years into his tenure, Rozelle was named by Sports Illustrated…
Johnny Unitas' 1956 Colt's Contract
Johnny Unitas is remembered as one of the greatest quarterbacks to ever play the game of football, but his NFL career had a rocky start. Cut by his hometown Steelers in 1955, Unitas was able to sign-on with the Colts for a one year contract in 1956.…
CBS TV to Pay 28.2 Million For 2-Year Pro Football Rights
This January 25th, 1964 New York Times article by Val Adams describes the new contract awarded to CBS by the NFL to televise its regular season games for the 1964 and 1965 seasons. The massive bid of $14.1 million a year outpaced the bids of rivals…
Sports of the Times: Overtime at the Stadium
On December 29th, 1958, the day after the 1958 NFL Championship Game between the Baltimore Colts and New York Giants, The New York Times' Arthur Daley wrote about the game, the roaring, partisan crowd, and the exciting overtime finish. From his…
The NFL Mancave
Secondary Resource- This photo shows the NFL's ideal TV customer of the 1960's. White, upper middle-class, and suburban, the man of the house drinks his beer in his man cave as the football game flickers on the black and white television.
Rozelle Retirement Memo
In March of1989, after almost thirty years at the head of the NFL, Pete Rozelle unexpectedly retired two years before the end of his contract. After having turned the NFL into the number one American Sport, and the largest sports business in the…
Super Bowl I Ticket
In 1967, after having completed the terms of their merger, the AFL and the NFL played in their first combined championship game (The term Super Bowl wouldn't come around for another two years). In the first game, played in Los Angeles' Memorial…