We have talked about many early teams during Pigskin Dispatch podcasts and on the pages of the website, including the Pottsville Maroons. As recently as this past December, the Maroons were the subject of the controversy they famously were a part of in the 1925 NFL Championship. Most of us are very familiar with the story of the NFL president Joe Carr having to boot its top team of the League in NFL for violating the territorial rights of the Frankford Yellow Jackets to play a postseason game, thus stripping the franchise of the 1925 NFL Title and handing it to a team they defeated near the end of the season, the Chicago Cardinals. However, the story of Pottsville's professional football team goes much deeper than the lost championship.
According to multiple sources, the town of Pottsville, which is northeast of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, says that this was the smallest city in NFL history to host a League franchise. There is error in this claim though as folks from La Rue, Ohio, former home of the Oorang Indians probably beg to differ. (Thanks Jeff Payne!) In the introduction of author David Fleming's book, The Breaker Boys; The NFL's Greatest Team and Stolen 1925 NFL Championship, legendary halfback Red Grange a few decades after he last strapped on a helmet, reflected on the mining town of Pottsville remembering his first impression of it so many years earlier. Grange who was born in nearby Forskville, PA was seemingly impressed with the town that in the mid-1920s was bustling with new construction and business activity. He was also extremely impressed with the fan support from the town of 27,000 and the play of its famed football team. A team that Fleming describes as the "Perfect Football Machine."
It is easy to see why the Maroons were thought of in this way as in 1925, as the team finished with a 14-2 record on the year thumping their closest contender the Cardinals 21-7 in a game that mattered as well as other tough opponents such as the Cleveland Bulldogs, the Canton Bulldogs, the Akron Pros and the Rochester Jeffersons among others. The two losses were suffered against the Providence Steamroller 0-6 and the Frankford Yellow Jackets 0-20. Both of these early-season losses in 1925 were well avenged later on in the season as they smashed Providence in the second meeting 34-0 on the road and blanked the Yellow Jackets 49-0 at home. Perhaps their biggest accomplishment was knocking off the Notre Dame All-Stars, featuring the Four Horsemen 9-7, at a time where pro teams almost never were able to compete with the top college programs. Ironically this game was also the one that befell trouble for Pottsville. For more on the 1925 controversy please check out our 1925 Pottsville Controversy article and podcast.
The story of how the Maroons came to be is fascinating. Like most Pennsylvania towns of size, Pottsville started supporting a local team in the early 1910s that would compete with other nearby communities on the gridiron. The first of these connected directly to the Maroons for the small mining town was called the Pottsville Eleven which was made upon mainly local firemen from the Yorkville Hose Company Station. They were an independent team at first, playing other coal mining towns across the region. Eventually, they gained the sponsorship of some local business leaders, and with this funding brought in some highly regarded players to become competitive. Stars such as Carl Beck, Benny Boynton and Stan Cofall were co-mingled with athletic local miners to create a very formidable squad. This recipe created a strong bond between the community of blue-collar workers and the team that represented their town, a passionate connection that still seems to resonate almost a century since the last time the team took the field.
In 1924 Doc Striegel, a local physician, purchased the team and promptly entered them into the Anthracite League. According to legend, Striegel decided to outfit his team in some new duds, so he contacted a local sports store to send his squad some new threads to play in. Shortly thereafter the team was delivered some colorful maroon-colored jerseys and thus the nickname of the "Maroons" was associated with this eleven. The franchise also hired on three members of the prior season's Canton Bulldogs Championship team among them Hall of Famer, Pete Henry. The NFL brass including Joe Carr was concerned with top-level players leaving the League to join the Anthracite League, and the Bulldogs even filed a lawsuit against the migration of its former players moving to Pottsville, which was dismissed by a Pennsylvania court. Pottsville went on to win the Anthacite League with a strong record of 6-0-1. After knocking off rival Coaldale for the title, the Maroons issued a challenge to the National Football League's two top teams of 1924, the Frankford Yellow Jackets and the Canton Bulldogs. Both declined but another NFL squad the Rochester Jeffersons accepted the challenge. The Jeffs of 1924 was not considered one of the top teams in the League but they gave Pottsville a game in which the Maroons came out the losing end with Rochester 10-7, but they did prove they could compete with NFL rosters in the process.
The Anthracite coalition dissolved after the 1924 season and so the determined Doc Striegel and his Maroons to join the National Football League for the 1925 season. The NFL was liking how Pottsville would thumb its nose at the Pennsylvania Blue Laws and play home games on Sundays. League teams could schedule a game at nearby Frankford on Saturdays and then conveniently travel to Miners Field on Sunday to take on the Maroons. This disregard of the rules was applauded by the NFL in this case but later would haunt them. Like we said they were a great success in their inaugural season in the NFL except for Carr booting them from the League for disobeying his direct instructions of not playing the Notre Dame game in Philadelphia which violated Frankford's territorial rights.
After the 1925 season, Red Grange and C.C. Pyle declared that they would create their own Pro League to compete with the NFL. The worry was that the now displaced and well-supported Maroons would become a centerpiece for the new Grange league so Joe Carr welcomed the Pottsville eleven back into the NFL for 1926. Pottsville again was a top-flight team in the League taking third place with a 10-2-1 record. In 1927 the team's players were aging and some departed for other ventures. The Maroons slipped into mediocracy with a 5-8 record in 1927 and a poor 2-8 record the year after that. Doc Striegel then sold the team to a former player who with partners moved the franchise to New England to become the Boston Bulldogs. After some more poor seasons, the franchise soon disbanded.
The popularity and admiration for the Maroons have even to this day stayed alive. After much petitioning by the community, the NFL in 1963 issued a commission to study the claim of the lost title of 1925. A vote of league owners went 12–2 in favor of continuing to recognize the Cardinals as champions. The lone support for the Maroons case was George Halas of the Bears and Art Rooney Sr. of the Steelers. In 2003 the case of the 1925 controversy was once again brought to a vote at an NFL Owners meeting and this time it fell by a tally of 30 votes to 2. The lone votes for the Maroons were again the Steelers and this time the other Pennsylvania team the Eagles. it is not likely after two sound defeats that the case will be brought up again by the NFL brass.
Pete Henry
Born October 31, 1897, in Mansfield, Ohio - Wilbur better known as Pete Henry, was a 3 year All-American tackle from Washington and Jefferson College. He was perhaps the largest lineman of his era as he stood 5-foot-11-inches tall and weighed in at a solid 245 pounds. Pete signed to play with the Canton Bulldogs coincidently on the same day that the NFL’s precursor the American Professional Football Association formed in Ralph Hay’s Hupmobile Showroom in Canton. The good natured Henry off the field was replaced by a focused beast on the gridiron. Pete’s most notable season had to be in 1923 with the Bulldogs according to the National Football Foundation's website. Henry booted a 94 yard punt, blocked a punt, scored a touchdown and kicked nine field goals via drop kick , oh and by the way the Canton Bulldogs won their second consecutive NFL Championship that year due in part to his great play. In the NFL for a total of 8 seasons not only with Canton but was a member of the Pottsville Maroons and the New York Giants too. Pete Henry was inducted to the College Football Hall of Fame in 1951. The Pro Football Hall of Fame enshrined Pete in 1963’s class of inductees.
