Football History

On November 12, 1892, in Pittsburgh, a pivotal moment in American football history occurred when William "Pudge" Heffelfinger became the first paid player in the sport. Heffelfinger, a standout player at Yale University, was hired by the Allegheny Athletic Association to play in a game against the Pittsburgh Athletic Club. The payment—$500, a substantial sum at the time—marked a significant shift in the way football was played, moving the game from amateur status toward the professional era.

At the time, football was primarily a college and club sport, with athletes typically participating out of passion rather than for financial gain. Heffelfinger's payment was not just a landmark for him personally but for the sport as a whole, signaling the beginning of organized professional football. Although the idea of paid players was met with some resistance, Heffelfinger’s participation proved that players could be compensated for their skills without compromising the integrity of the game.

Heffelfinger's role in the history of American football is often overshadowed by later, more famous figures, but his groundbreaking contract represents a foundational moment in the sport’s evolution. His payment paved the way for the professional leagues that would emerge in the following decades, shaping football into the multi-billion-dollar industry it is today.

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The celebration of the New York Football Giants' 100th season rolls on. We are in for a special treat in this 15th part of our series. Collector and Historian Jeff Payne brings some of his favorite NYG pieces to share some awesome gridiron history.

Part 15 of our celebration of the Giant's 100th season is underway, and what an awesome way to appreciate the early G-Men than to actually see some of the history. We also have the audio only available with the Giants Collectibles with Jeff Payne Podcast.

Darin Hayes: Hello, my football friends! This is Darin Hayes of pigskindispatch.com. Welcome once again to the pig pen, your portal of positive football history, and welcome to another edition of a collector's corner of sorts. We have our friend Jeffrey Payne with us from the vintage football community, and Jeff has some great things to share with us for our celebration of the New York Giants. One-hundredth season is coming up in and Jeff, welcome back to the pig pen.

Jeff Payne: It's great to be here, Darin, thanks for having me.

Darin Hayes: Yeah, Jeff, you shared an email with me. You knew we were celebrating a lot of Giants’ items and be a kind of a popular event for us, and you really have some neat things in your collection that really fall right in with what we've been talking about here the last to episodes on our NYG—series.

Jeff Payne: Yeah, that's totally cool. Yeah, we can start as early as you want to go. You tell me where you want to begin.

Darin Hayes: Well, you take us back as far as you can, and let's go. Let's go. We'll go chronologically. How does that sound?

Jeff Payne: That sounds cool. Yeah, I don't know how much you've talked about it already. But obviously, the New York Giants, in was actually not the first professional team in New York City.

Jeff Payne: and they weren't even the Per. The first Nfl team in New York City which a lot of people don't know.

Jeff Payne: There was an NFL team that was earlier than them. They actually were formed before the NFL. In
they went by the name the New York Brickley Giants. For reasons. One is the New York baseball Giants funded the team, and Charles Brickley, who was a time all American at Harvard in the mid-teens, very well known in the northeast. He was kind of the, you know the the person who put it all together and back. Then, of course, it was very common for teams to put this name of their star in their in their name, like Never's, you know, was often mentioned, for the Duluth Eskimos, and Thorp's name worked its way in a few times, and some of the teams, so it wasn't uncommon, for, you know, teams to try to use their star's name to you know, attract.

Darin Hayes: Red Grange, Yankees, and.

Jeff Payne: Exactly. Yeah. And so, you know, they called themselves the New York Brickley Giants. And actually, in they ended up not playing any games, because, you know, at the time that was back when there were the Blue Laws where you couldn't play and do things on Sunday. Well, in New York City passed a law that you were allowed to play baseball on Sunday. So the New York baseball giants were like, Oh, that's cool. Well, maybe we should like, you know create a football team and play football on Sundays after the baseball season ends, and that's how they kind of hooked up with Charles Brickley.

Jeff Payne: But unfortunately, New York City was like, no, no, no, we just met baseball. We didn't mean football, and they apparently got their whole team organized and structured and everything, and they were just about to play their first game, and and they found out they weren't allowed to play on Sundays. And that's just like they just said, forget it. We're disbanding. We're disbanding the team.

Jeff Payne: If that's the case. Cause we we want to play on Sunday when nobody's working. So yeah, so that that transpired. And then then they went dormant for a couple of years, and then in pop back up. It wasn't the New York baseball giants this time. It was his name Billy
Gibson. He was a boxing promoter in New York City, and he heard about the NFL. He thought, hey, there ought to be a team in New York City, and he and Charles Brickley again got together, and Billy Gibson funded it, and Brickley was the coach and the you know, player coach, and I think you own part of it, too, and they, you know, entered the NFL that season. They have the distinction of being that team that played the second least games in Nfl history. They only played NFL games. They lost them both and then they fold it, or they they dropped out of the League. They were still around as an independent team. For a while

Darin Hayes: Well, real quick. Do you know the name of the team that played the least amount.

Jeff Payne: Oh, sure tuna wanda.

Darin Hayes: Yeah, okay. The lumberjacks or the Cardacks.

Jeff Payne: Kardash, or whoever they went for. Yeah, they played one game and dropped out, and the brick and giants played. Yeah, I actually have a postcard of one of the Taj Wanda players. Yeah, I've been. I've been out gun several times when they've come up on ebay. You know there's there's probably I don't know a handful of people in the world that would. They see those things? They know what they are, but there's always one other person that knows it, too, and always seems to outgun me, but I finally got my hands on one, probably.

Darin Hayes: I know or Buffalo, New York, Western New York collectors are probably appraising some of the people you're bidding against.

Jeff Payne: Yes, yeah, I know where many of them live. Which is fine, you know. I just happened to finally get one. So I was pretty happy about that, because that's a cool story, too, that.

Darin Hayes: Yeah, we'll have to talk about that sometime, too.

Jeff Payne: Yeah, no, that's awesome. I do have a couple of of nice images of Charles Brinkley. If you want me to.

Darin Hayes[b]: You. You have the share screen capability. Please do.

[b]Jeff Payne: Let me do that. Let me see the easiest way to do that. I think I'll just share screen and just pop them up probably easiest here. Alright, should be coming up for for you.

Darin Hayes: I mean.

Darin Hayes: Hold on a second. Yep, there we go!

Jeff Payne: Yeah. So here's Charles Brickley. Yeah. And when he played for the Maslin Maslin tigers in Ohio, so after Harvard he played for Maslin for a few years.
and I. This is just a great shot of an early Nfl. Or sorry early professional player, who was very well known. This shows him obviously kicking, or maybe, you know, looks like maybe even a drop kick, because he's not lifting his leg very high. But Maslin tigers. Charlie.

Darin Hayes: Charles.

Jeff Payne: Correctly in action, right.

Darin Hayes: You can tell. He's a little older, and and these days.

Jeff Payne: Well, yeah, when you see him later, he's he gained some weight I was gonna like I had to like, look at. I was like is this even the same dude he looks like he bounced up and down to maybe lost his baby fat. He got a little little thinner, and then, now, later on, he kinda put some more weight on here.

Darin Hayes: Maybe he was on the some of the the diets that Oprah was how she was gaining weight and losing weight all the time. You know.

Jeff Payne: Now this you'll and you'll notice he's a little bit chunkier in this picture. This is from his high or his college days. So this is, when he was at Harvard.

Darin Hayes: Oh, yeah.

Jeff Payne: He looks bigger here to me spaces then, but you know. But.

Darin Hayes: Little thicker, maybe in the midsection. Yeah.

Jeff Payne: Yeah, that's his, his coach, Percy Houghton, who's a hall of Fame coach and coached at Harvard for many years. So this is a you know. great photo mid mid teams photo of him. And then I do have one actually, from when he was trying to get the the Giants off the ground. Unfortunately, since they didn't play, it's not of him with the Giants, but instead, it's with him. Showing Fordham University players how to how to kick.You'll notice that almost all of Brickley's photos are him kicking the ball. You know. That was, you know, obviously back then. Kicking was so important in the game of football, you know, particularly before passing was even allowed. But even in these days passing was not, you know, done frequently. It was more desperation, and the rules didn't really support it. So you know, teams were punting very frequently. You needed a good needed a good kicker. You need somebody who could PIN them down and make them go the distance, because that was almost impossible to do. And so, you know, players like Brickley. you know Thorpe was another one who were known for their kicking prowess. They also were both great. Drop kickers. You needed that kicker right? In fact, story about the team. You know, one of the Nfl teams that
the Brickley Giants did play was Thorpe's Cleveland team.
Sometimes they went by the Indian, sometimes they went by the tigers, sometimes they went by the thorps. I swear you know they used all

Darin Hayes: Was. Was it? Was it the the Oorang team, or was it the Cleveland.

Jeff Payne: Oorang was and This was.

Darin Hayes: Okay.

Jeff Payne: Cleveland Tigers, slash, Indian slash, whatever they seem to change their name E every so often. But they played one of the only Nfl games that the Bricklay giants played and they played the Polo Grounds. And the reason people know this game is because
Thorpe and Brickley put on a kicking exhibition.
And there's actually a photo out there. I don't own it. I know. There, if you Google it, it is out there you'll see it because it's posted a few places. It shows both of them kind of getting ready to punt. It was probably staged.
but they put on a kicking exhibition and apparently there's some controversy about who won that. Some accounts say, Brickley kicked. They were drop kicking and kicking field goals. Some say Brickley kicked the farthest one, and somebody else said, No, on this last try, for surpassed him and and won it.

You know, of course, back then it was anything to get a fan in the stadiums, and you know they were. They often did kicking exhibitions, and just a any kind of entertainment imaginable, right? Like, you know you mentioned that who rang Indians? They always used to bring their their dogs out from the kennel and have them do tricks and do other things. I even heard they like used to tree a bear. If there was a tree around they'd get a bear out there and sound kind of crazy to me. But
That's the kind of stuff they were they were doing back then for entertainment.

Darin Hayes: They had, to do something to compete against the the college game. So pulling out all the stops was one way to do it. So yeah, very interesting. Very cool pictures.

Jeff Payne: Yeah, fortunate. Unfortunately, they didn't make it. But as I'm sure you know, and people probably heard then, of course, in the actual New York giants came along that are not affiliated at all with the Brickley giants, so their their histories aren't aren't aligned.

Darin Hayes: There. There's a little bit of history, though, involved, cause we we've learned that, you know, from Alan March, who's the great grandson of Dr. Harry March, that and and it's also recorded in Dr. March's writings in his famous book on Early Football History, that Dr. March and Tim Mara, or before they approach Tim Mara.

Joe Carr and March went to Billy Gibson to try to get him to to fund the the New York team, and he didn't want. He had a bad taste in his mouse, I guess, from the previous experience, and stayed with boxing, and and Mara took the the chance on it, so.

Jeff Payne: Well, and I I feel kind of bad for Billy Gibson, because the reason he took the team in was because the NFL. Staged an exhibition game in late or, Sorry, wrong century in Between. I think it was the Canton Bulldogs, and oh, it was the Buffalo Americans, and so they were good teams in the League, and they had an exhibition game in New York City and they had people show up.

So you know, Joe Carr's like, Wow, you know, New York City. Biggest city in America. Right? We did a team here, and he, you know, Billy Gibson's like, Wow, boy, people really like football. I'm all in, and, you know, paid the money and then sunk like a rock. So you know. I I think. The the promise was there right? I mean, that game showed that if you had the right teams or right audience or right situation.

You know, people would show up in New York.

But I think Billy Gibson was like, you got me once on this, you know. I'm not doing it again. But to your point, of course, he introduced Joe Carr to Mara, and you know, as I understand it, you know Dr. March's grandson. Right grandson, is that one.

Darin Hayes: Great great grandson, I believe.

Jeff Payne: Grandson would know better than than I do, certainly, but my understanding was, Mira said. I don't know anything about football at all. Sounds cool. I'm a sportsman and he, you know, reached out to find out who could help him put together a team, and and who knew something about football to help him out, and he, you know, pulled in Dr. March, and who really orchestrated everything and got everything and got the players
did all the heavy lifting, because Miro is like I I don't know anything about the sport, you know.

Darin Hayes: I think the rest of his quote was because there's a $entrance fee. The yeah. The car was charging to get in, he said. God, anything's worth a bet on $you know. So so something that affect so.

Jeff Payne: Yup!

Darin Hayes: But that had to be a good chunk of change back in, you know, s.

Jeff Payne: Yeah, I heard that was it equates to like.
I just read it

Jeff Payne: somewhere between and maybe in today's dollars. So it wasn't huge amount of money. But still, you know, hey, you know, it's not something usually lying around. You're just like.

Darin Hayes: Right, right.

Jeff Payne: Thrown to the wind. But yeah, no merit merit did it. And here we are, right. A years later, and you know.

Darin Hayes: They've added quite a bit to football. That's for sure.

Jeff Payne: Yeah, no, the the giants are obviously an iconic franchise. It's so cool that we're starting to see year anniversaries for these teams. Now, right.

Darin Hayes: Easy.

Jeff Payne: You know. You know we're we got a some coming up in the early early thirties as well right.

Darin Hayes: Right, yeah.

Jeff Payne: Those are all coming up, and of course, this year is also the possible Maroons, one of my my loves, their hundredth year anniversary of their starting almost end in the Nfl.

Darin Hayes[b]: And I felt great. Yeah, very fearful.

[b]Jeff Payne: To see teams that are that

Jeff Payne: old

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah. Who'd who would have thought?

[b]Jeff Payne: Yeah, I know right? And and I love the story about the the grains game. Of course, that's pretty well published and and legendary of, you know, Grange coming into into New York City, and you know, playing against the Giants, and you know the numbers I saw, and you all might have covered. It was, I think, mirror was something like in the hole at the end of that first season, and they've had a good year. I think they lost their first games NFL games, and then they won like in a row. I mean they. They had a pretty stinking good year for their first year in the League, but they couldn't draw enough to break even and what I heard was, Mara was really on the fence about, how long am I gonna do this? You know, if it's gonna be a you know, year, you know investment every year. I can't do that very, very long you know, and you know everybody says that more or less range, and the bears coming into New York playing that infamous game they drew what close to fans they estimate.

Darin Hayes: Yeah, there's between and

Jeff Payne: Tender.

Darin Hayes: For reports, and you know the newspapers weren't super.

Jeff Payne: I think.

Darin Hayes: Yeah, hey? Sliding out of fingers.

Jeff Payne: Ooo! Ooo! Yeah, that kind of saved the save the year. Right? Save the franchise. Maybe it's possible that.

Darin Hayes: Save football in New York, you know. Sure.

Jeff Payne: Yeah, they would have had to gone back to Billy Gibson again, and.

Darin Hayes: See.

Jeff Payne: Yeah, he can wrestle up next right.

Darin Hayes: Yeah, exactly.

Jeff Payne: We do have a couple of of cool things from some of the players on that first team. Now, I don't have anything that shows Thorp on that team because he did play for them early on in the season. I think that was me's first attempted, hey? I'm gonna you know. I'm gonna bring in a name hopefully, a draw. And you know.
yeah, I don't remember what he was paying Thorp, but I'm sure it wasn't cheap, because Thorpe didn't play for cheap didn't matter how old he was. He wasn't play for cheap but he didn't play very much. He was just too old, just too injured, too broken down and I don't remember how many games he was involved. But Merra cut him loose at some point, and just they just agreed to part ways because he wasn't helping the team, and they were losing so much money that you know it just didn't make sense for him to stay engaged ironically. I have a photo of Dutch Hendrian, who is another player on the team. Old school pro I don't have it with me right now, but it's really skinny, tall and skinny, and I always wonder why it was cut like that. Well, it's actually a picture that has Thorpe in it, too. It's Henrieten and Thorpe, and, like one or other dudes in a row on the field, somebody cut it up sold it off. I'm sure they sold the thorp out from under it, so I can say I have part of a photo of Thorpe, but it doesn't show photo of Thorpe in it. You gotta like. Imagine he's next to him, you know, when you look at it.

Darin Hayes: And just have a make his hand or something.

Jeff Payne: Exactly just shows Dutch, Henry. But I've seen the full photo. I'm like, man. I wish I had that
that full photo, because that's that's pretty cool.
But players I'm sure you all have talked about which which I really admire, and they were definitely stars of that team were Hinky Hayes and Haynes, Hinky Haynes and Jack Mcbride.

Jeff Payne: Of course you and I be in Pennsylvania, boys. We love the fact. Both those boys grew up in Pennsylvania.

Jeff Payne: you know. So you know

Jeff Payne: Hanky Haynes was from, I think Red Lion's, where he grew up.

Darin Hayes[b]: I think so.

[b]Jeff Payne: I think that's it. I actually wrestled a kid from Red Lion College

Jeff Payne: never wrestled anybody from there in high school, but I wrestled him in college. I think he went to Lockhaven or Bloomsburg or somewhere, so I knew Red Lion. They have good wrestling programs, and

Jeff Payne: and Jack Mcbride was from closer to Philly, down by conscien, which is like between like Valley Forge and Philly ish sorta. So they're about Pennsylvania, boys, which go PA right, PA.

Darin Hayes[b]: Surprise the the answer Site League didn't like snatch them up. You know they were going.

[b]Jeff Payne: No? Right? Yeah. Well, well, I think like.

Jeff Payne: well, Haines played for one of the semi pro teams

Jeff Payne: earlier in the twenties, I'm gonna say, Philly team. Maybe, like the Quakers.

Jeff Payne: there was a there was a

Jeff Payne: independent team in Philly that was pretty big at that time.

Darin Hayes[b]: They had, like Union Club of Phoenixville.

[b]Jeff Payne: Like that. Yeah.

Darin Hayes[b]: For the month.

[b]Jeff Payne: Like that. Yeah.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah, yeah.

[b]Jeff Payne: He played there.

Jeff Payne: but I don't think either of them played in the the answers Anthrax League.

Jeff Payne: Of course you know I love trivia right like the what team played the

Jeff Payne: you know. Fewest Nfl games. Of course, you know, Hinky Haynes claimed the famous.

Jeff Payne: I believe he's the only player that won a World series and an Nfl championship.

Darin Hayes[b]: It's right.

[b]Jeff Payne: Of course Dion Sanders made it to the World Series. He won several Nfl championships, you know. Super bowls didn't win the World Series, though, wasn't with the braves when they won, so he doesn't qualify. So yeah, Hanky Haynes is the only one great great trivia question for you all football

Jeff Payne: guys. And you know, there's not a lot of Hanky Hane stuff out there. I mean, I've seen some photos and stuff like that.

Jeff Payne: I have one thing from Hickie Haines, which is kind of cool. We

Jeff Payne: share my screen again real quick, and I'll bring it up.

Jeff Payne: And it's a baseball item. Actually, it's called mother's bread PIN

Jeff Payne: Haines with the Yankees in he only played one year in the major leagues, so he was fortunate enough to play with the Yanks and win the World Series.

Darin Hayes[b]: What? What does the F stand for like fielder or.

[b]Jeff Payne: No

Jeff Payne: Well, he was. He was a center fielder.

Jeff Payne: But his first name is

Jeff Payne: Frank or Fred. I don't know if that's the position or his first initial.

Darin Hayes[b]: Okay.

[b]Jeff Payne: No, because he was a center fielder. So I'm like, okay, does that mean they were designated? He was a fielder, or is that designated his first name was Whatever it is sorry with an FI know that.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah, that it probably is.

[b]Jeff Payne: Wasn't.

Darin Hayes[b]: Color is his last name. It's probably his first initial. Yeah, that's good.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yeah, I'd have to find another that they did a bunch of mother's bread. Did a bunch of pins that year

Jeff Payne: of players. So.

Jeff Payne: yeah, so you know, one of the things I collect is kind of a sub collection you and I may have talked about. It is, I call it footballers in other sports.

Jeff Payne: I have this huge checklist of every player that I've ever been able to find

Jeff Payne: that played professional football all the way back to the hundreds, but also has something from another sport. Lot of it's baseball, right? You know, you've got the, you know, Patty Driscoll's and the Ernie never's. And those guys who all played baseball, and they've got various cards. You know. But you know occasionally you find some kind of cool items like this as well. It's the only Hanky Haynes item that I've.

Darin Hayes[b]: How? How about one of my favorites, Jack Hayden, who'd have been turning the century, you know, played for the Franklin team I wrote about, and I think he played for Connie Mac and the Philadelphia Athletics and baseball.

[b]Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah, yep.

[b]Jeff Payne: So that's my hinky hands. I have a couple of Jack Mcbride. He's the other the other guy. Of course he didn't stay in States hanky hands once Penn state, by the way, so he's a nitty lion hashtag, we are but he and he was a you know, baseball and football player

Jeff Payne: at Penn State did really well on that. But Mcbride left the State. He left the Philly area, went to Syracuse

Jeff Payne: and had a good, you know. Good

Jeff Payne: good good career up there in Syracuse before he drifted back.

Jeff Payne: you know, over to New York. I have a couple of things

Jeff Payne: from him that I.

Darin Hayes[b]: This was like in in Haines and Mcbride, in those first few giants teams that was their their rushing special. That was their backfield mates, too.

[b]Jeff Payne: They were. They were backfield mates, and also, you know, back in that day they both through a lot of passes, too, so you'll see them designated, as you know, you know.

Jeff Payne: quarterback, slash, halfback, or something, both of them. In fact, I think Hinky Haynes was designated as the Qb. The year they won the Nfl championship in

Jeff Payne: so he was considered their quarterback. But they both through the ball. This is the back of a giants program, and I always like this image of Jack Mcbride just looks so tough. There, you can tell. He was a brawler and a bruiser.

Jeff Payne: I always thought that was pretty cool.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah, it looks like a hard asset, somebody you don't want to go outside with at the bar, and then.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yeah, he he might have spent some time town downtown, Philly, getting into some fist fights when.

Darin Hayes[b]: Right.

[b]Jeff Payne: Young and spry, and then he has a

Jeff Payne: He! He has a matchbook as well from

Jeff Payne: which I think is cool.

Darin Hayes[b]: That's a Syracuse uniform. He is on.

[b]Jeff Payne: You know.

Jeff Payne: I mean, it's But who knows when that photo was taken.

Darin Hayes[b]: The first thing if I'm reading upside down

[b]Darin Hayes[b]: product of series.

[b]Jeff Payne: Product.

Darin Hayes[b]: University is. There's.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yeah.

Darin Hayes[b]: I would be, you know.

[b]Jeff Payne: Form is.

Jeff Payne: It's kind of a funky uniform. It does have a lot of orange in it. So.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah.

[b]Jeff Payne: Giants had some.

Jeff Payne: you know. Orange, too, right? For a while. Yeah, I think they they might have.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah, yeah, could have.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yup, so that.

Jeff Payne: His match book, which I think was cool.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah, if I'm reading right, they're advertising. You know. Size, what? foot, pounds, you know

[b]Darin Hayes[b]: today, that would be the the water boy. I think I know.

[b]Jeff Payne: Maybe ball boy. And then my big, my big piece from is the you know the program from the game.

Jeff Payne: So I've had a couple of these. Actually, they're not as hard to find as you might imagine, just because there were of them of them. Well, who knows how many people bought the program. But obviously there were a lot of these programs

Jeff Payne: purchased at that game. So you know, I I am working on a run of all of the barnstorming programs from the Red Grange barnstorming tour.

Jeff Payne: you know that started, you know, right after he graduated. Well, right after he finished his last college game up through

Jeff Payne: early you know,

Darin Hayes[b]: That's a lot of games. So we we had Chris Willis of Nfl. Films, wrote a good nice book on. We had him on and have his book, and you know great coverage of all those different stops in the Floridas and out West, and everywhere else, is pretty cool.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yeah, and like.

Darin Hayes[b]: And a buckling with some items.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yeah, no, that'd be a fun talk, too, is to talk that through that that thing I got I have quite a few things from that. I I don't have a massive amount of programs. I probably have or of them, and I think there was like or

Jeff Payne: or installing games, and I've missed on as well. You know, a long time, collector friend.

Jeff Payne: you know. I remember him telling a story about how he missed on something he really wanted, and he said, Oh, well, you know, I'll get it next time it rolls around. And then he he said it took years before he saw it again. And his his lesson was, if it's something that really really fits your collection you really really want. And you know, it's really really rare. You better freaking. Buy it.

Darin Hayes[b]: I gotta buy it when it's available.

[b]Jeff Payne: You may never see it again, and I violated that rule twice.

Jeff Payne: and I am still kicking myself because I have never seen either of those programs again. This one, you will see. I've had copies of this program.

Jeff Payne: I traded one few years ago for some other very early Nfl programs.

Jeff Payne: but just a

Jeff Payne: great image of Grange on the front, you know.

Darin Hayes[b]: But, Jeff, just just curious. So being going to your collector side when you have a paper products, you know that we're not meant to survive and be a hundred years old, like they are. How how do you care for those, or display them? Or you know they like, locked in way in darkness? Or do you have them

[b]Darin Hayes[b]: like Madden and frame? How how do you display that.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yeah, I don't have any of my programs

Jeff Payne: matted and displayed.

Jeff Payne: I have some big cabinet photos matted and displayed. They're all

Jeff Payne: behind, you know, ultra UV

Jeff Payne: glass, you know, if if they're

Jeff Payne: I keep my programs and my other stuff for the most part in binders in the dark.

Jeff Payne: Never see the light of day other than if I pull it out and look at it.

Jeff Payne: But yeah, in in, you know, acid free, you know, holders and binder pages. You know you do need to be careful, because I mean right years old. This thing is years old.

Darin Hayes[b]: Alright!

[b]Jeff Payne: You know.

Jeff Payne: and you know you can see it's gone through. The war. Looks like somebody crumpled it up and stuck it wanted it in their coat pocket.

Darin Hayes[b]: Cup of coffee on it on the corner.

[b]Jeff Payne: No? Right? Yeah. Well, it's funny a lot of those old programs, you will see. And they will just have a crease right straight down the middle, because, of course, back. Then everybody dressed up to go out, and you can just envision somebody getting a program at the end of the game, fold it in half, stick it in their coat inside pocket. Right? I do that.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah, really.

[b]Jeff Payne: Stuff all the time. If I have a suitcode on.

Darin Hayes[b]: And it's just.

[b]Jeff Payne: I I think it's kind of cool, right? You're like, oh, I know what happened to this program. I know exactly what this person did watch the game, and then folded it in half and stuck it in their coat pocket. And here it is today.

Jeff Payne: This one didn't do that, but it looks like they I don't know held it over their head to stop the rain, or I I don't know what they did with this thing, but it.

Jeff Payne: It got beat up.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah, we'll have to look at. See what the weather report was. On December sixth, in New York.

[b]Jeff Payne: Oh, well, you know I don't know if you heard the story about that, but my understanding was that up that of course this is early December, so early December in New York. You could get anything right. I mean, that's like playing in Chicago any in December, and my understanding, from what I read is that the weather up

Jeff Payne: coming up to the game was not very good. I don't know if they had a lot of snow, but I know it was cold, and they had some precipitation. They had some rain, and what I've heard is that Mera was just nervous is all heck, you know. I mean he was betting a lot on this game. Of course he went out there to the Midwest to try to convince Grange to play for the giants that didn't work out too late.

Jeff Payne: but kudos to him, he immediately pivoted around, and he said, Well, next best thing is, get him to come to New York for a game, and

Jeff Payne: he got that commitment. And now

Jeff Payne: it's all dependent on the weather right? And what I heard is it? Up until the day before it was. It was not good weather, and sometime that night.

Jeff Payne: you know, that didn't. The night before the game

Jeff Payne: skies cleared up, things got nicer out still cold, obviously in New York. But

Jeff Payne: nice day.

Jeff Payne: least partly sunny.

Jeff Payne: And he woke up, and he was just like, Thank you. God, I need this, and I read that that the Giants made like a hundred $off that game something like that. Now, I don't know if that was the grand total, and then they split it, you know, with with Grange and the bears, or that was their take.

Jeff Payne: but regardless it more than pulled them out of the hole, and.

Jeff Payne: you know, gave them a cushion that they could use going forward, which you know.

Darin Hayes[b]: Great sign sign in some of these players that helped them win a championship. But you're coming up.

[b]Jeff Payne: Well, another another trivia. Another early trivia is at point Tim Mara owned at the same time Nfl franchises.

Darin Hayes[b]: Really.

[b]Jeff Payne: Cause. I know.

Darin Hayes[b]: I know about one other one other than the giants, but.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yes, he.

Jeff Payne: my understanding is, you know. Obviously he made the decision to buy the Detroit team because he wanted Benny Friedman. That was the only way I could he could get them was they were flailing. They belonged to Detroit.

Jeff Payne: He was worried. Somebody else was gonna buy him. I think he bought it for like grand.

Jeff Payne: So he bought the Detroit team and took their players

Jeff Payne: and so now he had

Jeff Payne: and I don't remember what he did with that one. I don't remember if he turned it back in the League eventually, but he had to.

Jeff Payne: and then the other one was. My understanding is

Jeff Payne: because of his arrangement with Grange

Jeff Payne: and

Jeff Payne: CC. Pyle when he allowed them to come into the Nfl

Jeff Payne: with the other New York team, the Yankees

Jeff Payne: if I'm remembering that right. That was the third one that he ended up with when Ccp.

Jeff Payne: Decided he didn't want to carry forward with the Nfl. Version of that team after a few years.

Jeff Payne: and he ended up with that one, too, and I believe that became the Staten Island. Stapleton's like he sold that to somebody else

Jeff Payne: to form the staple tins, because he still.

Darin Hayes[b]: Oh, okay.

[b]Jeff Payne: The rights in New York.

Jeff Payne: and he was only gonna sell it to somebody that you know. He kinda felt like he controlled or they weren't, you know, encroaching in territory, but he actually, I read. He had Nfl franchises at the same time.

Darin Hayes[b]: Taking a while. Guess I was thinking like, maybe the the horseman, the afl horseman team, because I know they merged with somebody, and I couldn't remember

[b]Darin Hayes[b]: if that was it. But so he had the the New York ranges. Ccp. Yankees in their Nfl year. Okay, after that.

[b]Jeff Payne: I believe that is yeah. So he owned at once, which is kind of freaking crazy. You think about it.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah, it is.

[b]Jeff Payne: From not knowing anything about football to owning

Jeff Payne: basically franchises, of them defunct. Obviously they weren't playing.

Darin Hayes[b]: How many people can you can say that, you know, cause even like Burt Bell, only part of you know. He was ownership of different franchise. I can't think of anybody else that

[b]Jeff Payne: Honestly at the same time. Right you could think of like you know, Ollie Osg Group, if that's how you pronounce his name, who own the Eskimos, and then negotiated with the Nfl. A smart man to have the right to be part owner in a future team in the area, and man. That was a pretty cool move on his part.

Jeff Payne: I can't think of many.

Darin Hayes[b]: Unless you count like, you know, or or say trading the the you know, with the rams Colts thing. Yeah. And the the other party on that I forget their name. But the yeah, very cool.

[b]Jeff Payne: The other thing I thought you might like is, and you may have had somebody else show one of these. But

Jeff Payne: these were season passes.

Jeff Payne: They call them silver passes that the New York giants sold

Darin Hayes[b]: Never seen that before. That's cool.

[b]Jeff Payne: Well, I think they stole it from some of the New York baseball teams, because I've seen baseball ones. They're obviously not shaped like this, but they're baseball ones from the mid twenties to from New York, and I can't remember if they were Yankees or giants.

Jeff Payne: But same idea right? You know, a silver pass, you know.

Jeff Payne: with the team on the front

Jeff Payne: and then on the back, which I think is really cool.

Jeff Payne: is, you know, the name of the person

Jeff Payne: and and the number of the past. This is for the season.

Jeff Payne: Now I've made it a little hobby every time one of these comes up I go on newspaperscom to see if I can figure out who the heck. This person was right. I did track down Mr. Trumbull. As you would imagine if you were buying a season pass. You probably had some cash in So it wasn't actually that hard to find the ones that I've seen.

Jeff Payne: because they tend to be people who are at least somewhat well known or affiliated with sports in the New York area. Mr. Trumbull was a newspaper columnist for one of the papers. I've read some of his articles from back in It's clearly him.

Jeff Payne: Which is kinda cool.

Jeff Payne: you know. I think he was in Brooklyn. Is that where he was at? Yeah, I think it was Brooklyn. I've seen one for John Mcgraw, manager for the New York, you know, baseball team.

Darin Hayes[b]: Baseball. Giants. Yeah.

[b]Jeff Payne: Back in the day. I've seen one for him, so he was clearly a season ticket holder, and I've seen one for a judge.

Jeff Payne: So I tracked him down from some of the court cases. His name?

Jeff Payne: Yeah. So it's just a little kind of cool.

Darin Hayes[b]: Now, how how large is this? A, actually, is this like size of a coin? Or you know.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yeah, it there it's I have it blown up here so you can see. I'd say it's about.

Jeff Payne: Oh, it's hard to tell on the screen. But yeah, like, you know how you

Jeff Payne: you put those coins in a machine and stretch them out. It's not that small. They're bigger than that.

Jeff Payne: but

Jeff Payne: you know they're probably

Jeff Payne: to inches long, one inch.

Jeff Payne: aye, maybe a little bigger than that nice size.

Darin Hayes[b]: And they're like pure silver. So, or is it just silver.

[b]Jeff Payne: I do not know what they're

Jeff Payne: well, there's a mark down there. I I don't know.

Jeff Payne: They call them silver passes. I do not know if they're actual silver or not

Jeff Payne: that yeah, that'd be hard.

Darin Hayes[b]: Pretty expensive token to be carrying to a football game. Say, okay, I'm here for my wanting to gate.

[b]Jeff Payne: But pretty expensive tickets to be,

Jeff Payne: you know, producing for your fans, too, you know.

Jeff Payne: There, these are hard to get, and they're hard to get, because when they do show up they go for some cash. And people, probably giants, fans really like these, and they do not show up. I've only seen like I said, a handful of them through the years.

Jeff Payne: and they're hard to get. I took or runs at them before I finally was able to get one.

Jeff Payne: I just think they're cool. It's like.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah, that's really neat. I've never seen or heard of those before. That's really that is neat.

[b]Darin Hayes[b]: Yep, yeah, thank you for sharing that.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yeah.

Jeff Payne: So I think that's that's my stuff from the giants, early giants.

Jeff Payne: memorabilia. Wise. I I have later stuff some freedmen things and other things, of course, into the

Jeff Payne: s. But in terms of the first couple of years of the giants.

Darin Hayes[b]: Very very cool.

[b]Jeff Payne: Able to track down.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah, those those are. I mean, that's great. I mean you. We've we've talked about some of these folks, but you you shared some different stories about them. Some, you know, we saw some different images of them from your collection. Learn some new things like the silver in the past that you had, and that's all great stuff in the match book. I've never seen seen that before. That's

[b]Darin Hayes[b]: that's some really neat stuff that they they used to make.

[b]Jeff Payne: Absolutely. Yeah. I love. I love trying to find images of pro players, you know, from the early days, because there weren't a lot of cards back. Then, you know, there weren't many card sets, so

Jeff Payne: you know, there's no tops. There's no bowman there. There's not none of that stuff out there. So you gotta kind of really dig

Jeff Payne: to find things, whether it's photos or match books or pins or

Jeff Payne: backs of programs, fronts of programs. There's just not that many images for a lot of these players, you know

Jeff Payne: it does in that era.

Darin Hayes[b]: It seems like advertisers love to use those their images, though, you know, like you had the mother's bread, and what was the matchbook of probably a cigarette company or something.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yeah, I'm in diamond mash books. Yup.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah, yeah.

[b]Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah, real. Cool.

[b]Jeff Payne: And and I do have some. You know, when Grange came to New York City I know the story is, you know, one of the ways that mayor enticed

Jeff Payne: him and the bears and whatnot to come. Play that game was.

Jeff Payne: you know, he's like, Hey, you know, New York city advertising capital of the world. You can sign endorsement deals there, and and my my understanding is Grange and Pyle either came a day early or stayed a day later, and just basically set up in the hotel.

Jeff Payne: And we're like, just bring it whatever you want grains to endorse. You. Come and pitch it. We'll take the

Jeff Payne: the best deals, and apparently they they signed up a lot of endorsement deals. Well, they were in New York City.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah. I've already had.

[b]Jeff Payne: Hello! I heard.

Darin Hayes[b]: Andy bars. I think I've seen before.

[b]Jeff Payne: Shotwell. Yeah. The Shotwell candy bars which the movie came out of that the movie you know came out of that as well associated with the shot. Wells. I think that was actually a Kennedy production, right? Wasn't Joe Kennedy. I think Joe Kennedy produced the movie min

Jeff Payne: to play.

Jeff Payne: which was the the Grange movie. And

Jeff Payne: Shotwell was the sponsor for that movie. Because, you know, then they produce those great card sets

Jeff Payne: of Grange, the addbacks and the blank backs from the movie.

Jeff Payne: Yeah. So I I think I don't remember what I heard. Grange ended up with endorsement deal wise out of that New York City trip, but it was a lot.

Jeff Payne: He he raked it up, including the meatloaf story. I love the meatloaf. I've never seen anything with Grange's picture on a meatloaf before, so I kind of wonder how that all went down. But apparently that was one of the endorsement deals that.

Darin Hayes[b]: And what was it like.

[b]Jeff Payne: A meatloaf.

Darin Hayes[b]: And in the shape of his head, or.

[b]Jeff Payne: Don't know. I've never seen.

Darin Hayes[b]: Your meat loaf in it. You want your meat loaf to look like a football player. Here we go.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yeah, I mean, the you know, Shotwell rappers are out there. The Shotwell cards are out there. There's movie placards. I have a big kind of broad board broad, you know, broadside advertisement for that movie hanging up in my my basement that I picked up somewhere. So you know a lot of those endorsement deals there's stuff out there to to grab. And I love. I love grabbing, you know, advertisement type stuff with football on it.

Jeff Payne: but I've never seen the meatloaf. I don't know what happened with that one, you know.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah, pro. Probably not any of them left. I'm probably got eaten or thrown away by now.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yeah, I know. Right, you're gonna keep a meat loaf camp.

Darin Hayes[b]: I don't want to smell a hundred year old.

[b]Jeff Payne: That.

Darin Hayes[b]: I know.

[b]Jeff Payne: No, I have a couple of the Shotwell boxes

Jeff Payne: that the candy bars came in.

Darin Hayes[b]: Okay.

[b]Jeff Payne: As well. Yeah, those are floating around out there. You'll see them.

Darin Hayes[b]: They gotta be rare.

[b]Jeff Payne: They're pretty rare.

Jeff Payne: They're pretty rare. But they yeah. Once in a while one will pop up

Jeff Payne: ebay or at auction, or whatever more so than the rappers do the wrappers you never see.

Jeff Payne: They're really hard to find.

Jeff Payne: and there's different varieties. There's I think it's or different versions of the wrapper that are out there. I think I have or of them

Jeff Payne: never found them all

Jeff Payne: they're impossible to find. Always on the prow. One came up. Actually, I think it was on

Jeff Payne: ebay sometime in the last couple of months, but it was one I already had so.

Darin Hayes[b]: Who? Who would have thought when some kids eating a candy bar, and you know, tossing it away, that someday somebody would want that and have it as a piece of collection and pay big money, for that's, you know, something

[b]Darin Hayes[b]: one man's treasures, another man's trash, or however it goes.

[b]Jeff Payne: One cool thing that came out of that was, there's always been a debate about.

Jeff Payne: you know, which card is Red Grange's earliest card.

Jeff Payne: Is it the strip card that was produced? Is it the Shotwell sets that was produced? Is it the star player candy? Is it the Spalding Slash sports Company, America. All those were produced in the twenties at some point, obviously mid to late twenties.

Jeff Payne: but nobody knows for sure when those were actually produced.

Jeff Payne: and for a long time, you know, it was felt like

Jeff Payne: the star player candy which

Jeff Payne: one of the grading companies has. This One of them has this

Jeff Payne: it could be arranged, too, right? Nobody knows, because the problem is, the card says, you know, he's with Illinois on the card, so everybody's like, well, it ha! It can't be after

Jeff Payne:

Jeff Payne: but it wasn't uncommon, of course, back then, for

Jeff Payne: the makers of cards to put their college designations on players cards, because college was just so much more popular than the pros were.

Jeff Payne: And so I don't know if that necessarily means that cards from I know that some of the other players in the shot or in the star player candy set

Jeff Payne: a couple of the cards designate the player as captain, and that person wasn't captain until

Jeff Payne: for their team in college. So they at least went, they were at least produced until

Jeff Payne: And so, you know, one of the grading companies has is because of the Grange. Somebody else has a because some of the cards couldn't have been produced before then.

Jeff Payne: Who knows when? But there's always been this debate about when these cards were produced.

Jeff Payne: but one interesting thing is so. A lot of people say, well, the the star putter candy, because of the cards that are in there, you know. People tend to think maybe it was a little later, and they just put Grange is Illinois cause he was so well known for that.

Jeff Payne: But then you have the well, was it? When did the shot well, candy come out? Did it come out before the movie was produced because the movie came out in. I think it was the

Jeff Payne: fall of

Jeff Payne: was filmed during the summer.

Jeff Payne: If you heard that story like they need people in the stands, but it had to be cold. So they they paid people.

Jeff Payne: No, they even pay them. Ccp. I think, came up with the idea of. They told people they could come in and watch an exhibition of football if you wear a winter coat during the game, and it was in like La in the summer. And all these people showed up for free football, and they scrimmaged as part of this

Jeff Payne: this movie production. They got all these people to come for free and wear coats like it was cold out.

Darin Hayes[b]: In l-.

[b]Jeff Payne: Really

Jeff Payne: great idea. Right? So a lot of people are like, well, when did this come out? And and you know, could the Shotwells be the earliest but long story short, one of the wrappers I bought was taken it was removed from a scrapbook.

Jeff Payne: and on the back of the wrapper still attached

Jeff Payne: to the

Jeff Payne: to the the wrapper.

Jeff Payne: From the back side of the scrapbook was a piece of a box score from a baseball game.

Jeff Payne: Alright, and I was like, Okay.

Jeff Payne: I'm gonna figure out when this game was played.

Jeff Payne: Is this a game.

Jeff Payne: just a game.

Jeff Payne: What month, and then I'll be able to know at least right.

Jeff Payne: When did this? When was this candy bar purchased at least.

Jeff Payne: and I did track it down

Jeff Payne: through a lot of heavy lifting. It's actually a world. It was a world series game in So it was played in October of

Jeff Payne: so I at least know the candy bars, you know. You know. At least we're being produced during that timeframe.

Jeff Payne: You know, around October of which was right around when the movie came out. So they probably coincided.

Jeff Payne: You know, the relief.

Darin Hayes[b]: And it coincided with the the Afl

[b]Darin Hayes[b]: Yankees, red, green Yankees.

[b]Jeff Payne: Oh, yeah.

Darin Hayes[b]: Original, Afl.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yep.

Darin Hayes[b]: That's season.

[b]Jeff Payne: So yeah, that was kind of cool. So I kinda know when those were produced.

Jeff Payne: subsequently learned that you can tell based on some nuances of the strip cards that were produced.

Jeff Payne: which year they were produced, and the Grange one definitely was produced in So I kind of lean toward the

Jeff Payne: the Grange strip card.

Jeff Payne: black and white strip card that's out there that you see occasionally as being probably his oldest card.

Jeff Payne: but nobody's

Jeff Payne: certain on that.

Darin Hayes[b]: That's the fun part of collecting and like in history, when you have those controversies. And there's not really any answer that's definitive, that it makes for great debate and stories and and great listening for for people like myself and the listener. So that's cool stuff. It probably drives you crazy. But we, we love it.

[b]Jeff Payne: It's all. It's all good, you know. It's not life or death, right? I always say it's just. It's just collecting nothing to get worked up about. You know you have your opinion. I have mine. You have your facts. I have mine. We agree disagree, whatever. It's just a hobby. Just fun.

Jeff Payne: Yeah.

Darin Hayes[b]: So may maybe, with with that thought, let's segue in. You know you have run a a forum that has some some of the the best football minds and historians of our day. Because they mo many, most of them are collectors, and know, just like yourself, know a lot about the pieces they collect. So you know, when you're throwing down some some cash on some things, you want to have some back history on it. Once you share with folks that maybe they'd be interested in in joining, or, you know.

[b]Darin Hayes[b]: looking at some of the stuff, too, that's being shared on our collectors form.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yeah, sure. Yeah, thanks, Darren, yeah. So I run vintage football community.

Jeff Payne: It's a football only

Jeff Payne: community of I always say collectors and collectors, hobbyists, and researchers. Because

Jeff Payne: we have all sorts. You mentioned Chris Willis earlier, who's written a bunch of books. I love all his books on football

Jeff Payne: and he's a he's a member. He does some collecting, but he's more known for his research and his books and whatever. And

Jeff Payne: and if you're gonna

Jeff Payne: really understand some of these items and their context. You need people really know

Jeff Payne: football, you know Timothy Brown, who, you know, obviously, is another person that

Jeff Payne: sticks out to me as being somebody who just drills into subjects

Jeff Payne: and knows so much about so many things.

Jeff Payne: Then, having people like that around, you know. You know. I I the people on the on on our group always say not a week goes by that you don't see something in the hobby you've never seen before. It is so true true for me every week I'm like, Wow! I've never seen that before. I cannot believe that exists.

Jeff Payne: and you know it's great, because people will post something and say, Hey, I don't know what this is right. We have that one.

Jeff Payne: We've one thread that's the unsolved. We called unsolved mysteries.

Darin Hayes[b]: Has commented multiple times. That's his favourite thing.

[b]Jeff Payne: A.

Darin Hayes[b]: Loves, that when those come up and.

[b]Jeff Payne: And now gets.

Darin Hayes[b]: Digging. You know he loves that.

[b]Jeff Payne: Yeah. And there's lots of people that do a lot of digging right? I mean, they'll see something they'll be like, I I think I know where to look for this, and

Jeff Payne: within a couple of days often not always like some stuff you just you just can't find.

Jeff Payne: But people will dig in and find stuff and pop up

Jeff Payne: contacts for it.

Jeff Payne: You know what like. I was just doing some research on early black players pro players, and it reminded me that I had this photo of a you know, an all black team.

Jeff Payne: and the it had a banner, but it was really hard to read it, and I could not figure out what this team was, and finally I gave up and I posted it to.

Jeff Payne: You know. Vfc.

Jeff Payne: in that.

Jeff Payne: you know, in that channel, and within a day or

Jeff Payne: somebody had it right. They're like, Oh, this, that's here's what it is. And what what struck me was they mentioned in the article I was reading, that the first game

Jeff Payne: between

Jeff Payne: black teams, college teams, historically, Black Universities, was played between Biddle and Livingston University.

Darin Hayes[b]: Yeah.

[b]Jeff Payne: I think they were in North Carolina or somewhere in the South.

Jeff Payne: and

Jeff Payne: this is a photo not as old as that game.

Jeff Payne: Of Biddle.

Jeff Payne: they change their name so on the on the

Jeff Payne: the pennant that was really hard to read. It had their new, the new name of their college. But the ball

Jeff Payne: had Lc. For Livingston College, so they clearly had taken this after they'd beaten their arch rival, who they played the first game between historically black colleges.

Jeff Payne: you know. Here's a picture, you know. I think it was from the team. So.

Darin Hayes[b]: That's.

[b]Jeff Payne: You know, or so years after

Jeff Payne: the first time they played, but you know I was. I never would have known what that was if it wasn't for for vm.

Darin Hayes[b]: And see, and.

[b]Jeff Payne: We just, you know, it's also a place that collectors can share and

Jeff Payne: talk about stuff and enjoy each other people that appreciate your stuff right? You know I don't know about you, but most people I know they don't appreciate this stuff.

Darin Hayes[b]: No, yeah, right? It it.

[b]Jeff Payne: They they close up.

Darin Hayes[b]: So as so.

[b]Jeff Payne: Talking about. They start blazing over.

Darin Hayes[b]: Get in a group of football nerds like the Vfc. Is. That's that's our place, that with our safe place that we can all enjoy each other's company and collections, and the history so great. Great Forum, great place.

[b]Jeff Payne: Always looking for new members. It's free.

Jeff Payne: You know. Just drop me a line and

Jeff Payne: send it through, Darren. If anybody's interested. We're always looking for more people, the more the merrier you know, the more contacts, the more people showing different things. It's just a great place to enjoy the hobby kind of so.

Jeff Payne: and and we always do something. Anyone's going to the National this year.

Jeff Payne: You know, which is Mecca for me. I I went when it came to Baltimore, and like right around whenever it was in Baltimore, that was my first national. I was just getting back into the hobby.

Jeff Payne: and it was local. So I was like, I'll run up and I'll check this thing out. I've heard about, and I just fell in love with it. I've been there every year since other than obviously Covid year when they didn't have it.

Jeff Payne: And I've already said I'm gonna go there until they can't wheel me there anymore.

Jeff Payne: I just love it. And it's not even the content. There, I mean, you see, so much great stuff, but

Jeff Payne: it's just catching up with people and

Jeff Payne: seeing so many people and talking about so much stuff. And you know, it's just it's almost like a reunion at this point.

Jeff Payne: Anybody that's going to Cleveland this year definitely. Yeah, look me up. And if you're interested in VFC, let Darin know. I'd love to have you.

Darin Hayes[b]: Very cool, Jeff. We real, I mean, we appreciate you sharing these stories, the information you have. You're hoping to preserve the football history and and helping us celebrate this New York giants season as well. And we can't thank you enough. And appreciate your time.

[b]Jeff Payne: Thank you. Happy birthday giants. Fans.

Jeff Payne: It's a great, great accomplishment. A years.

---

The Football Archaeology of the Football Men Who Endorsed and helped Goldsmith Sporting Goods to make football equipment in 1935.

Helmets are probably the first piece of equipment we think of when someone asks us about football. The head covering may be the most recognizable element of the gridiron.

Timothy Brown, like many of us, is enamored by the evolution of the football helmet as a product and safety device. Tim collects football catalogs selling the equipment and then dives into the variations and innovations that were derived along the way.

In a recent post, footballarchaeology.com/p/todays-tidbit-1935-goldsmith-sports">1935 GoldSmith Sports Equipment Consulting Staff, Tim delved into the 1935 Coaching Consultants and reps that GoldSmith had and then came on to share what he found with us on a podcast episode.

-Transcription of 1935 GoldSmith Sports Equipment Consulting Staff with Timothy Brown

Hello, my football friends, this is Darin Hayes of PigskinDispatch.com. Welcome once again to The Pig Pen, your portal to positive football history, and welcome to another Tuesday as we get to visit with our friend Timothy P. Brown of FootballArcheology.com. Tim, welcome back to The Pig Pen.

Thank you, sir. Look forward to chatting again, as always, and hopefully we'll have something interesting for people to listen to.

Yeah, you, Tim, you have some amazing things happening, you know, each and every day, and every once in a while you get some of these zingers that like, just like, I can't call it an earworm, I don't know what it is, it just, it stays with me all day when I read it. I read it in the evening and it stays with me through the night. I'm laying in bed thinking about it, wake up next morning, and one of those is, you keep going into the Goldsmith's catalog, and you had one that, you know, that you had back in September out as a tidbit that talks about some staff that Goldsmith's catalog got some information from, so maybe you could talk a little bit about that tonight.

Yeah, so, you know, so I guess, you know, first off, just, you know, by way of background, I have something on the order, you know, 30 or 40 vintage sporting goods catalogs, you know, so I collect them over time, or I've collected them over time, it's just a way to be able to look up, okay, well, you know, some of it's just images, you know, for the tidbits, but it's also just, you know, you can look at them and understand, okay, this is what this equipment was made of at the time, and how things changed and things that they created that disappeared because they didn't really work very well, or they were uncomfortable, you know, whatever it may have been. Anyways, I collect these catalogs, and most of them, I'm just, you know, I'm buying them online, and so I don't, typically, I'm only seeing like cover photographs, a couple of inside pages, but I don't know what, you know, it's not like, you know, it can be a 90 page catalog, but I'm only seeing images of a couple of them. Anyways, this was one of those, you know, I bought this, Goldsmith was a big brand at the time, and I didn't have a lot of Goldsmith catalogs, so I, you know, picked this one up.
And, you know, then once it was delivered, it was like, right away, okay, this is really cool, because in addition to just normal pages, showing the equipment, the pricing and everything for shoulder pads and helmets and whatever, each of the different major types of equipment, they had a lead in cartoon page that kind of told the history of that type of equipment, the history of football shoes, the history of helmets. And so, it was, number one, it's just kind of fun imagery, they're interesting cartoons. So, it was just a way to, you know, kind of go through those, and then, you know, what I've done, you know, it's a series of, there will be an eighth week now, but, you know, so it's just a way to publish, to do these, show these cartoons, and then just go through the equipment of the time.

And so, this is mid-30s, you know, so what was equipment like, you know, then. And so, this, the first of those cartoons was about what they called their consulting staff. And so, that was, you know, essentially, consulting staff was like, the coaches, and one trainer, who were their, like, their advisory staff, they were the guys who they would go to, to talk through, you know, what kinds of changes do we need for the equipment, or if they had a research and development group, they would show them, they'd show these coaches, hey, here's what we've come up with, what do you think about this? Can you have you guys wear this stuff in spring practice, or in regular practice, and see how it performs? You know, so they were, you know, obviously, these coaches were paid.

And in many cases, they, that, you know, the manufacturers would then, you know, just like your old baseball gloves, where it was like, the Mickey Mantle glove, or whatever, you know, there were, there were pants, and helmets, and footballs, that had the Newt Rockne name on it, or who met Pop Warner, and John Heisman, and, you know, so. Well, Tim, was, was Goldsmith, were they sort of in the Midwest? Is that what I'm getting a sense of? Or what part of the country were they centered out of? You know, a lot of the coaches that are on this advisory staff are Midwest guys. So, I kind of get a sense of that.

But, you know, there was a lot of Midwest, like D&M was out east, they were like a Massachusetts firm, but Spalding was Midwest, Reach, I believe, was Midwest, or a couple down in St. Louis. So, yeah, I don't have that catalog in front of me. But I could, you know, I could look, look it up.

And I can, you know, let you know, you know, kind of where they were based. Yeah, that's, that's what I was, Is there a reason you ask her? Well, I know that Spalding was out of Chicago, and it just seemed, you know, and it seems like, like you said, this, a lot of these coaches are Midwestern teams, Western Conference, Big Ten teams. And I just wondering, you know, if there was a reason why maybe, you know, distribution or something that they were in the center of the country because you really, you think about that area, you know, football starting in the east and moving west, you'd almost think the equipment would be more of an eastern-based, you know, industrial shipping out.

But just curious. Yeah, I think, well, my understanding is a lot of it was the stockyards in Chicago, you know, so there was access to leather. Okay, you know, so I mean, so much of the early equipment, yeah, so much of the early equipment was leather, that, you know, it made more sense to be where you could pick and choose and get high-grade leathers and yada, yada, yada.

So, yeah, I mean, it's funny, it's one of those things you wouldn't even think is, you know, there's no reason anymore, you know, to be near a source of leather.
Obviously, you know, baseball gloves are a different story. But otherwise, you know, most football equipment, there's no leather involved anymore.

And then the ball, you know, obviously, the balls were leather. So anyways, yeah, that's, that's why I love it, you know, started in the Midwest. That makes perfect sense.

Okay, thanks. Yeah, so, so then, you know, like these coaches were, you know, the folks that they had on at that point, so in 1935, they had a Hunk Anderson, who was at North Carolina State, but it just finished a tour at Notre Dame. So Midwest, then he had played at Notre Dame.

Noble Kizer was at Purdue. Fritz Crisler was at Princeton, but he had been at, he had played at Uof Chicago. He had coached Minnesota before going to Princeton.

And then obviously ended up at Michigan. Doc Spears had been all over. Well, he kind of he was a journeyman, he was actually a doctor, but a football coach, but he was at Wisconsin at the time.

And I can't remember if he had just gone there. I think he got fired after that, and then went out to Oregon, or it could have been the other way around. And then this guy, Frank Major Wandel, from Yale, who was, he was one of those interesting guys at the time, there were a lot of, it's kind of like, you know, there are these strength and conditioning coaches now who are, you know, kind of, they have their own brand, they're, they're nationally known, nationally recognized guys.

And, you know, back then, there were trainers like that, too. And he was one of them. So he'd been longtime trainer at West Point, and he ends up down at, I think it was LSU for a couple of years.

Then he ends up at Yale, which is where he was at at the time. So, so actually, the mix isn't that much Midwestern. But it's interesting, because the image that you have, and folks, if you've got to enjoy these images that Tim's talking about, we have link in the show notes, you can go to Tim's page and see some of these, he's talking about these cartoons.

But Major Wandel, you know, everybody else is sort of wearing like white knickers. And he's got like, I don't know if they're plaid knickers, or, but that's what jumps out of you on the page to me, is these knickers. And it's he's in the lower right hand corner of the page I'm looking at, but he must have been a character to have some like looks like he's golfing, maybe.

Yeah, I mean, he's one of those guys who just like came out of some gym in New Jersey, and ended up eventually hooking in with, he did some training, you know, during World War One, and then ends up at West Point for quite a while. But yeah, I mean, back then, trainers were function both. They handled both the kind of sports medicine side, you know, they weren't physicians.

But when we think about athletic training, we're thinking about, you know, hot baths, and cold baths, and, you know, taping guys, and, you know, some kind of contraption, you know, so it doesn't hurt, as well as strength and condition. So they were both at the time, and mostly conditioning, they didn't do as much strength work. But yeah, a lot of these guys were, you know, they're big on the whole, getting guys to roll on the ground to toughen them up.

Things that we now think are pretty absurd, but, you know, that was kind of core beliefs at the time. Yeah, I can remember back when I was playing when I was, like, I think the first year I played, maybe I was in fifth grade or something. I remember our coach, he was old school.

He was an older guy. And you'd have part of your calisthenics, you'd run in place, and then drop and make sure your stomach hits first, because that's going to toughen your gut up, you know, as everybody gets the wind knocked out of when you hit the ground, and you're gasping trying to get back up. But I picture that kind of training.

Yeah, that was the deal. But one of the things I thought was kind of cool, I can't remember, you know, which eater left this as a comment or a question, but, you know, I'm a Purdue fan. And, you know, there were a lot of schools back in the 30s that wore winged helmets, right? I mean, we now associated with just a select few schools.

But back then, it was very common. Nevertheless, you know, this guy made a comment that you know, back in the 30s, mid-30s, in particular, Purdue wore winged helmets, you know, so wing in front straps, you know, going back, kind of, you know, the Michigan, Delaware, Princeton style now. But she's like, so that's where you know because Noble was one of these advisory coaches.

And so I would bet if you look at images of the Purdue team from that era, there probably weren't some, some form of Goldsmith helmet, right? So as opposed to some competitive brand. So anyways, but for him, it was kind of a neat insight because it's like, so that's why they were those, those stupid. Now, with these coaches, sort of being on the board of directors, or the consultants of the now the day, is that, you know, their teams buy all their equipment from a Goldsmith, then is that was that's part of the deal of, you know, I've never really seen anything that goes into the details of those kinds of contracts.

I mean, I've read a few things about Knute Rockne because he was like, I mean if you think that there's somebody that, that is on every commercial nowadays, like, you know, save been, you know, down in Alabama's on a fair amount of stuff. But Rockne was, I mean, he was pitching, obviously, all kinds of athletic equipment. And then he pitched Ramblers or Studebakers, you know, one of those brands, he made coffee, he did all you know, stuff for Kelloggs, a lot of stuff for Kelloggs, and they had coffee at the time.

I just thought Barbasol was big on Barbasol. So he was from a Holmes and Travis Kelsey, eat your hearts out. Newt Rocky was first.

That's right. Major sponsor ambassador. Yeah.

Okay, so well, yes. Did the coach or did the teams buy that brand of equipment? And so I've never really, you know, I've never seen anything definitive. In that regard, and I have this kind of a storyline I've never checked into.

You know, I have read a number of things with Newt Rocky and his, you know, he, he promoted a lot of different kinds of consumer goods, but then also a lot of football equipment. So I mean, I have to believe that they, at minimum, they benefited from the, you know, they got discounts on the equipment, and in some cases, free stuff in order to test it, you know, it had to be that kind of thing going on. But, you know, the research I've done in the past about, you know, like when logos first came, you know, when logos became prominent in the 60s, really Adidas, you know, among track athletes that whole thing got going, and they were, you know, giving away equipment, paying athletes to wear their branded goods.

So that's really where that started. But there were probably, you know, less, you know, maybe a little bit less formal, you know, kinds of, you know, deals in the past, right? You know, yeah, I'm just picturing like a high school coach or athletic director saying, Hey, you know, Fritz Kreisler's endorsing this product, goldsmith, we better write our equipment there, because, you know, we're, we're Fritz Kreisler fans, or, you know, you know, Hunky Anderson fans, whatever, you know, they see they're endorsing it. And, you know, that's probably a lot of the attraction from for having them on the covers.

Yeah. And, you know, I'm sure they got that they got paid something just like, you know, the baseball gloves. And, you know, those athletes got things, and somehow they get money when their gloves are sold.

Right. So right. But, you know, the details of it, I don't understand, or, you know, really know anything about.

I wonder, I picture, you know because you have some great images of the helmets. I wonder maybe, you know, we can look back at some old photographs. Maybe I'll do that in some spare time here and look and see if you can tell a goldsmith helmet from, you know, a Spalding or some of the other manufacturers.
And maybe you can tell that way and say, Hey, you know, Purdue was wearing a goldsmith in 37 or. Yeah. And yeah.

Well, even in that article, I did do that. I couldn't find a good sharp image of the Princeton team from that era to see, well, what helmet they wore? Well, in fact, what I, the only thing I really found was a, it was a painting or an illustration from a year, you know, Princeton yearbook. And the helmets of Princeton players are wearing what we think of as a classic winged helmet.

It was. There's a helmet style. It kind of looks like, now I'm blanking on the term, but it's kind of like a three-leaf clover sort of design. It's, you know, so anyway, but, you know, and Goldsmith offered that helmet and, or that style of helmet, but I think others did as well.

So sometimes it's hard to tell like what brand, because, you know, people, you know, they, they wore, you know, they had similar designs, you know, different brands. Okay. Gotcha.

All right. So go ahead and continue. Yeah.

Well, I was mostly just gonna say, I'm not sure, you know, I'm just, I put together some notes in advance. And so I don't know that I had had anything else. I mean, other than just one of the things that's pretty remarkable, as in all the catalogs or in all the different products, is it like on helmets, you could go from, like, say, a $15 helmet down to like one that costs $2 and 35 cents.

So the, you know, they, they end up having these high end helmets, and then, then there's kind of moderately priced ones, and then there's pretty inexpensive helmets. And so you just gotta, you know, it's like now, every helmet has to meet a certain base at least, you know, performance level, you know, based on Noxi. But, you know, back then, it was like, well, no, we, this is a helmet, it's good.

You know, but there's no measurement standards or anything. It's just like you're taking somebody's word for it. Yeah, that leads into one of the questions I was gonna ask you because the the ad for the helmets that you have on this tidbit, you know, it has three examples of helmets that they were promoting.

And all of them say leather lined. Now, what would be the alternative to leather-lined in that era? Would it be like, you know, cloth or something? Or, you know? Yeah, I think the internals were either leather or felt for the most part. And so you'll, you'll also see things.

You pretty much have to look at the less expensive ones to get a handle on the alternatives. For example, moleskin was kind of a high-end material for pants. It was not as popular in the 1930s, but it was still a high-end material.

Canvas was a low-end material. And then there might be different kinds of twills and maybe duck and whatever. I don't even know what some of those things really are, that they're one form of cotton, you know, material or another, but then by the 30s, you were getting into, you know, silk, and a lot of times it's like airplane cloth, which is actually a form of silk.

So silk, and then I'm blanking on the kind of the really shiny material that satin, you'd see that satin, yeah, it's so you'd see satin on the front of you know, certain, certain teams pants. So yeah, I mean, some of it was once they got into some of the, the not-so-like silk, one of the real values of it was lighter, much more water repellent, you know, so it didn't soak up sweat and, you know, water in a rainy situation. So the players, you know, felt lighter, but it also silk is much easier to dye.

And you can do a much broader range of colors, whereas the duck and canvas pretty much always had earth tones, you know, one or tone or another. So everybody wore kind of the same look in pants until New York versus wearing purple pants. So, you know, I mean, it's, you think about it, that was a big deal.

Awesome. Somebody, hey, they're wearable pants. Right? Yeah, I was just trying to go when you were saying, you know, that from the $15 helmet down to the $2 and 35 cent helmet, I'm picturing, you know, hey, you know, varsity players, you get the $15 helmet with a leather lined and freshmen, you're going to get the burlap lined helmets, you know, uncomfortable.

Yeah, well, I'm sure that sure that was short, obviously, the freshmen who were wearing the stuff, those latest and greatest 10 years ago. Right. And the thing on some of that is, I was looking at, so I'm still writing, you know, writing one of these, and it there's, there's kind of like a flap in the back between kind of the ear hole area in the back.

It's got some kind of flexible extension, some kind of elastic band there. So there was that part of the sizing. If you look at the catalog, sometimes not a lot is said about helmet sizing.

And so, you know, I always had a big old water bucket head. So I needed a big helmet. I've got a younger brothers, you know, got a pinhead.

And, you know, so, but presumably, we would have been issued the same helmet. So, yeah, I'm sure they had some kind of size variations, but, you know, they don't talk about much of the catalog size variations. You had to stuff some straw or a rag in the back or something to make it stay on your head.

Tim, that's a fascinating stuff. And you've, you've got a lot of these goldsmiths that you've been coming out as you said, you had an eight-part series on it, but you have a lot of other interesting stuff coming out, you know, seven days a week. Maybe you could share with folks how they could get in touch with you to learn about your tidbits and read them each and every day.

Yeah. So, you know, so my preferring would be that it just visits the site and you subscribe. And, you know, that way, basically if you're subscribed, you can, you'll get the, you'll get the tidbit by email every night.

Cause I assume it's seven o'clock Eastern. If you, if you're a Substack reader, you can also just get it and follow me on Substack. And then, you know, you'll, you'll be able to get them every night.

Some people don't want the email, but there you go. They like getting it on Substack. I also, at least for now, tweet it every night.

And then I also posted on the application threads. So me on one of those, it's always Football Archaeology. You know, if you enter that, you'll find me.

And then it's kind of like happy reading. All right. Well, Timothy Brown, thank you.
Once again, footballarchaeology.com is the place to go and we appreciate you, sir. And we will talk to you again next Tuesday.

Very good.

Thank you. Thanks, Tim.

Transcribed by TurboScribe

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November 14th has been a date of significance in the annals of American football, marked by both historic achievements and somber reflections. The gridiron has witnessed moments of triumph and tragedy on this day, forever etching the names of legendary players and teams into the sport's lore.  

From record-breaking performances to heartbreaking losses, November 14th has seen it all. The day has also been a time to honor the legacies of football's greatest figures, as several Hall of Famers were born on this date. Their contributions to the game continue to inspire generations of fans and players alike. As we delve into the events of this day, we'll revisit the stories of those who have left an indelible mark on the sport we love.

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November 11th has been a date of significance in the annals of American football, marked by both historic achievements and the celebrations of legendary figures. This day has witnessed moments that have reshaped the sport, etched into the memories of fans and players alike. From record-breaking performances to pivotal victories, the gridiron has seen its share of drama and excitement on this particular date.

Beyond the on-field action, November 11th has also been a day to honor the legacies of those who have made indelible contributions to the game. Several Hall of Famers were born on this day, their birthdays serving as a reminder of the immense talent and dedication that has shaped the sport's history. These individuals, through their extraordinary skills and unwavering commitment, have inspired generations of players and fans.

In this edition we discuss Jim Thorpe's coming out party against Harvard, Lamar Jackson's record setting performance as well as many more HOF Legendary stories.

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November 24th has consistently proven to be a significant date in the rich tapestry of American football history. Year after year, this day has witnessed pivotal moments that have shaped the sport, showcasing the extraordinary talents of players and teams who have left an enduring legacy.

From dramatic comebacks to record-breaking performances, November 24th has been a stage for some of the most memorable plays in football history. Whether it's a thrilling overtime finish or a dominant defensive display, this day has consistently delivered excitement and drama.

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October 2 has a rich history in American football, marked by significant events and the birthdays of notable figures in the sport. From the early days of collegiate football to the modern era of professional football, this date has witnessed key moments that have shaped the game we know and love today.

One notable event that occurred on October 2 was the five-TD game for a Cardinal in Chicago. This game marked a significant milestone in professional football.

In addition to significant events, October 2 has also been a special day for many notable figures in American football. Several college and pro football hall of fame members were born on this date, including Miles Lane, Tarzan Kendall, and Bob Schloredt. Their contributions to the sport have left a lasting legacy and continue to inspire generations of football fans.

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November 21st has been a date marked by significant events in American football history. From the exploits of legendary players to the triumphs of iconic teams, this day has witnessed a plethora of memorable moments.

Heck November 21 had one of the most important moments in college football, Red Grange's last college game!

Whether it's the exceptional performances of Hall of Famers or the historic achievements of storied franchises, November 21st has consistently delivered exciting and unforgettable football action.

October 1 has a rich history in American football, marked by significant events and the birthdays of notable figures in the sport. From the early days of collegiate football to the modern era of professional football, this date has witnessed key moments that have shaped the game we know and love today.

One notable event that occurred on October 1 was the first-ever game played by a team called the Chicago Bears. It was also the inaugural game for a team that would go on to be tabbed as the Saskatchewan Roughriders.

In addition to significant events, October 1 has also been a special day for many notable figures in American football. Several college and pro football hall of fame members were born on this date, including [insert names of hall of famers born on October 1]. Their contributions to the sport have left a lasting legacy and continue to inspire generations of football fans.

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October 21st has witnessed a rich tapestry of events in American football history, marked by significant accomplishments and the birthdays of legends. From iconic plays and thrilling victories to the recognition of extraordinary talent, this day has been a stage for some of the most memorable moments in the sport.

As we delve into the annals of football history, we will explore the stories of individuals and teams who have left an indelible mark on the game. From the gridiron heroes who have captivated fans with their exceptional skills to the coaches and administrators who have shaped the sport's trajectory, October 21st has been a day of celebration and remembrance.

Enjoy items like the beginning of down and distance in today's story.