On December 18, 1932, the Chicago Bears defeated the
Portsmouth (Ohio) Spartans, 9-0, in the NFL’s first playoff
game—and first game played indoors.
The victory gave the Bears the championship and leads to
a playoff system for the first time. Because of frigid weather
and waist-deep snow, the game was moved from Wrigley
Field to Chicago Stadium, home of the city’s NHL team.
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On December 10, 1922, the Canton Bulldogs defeated the Toledo Maroons, 19-0, and are declared the first champion of the newly
renamed National Football League.
Canton finished the season 10-0-2, allowing 15 points, producing
nine shutouts. The league champion is determined by best regular-season record.
Future Hall of Famer William Pete Henry, a 5-foot-11, 245-pound
tackle and kicker, and player-coach Guy Chamberlin were the
team’s stars.
The 1940 Chicago Bears’ 8-3 regular season wasn’t spectacular,
but their championship game was: they beat the Washington
Redskins 73-0, the widest margin in NFL history.
The Bears led the NFL in rushing offense with 1,818 yards, and
in rushing TDs, with 16.
Chicago Bears owner and couch George Hallas (with hat).
On December 6, 1961, Syracuse running back Ernie Davis
became the first African American player to win the
Heisman Trophy, college football’s top individual award,
beating Ohio State fullback Bob Ferguson. Earlier in day,
Davis met with President John Kennedy at the Waldorf-
Astoria Hotel in New York. "I never thought I’d ever be
shaking the hand of the President of the United States,"
he says.
As a senior in 1961, Davis rushed for 823 yards and scored
14 touchdowns. The previous season, he rushed for 877
yards.
Davis was the first pick in the 1962 NFL draft, by Washington,
which traded him to the Cleveland Browns. But he never
played in the NFL. Davis was diagnosed with leukemia later
in 1962, and died on May 18, 1963. He was only 23.
On November 30, 1876, Yale defeated Princeton, 2-0, in
Hoboken, New Jersey in the first collegiate football game
played on Thanksgiving. Nearly 1,000 fans attend the
game, played in cold, rainy weather.
The football was oval and made of leather, the New York
Times noted, "similar to those used in Rugby Union rules."
The game resembled rugby more than a present-day football
game.
First Yale team playing under American intercollegiate
football rules. This team beat Harvard in the fall of ’76.”
