The Man Who Built the National Football League: Joe F. Carr

by Chris Willis

  But Carr's league did have its problems. In the middle of the season the Buffalo Bisons disbanded after suffering five straight defeats. Manager and coach George "Dim" Batterson gave the reason for quitting as "lack of cooperation from players and interference by club managers," while Bisons president Ray Weil said "small crowds and financial losses" were the real reason.28 The bottom line was that the Bisons were not a very good team, and the city was not ready to support an NFL franchise. On October 12 the Bisons hosted Red Grange before his knee injury occurred and only attracted 3,000 fans. The club lost $7,000 in their two home games and left Carr's loop.

  Carr's plan to reduce the number of teams in the NFL to a smaller, stronger organization seemed to pay off in 1927. Compared to 1926 and its super-sized twenty-two-team loop that attracted 490,800 fans in 116 NFL games, the twelve teams in 1927 generated 557,100 fans in just 72 league games-averaging about 7,737 per game-and the future of the league seemed to be on the right track to become that big-city sport that Carr envisioned 29 After the season, Carr attended the second annual Ohio State Journal Sports Department Christmas party, conceived by Carr's former colleague and friend Clyde Tuttle, the paper's sports editor.

  Santa showed up to give out gifts to all the special guests, Carr received a souvenir baseball, as other giveaways went to Chic Harley (a book), Dr. Bob Drury (a book on how to play baseball), Clyde Tuttle (a poem), and John McNulty (derby hat). Carr's holiday with his family was always short-lived as preparation for the upcoming season was quickly upon him and the other owners.30

  Carr traveled north to attend the winter meeting in Cleveland on February 11-12 at the Hotel Statler. The first day Carr read the "President's Report, " stating that the 1927 season's "fan attendance was the greatest in the history of the League and the general condition the best in its history," and treasurer Carl Storck said that the "league's finances are in very good condition." But you couldn't prove it in Cleveland, Buffalo, or Pottsville.31

  Cleveland owner Herbert Brandt pulled the plug for 1928 and the city, which Carr thought was a perfect NFL location. The Buffalo franchise that disbanded during the middle of 1927 would also not field a team in '28, and neither would Duluth. After five seasons in the NFL (last two with Ernie Nevers), the city of Duluth was now out of pro football. Nevers's Duluth Eskimos would be the last true traveling team in NFL history. Carr needed his franchises to be in larger cities with some stability, and Duluth didn't fit the plan.

  Pottsville was also in trouble, but Dr. John Streigel would let star player Pete Henry run the team for one more year. If half the NFL's active franchises were a little sick, at least half were in reasonably good health. Carr's plan to scale down the league had worked for now. At the end of the meeting, the league awarded the 1927 championship to Tim Mara's New York Giants to cheers from the other owners.

  Before leaving Cleveland, Carr announced that the summer's scheduling meeting would be on the East Coast in Providence on July 7. Nine owners arrived in Rhode Island at the Biltmore Hotel to schedule games for the 1928 season. Carr read a letter from Mr. Brandt that confirmed that Cleveland wouldn't field a team, and then the owners got to arranging games. After a dinner break the league again approved the official game ball from Spalding, and with no other matters to discuss Carr cut the meeting to just one day. But the owners weren't quite done .12

  Carr called for one more meeting on August 12 in Detroit to welcome the newest NFL franchise. After lying dormant for one season, the Motor City franchise was reactivated under new ownership by a consortium of Detroit businessmen. Just like the city of Cleveland, Carr had a soft spot for Detroit. He thought the city was the ideal location for professional football and was willing to bring them back into the league. As for players, the newest team signed several men from the defunct Cleveland franchise, including star quarterback Benny Freidman, the former Michigan All-American, and because of that the team was nicknamed the Wolverines.

  All the teams put down their $2,500 guarantee fee; the NFL would only field ten teams in 1928 (two less than in 1927) and the season was prepared to start on September 23 and end on December 16.33 For Carr this would be the NFL's seventh league meeting in the past nineteen months; the league's president was becoming a traveling fool. He was confident his league would continue its run of improvement and progress. The 1928 season saw more baby steps in between another personal loss.

  In 1928 the NFL's New England outpost was the Providence Steam Roller. Organized as a professional team in 1916, the Steam Roller played a schedule of games mostly against independent teams in the area before joining the NFL in 1925. In three seasons, the team had a 19-17-3 NFL record under the ownership of sportswriter-lawyer Charles Coppen, former judge James Dooley, and realtor-promoter Peter Laudati. Laudati was such a fixture at games that he held the first-down marker, a job the wealthy businessman enjoyed. Coppen was the sports editor at the Providence journal and suggested the unique nickname of the team. "We did have quite a debate as to whether it should be singular or plural. Mr. Coppen, who as club president made most final decisions, insisted that the singular sounded better and made more sense," recalled Pearce Johnson, a young "stringer" at the paper who was made the team's manager. "So we became the Providence Steam Roller."34

  The Steam Roller's home field was the Cycledrome, located near the Providence-Pawtucket city line, and was built mainly to host bicycle races. The stadium sat approximately 10,000 spectators in an oval of bleachers surrounding a wooden banked cycle track. This wooden track, steeply banked around the turns and flatter on the straightaways, enclosed just enough ground to fit a football field, with some slight problems.

  The track equipped with seats and a bench for the players on one side, ran so close to the sidelines that players tackled near the boundary line frequently caromed into the front row of seats. The Cycledrome had an intimate ambiance, so that all the seats, priced at $2, $1.50, and $1, were actually good seats from which to view a football game. The dressing quarters for the players were less agreeable; the dressing room used by the Steam Roller players had been built with a couple of bicycle racers in mind, so that a football team of eighteen men found the room to be cramped, with only two showers at their disposal.

  "There was probably more room in a phone booth," said Pearce Johnson in a 1988 interview. "With 18 giants changing all at the same time, somebody was always getting an elbow in the eye or a sock in the chops from an arm struggling with a jersey. Jim Conzelman used to say we got more injuries dressing than on the field." There was no visitor's quarters, so the visiting team had to dress at the hotel, come to the stadium, then return in uniform to the hotel to shower and change.35

  The 1928 Steam Roller were coached by Conzelman, who was getting a salary of $292 per game. He not only coached the team, but he also played quarterback in the single-wing formation. Joining Conzelman was AllPro lineman Clyde Smith, tackle Gus Sonnenberg, and halfback George "Wildcat" Wilson. Despite Conzelman blowing out his knee in the fourth game, the Steam Roller became the NFL's best team. "We had no fights or feuds," Johnson recalled. "They were paid players but they wanted above all else to win the NFL championship. It probably sounds odd today but salaries were secondary considerations.""

  After losing the second game of the year (10-6 loss) against the Frankford Yellow Jackets, the Steam Roller won four consecutive games. With a 5-1 record the Steam Roller were prepared to play the Yellow Jackets again on back-to-back days in the middle of November; first playing in Philly on Saturday, November 17, and then the following day in Providence (Sunday, November 18). The Jackets were 7-1-1 going into the biggest weekend of the 1928 season. Carr made sure he was there.

  Conzelman and his squad traveled to Philly on Friday night and stayed at the Hotel Adelphia. Carr also arrived in the City of Brotherly Love and with a crowd of 8,000 spectators witnessed a very tight game between the NFL's two best teams. The hometown Jackets scored on a blocked punt for a touchdown in the third quarter to take a 6-0 lead, missing the extr
a point. But late in the fourth quarter the Steam Roller offense caught a break with a poor punt deep in Jackets' territory. After seven straight running plays Wildcat Wilson plowed over for a twelve-yard score, but like their counterparts, they too missed the extra point. The game ended in a 6-6 tie.

  After relaxing for a few hours, both teams hopped on a train and headed to Providence for the rematch. The Yellow Jackets usually played back-to-back games, so this wasn't unusual, but the Steam Roller didn't and would be playing the most important game on just a few hours of rest. Rain threatened to drench the Cycledrome, but an overflow crowd of 12,000 fans came out to root for their local heroes. In the opening quarter, the Steam Roller had the ball on the Frankford forty-six yard line when Wilson threw a short pass to Curly Oden, who raced the remaining distance for a touchdown.

  The extra point failed but that didn't matter; the home team had more than they needed. For the rest of the afternoon, the Steam Roller defense kept the 1926 NFL champions out of the scoring column. When the final gun sounded, the Cycledrome scoreboard read 6-0 and the Steam Roller had rolled into first place in the NFL standings. When Carr arrived back in Columbus, he should have been rejoicing the league's fantastic weekend of play on the field. Instead he got a heavy dose of reality.

  On the same day that Carr arrived in Philadelphia, Dr. Frank Sullivan suffered a stroke due to pressure in his brain and was admitted into Mt. Carmel Hospital in Columbus. When Carr returned that Monday morning (November 19), Josie's younger brother passed away at the age of thirty-eight. The successful doctor left a widow and three young children, including his eldest child, Martha Sullivan."

  "When my father died we were very young and Joe Carr became a surrogate father. He always had time to visit with us. He always had time to listen to us," says Martha Sullivan. "He thought we needed the attention and of course we got too much attention as it was. We were all spoiled. He would talk to us and just made us feel important. He was very sensitive toward us. One thing I remembered is that one of his brothers was in the coffee and candy business, so Uncle Joe would always have a supply of candy and he was always very generous in sharing those candies with us. In retrospect you realize how sweet it really was."38

  Josie and the rest of the Sullivan family were still in a state of shock as Joe took care of the children. The funeral service took place at St. Patrick Church with the whole family there, and Josie's brother was buried in St. Joseph's Cemetery in the south end of Columbus. It would take some time for everything to get back to normal, and for Carr the end of the NFL season seemed to take a back seat in his world.

  The following week after the Steam Roller's big win over the Yellow Jackets, the Providence squad crushed the NFL's defending champs, the New York Giants, 16-0. Then the team escaped the Pottsville Maroons, 7-0, to set up a season finale matchup with the Green Bay Packers at the Cycledrome. All Providence had to do was not lose to the Pack, and it would capture the NFL championship. In front of 10,000 fans the hometown team struggled early on, trailing 7-0 into the third quarter. Then the Steam Roller put together an eleven-play, seventy-two-yard drive to tie the game. George Wilson's well-placed punts kept the Packers away from the goal line the rest of the game and secured a 7-7 tie. Although the Packers weren't fighting for the NFL title, they let the rest of the league know that their time was about to come.

  Later that afternoon the Frankford Yellow Jackets lost 28-6 to the Chicago Bears, making the Steam Roller the undisputed champions. The following Tuesday the team, a delegation of city and state officials, and approximately 200 fans celebrated the success of the football team at a victory banquet held at the Hotel Biltmore. Each member of the squad received a gold watch and a loving cup was presented to coach Jimmy Conzelman as team Most Valuable Player. Conzelman praised his players, saying that "there had not been a cross word between any two of the players in three months, on or off the field."39

  The Providence owners of Coppen, Dooley, and Laudati rejoiced in the team's profits, but it would be the only time the Steam Roller would finish higher than fifth place in the NFL. In Chicago, Chris O'Brien's Cardinals barely survived the season with an odd schedule. They opened with a 150 loss to the Bears before only 4,000 fans at Normal Park; skipped a week and then beat a dreadful Dayton team 7-0; then a week later they were pounded by the Packers 20-0. Then they took five weeks off, apparently because O'Brien couldn't arrange any games. With his team out of Comiskey Park and back at smallish Normal Park, the only visitors were the Bears and the Dayton Triangles, who would take any guarantee. O'Brien had a big decision to make about what to do with his team in 1929.

  Near the end of the season, Carr spoke to Newspaper Enterprise Association sportswriter Henry Farrell, a former beat writer in Columbus, for a feature article on the NFL. He was asked by Farrell why pro football wasn't a success. "It is a success and if you don't know it you have turned sap. To make a success of any business or undertaking it is necessary to apply intelligent business sense. Pro football is a business. So is college football. College football is one of the biggest businesses in the country and smart men are running it. How do you get that way?""

  Carr and the NFL were still learning how to make the sport a successful business but the groundwork was there. Carr knew the league had to be in the big cities, and these big-city franchises needed to be operated by financially capable owners. He also knew that this would be a long process and wouldn't happen overnight. He would be in it for the long haul. On Christmas Eve, Carr attended the Ohio State journal's third annual Christmas party hosted by his friend Clyde Tuttle. This time Carr brought thirteen-year-old Joe Carr Jr. to the party, who was very happy when he received a model plane set as a gift. Nearly 300 employees and guests ate sandwiches and drank refreshments provided by The Clock, Columbus' most popular restaurant. Music played all night, and enough Chesterfield cigars were available to make everyone satisfied. After a tough year traveling and losing a family member, Carr cherished this time with his son. Soon it would be back to work.41

  oing into the NFL's annual winter meeting, Carr's loop was now looking to put a few more teams on the field and those teams had to be in big cities. But events off the field that fall would have a far greater bearing on the health of pro football than any games played in 1929. At 2:00 p.m. on February 2, President Carr called the one-day meeting to order at the Hotel Sherman in Chicago. After Carr read his annual state-of- the-NFL report, treasurer Carl Storck read his financial statement, which was received with "considerable comment, all very complimentary." But some teams weren't rejoicing.'

  The owners then awarded the 1928 NFL championship to the Providence Steam Roller, with Judge Dooley accepting. After the back-slapping ended, the moguls elected Joe F. Carr again as their president. A motion was then brought up by Mike Redelle of the Dayton Triangles and seconded by C. C. Pyle, who actually showed up to represent his Yankees, to raise the president's salary to $3,000 per year and to have the league pay for office rent, a secretary, and office maintenance. Carr was to get a check for $250 a month. Carl L. Storck was then elected as vice president-to replace John Dunn-and treasurer at a salary of $1,000 per year. Shep Royle (Frankford), James Dooley (Providence) and George Halas (Bears) were selected members of the NFL's executive committee.2

  Pyle's appearance was somewhat of a surprise as he was one of the owners who was in deep financial trouble. His New York Yankees had been without their main attraction, Red Grange, in 1928, but Pyle's problems also included some bad investments that lost a bunch of money. At the end of the season, Pyle owed his players over $7,000. If he couldn't pay them, all of his players would become free agents. Pyle told the owners he had paid $1,200 to his players and asked to be given until April 15 to come up with the rest. Carr gave him until May 1.

  Another issue that was presented to Carr was what to do with the Buffalo franchise and its $2,500 guarantee fund. The Buffalo team had quit in mid-1927 and not operated in 1928. The $2,500 they'd put into the fund was still sitting there,
and former owner Ray Weil advised the league he wanted his money back. After the meeting Vice President Storck wrote Carr a letter saying, "I met Mr. Weil of the Buffalo Club in the hotel on Sunday and he advised me that they were going to start legal proceedings with reference to their guarantee fund. I imagine that we will have some problems on our hands with this before we get through."3

  In view of the league's modern million-dollar lawsuits, it's rather quaint to see the NFL officers nervous over a mere $2,500. But for Carr everything was scaled down in those years, and anything dealing with money had to be treated with care. Carr adjourned the meeting, with both Detroit and Pottsville (who didn't even bother to attend the meeting) pretty much out of the league. Carr now had just seven healthy teams, one on life support (New York Yankees) and one about to sue (Buffalo). It was time to look toward some new blood.

  Two days after returning from the owners meeting, Carr had a special visitor to his office at 16 East Broad Street in Columbus. C. C. Pyle was in town to promote his second annual "Bunion Derby"-a 3,455-mile crosscountry foot race from New York to Los Angeles-that was scheduled to arrive in the capital city in April. Carr reiterated to Cash and Carry that he must pay his players or he would have to give up his team. This time Carr wasn't going to back down; he was pretty fed up with Pyle's lack of "fiscal responsibility," and the league needed smarter businessmen running their teams. It would be the last time Carr would talk to Pyle as an NFL owner.'

  In the spring Carr dealt with his baseball issues (remember he was also a baseball executive) and went about hiring a secretary to help him with his NFL duties. Carr was swamped with all the paperwork and public relations he had to deal with as NFL president, plus with all the traveling he had to do with all his jobs, he finally realized that he needed help. At the winter meeting he was given permission by the owners to hire a secretary, and Carr looked to the Irish neighborhood to find his partner for life.