It's difficult to imagine today-when the Super Bowl has virtually become a national holiday and the National Football League is the country's dominant sports entity-but pro football was once a ramshackle afterthought on the margins of the American sports landscape. In the span of a single generation in postwar America, the game charted an extraordinary rise in popularity, becoming a smartly managed, keenly marketed sports entertainment colossus whose...

"Introduces readers to pro football's biggest event, the Super Bowl, and to the players who have given the greatest performances on its stage"--

"When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, college football was at the height of its popularity. As the nation geared up for total war, one branch of the service dominated the aspirations of college football stars: the United States Marine Corps. Which is why, on Christmas Eve of 1944, when the 4th and 29th Marine regiments found themselves in the middle of the Pacific Ocean training for what would be the bloodiest battle of the war - the invasion...

This book tells the story of professional football in the 1950s and 60s through the words of the players themselves. The chapters are full of anecdotes and reflections on the best and toughest players of the era, while two additional chapters include humorous quotes and the players' thoughts on how the game has changed since their heyday.

Native American Jim Thorpe became a super athlete and Olympic gold medalist. Indomitable coach Pop Warner was a football mastermind. In 1907 at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania, they forged one of the winningest teams in American football history. Called "the team that invented football," they took on the best opponents of their day, defeating much more privileged schools in a series of breathtakingly close calls, genius plays,...