The Story And Significance Of Walt Kiesling - Four Consecutive Years Voted As An All-Pro At Offensive Guard

Walter Andrew Kiesling was an American football guard and tackle who spent 36 years as a player, coach, and aide with National Football League teams. He was posthumously inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1966 and was named to the NFL 1920s All-Decade Team in 1969.

A native of Saint Paul, Minnesota, Kiesling played college football at the University of St. Thomas where he was selected as an all-state player in 1923, 1924, and 1925. He then played 13 years as a guard and tackle in the NFL with the Duluth Eskimos (1926–1927), Pottsville Maroons (1928), Chicago Cardinals (1929–1933), Chicago Bears (1934), Green Bay Packers (1935–1936), and Pittsburgh Pirates (1937–1938). He was a first-team All-Pro in 1929, 1930, and 1932, a second-team All-Pro in 1931, and played for the Packers' 1936 NFL championship team.

Kiesling also spent 25 years as a coach or aide for NFL teams, including seven years as head coach of the Pittsburgh Pirates/Steelers from 1939 to 1942 and 1954 to 1956. He led the Steelers to their first winning season in 1942. He also served as co-coach of the wartime merger teams known as the Steagles in 1943 and Card-Pitt in 1944 and as line coach for the Pirates (1937–1938), Green Bay Packers (1945–1948), and Steelers (1949–1953). He retired from active coaching for health reasons in 1957 but remained an aide to the Steelers coaching staff from 1957 to 1961.

In the fall of 1926, Kiesling joined the Duluth Eskimos of the National Football League, appearing in 11 games as a tackle for a team that featured star backs Ernie Nevers and Johnny Blood. He remained in Duluth for the 1927 season, moving to the guard position and appearing in six games.

Kiesling joined the Pottsville Maroons for the 1927 season, starting 10 games at right guard.

Kiesling next joined the Chicago Cardinals where he played at the left guard position from 1929 to 1933. During his prime years with the Cardinals, he was recognized as one of the leading linemen in the NFL.

In 1929, he started 12 games at left guard and was selected as a first-team All-Pro by Collyer's Eye magazine.

In 1930, he appeared in 11 games, nine as a starter, and was selected as a first-team All-Pro in 1930 by both Collyer's Eye and the Green Bay Press-Gazette, based on the returns of ballots sent to the league's coaches, club officials, sports writers and officials.

In 1931, he started nine games at left guards and was selected as a second-team All-Pro by the United Press, the Green Bay Press-Gazette, and Collyer's Eye.

In 1932, he started 10 games at left guard and was selected as a first-team All-Pro by the Associated Press.

Kiesling was the Cardinals' heaviest player, ranging from 235 to 260 pounds at six feet, three inches. He was reputed to be "excellent on defense and unusually shifty on offense." He was also known as "a smart guard, a sure tackler despite his bulk and adept at rushing a passer."

During his NFL career, Kiesling lived in Saint Paul in the off-season, operating a cafe and playing as a pitcher and outfielder for a semi-pro baseball team. He also played league baseball in Montana and Canada.

In August 1934, George Halas signed Kiesling to a one-year contract with the Chicago Bears. Kiesling appeared in 13 games for the Bears, only five as a starter.

In August 1935, Kiesling signed with the Green Bay Packers. At the time of his signing, the Green Bay Press-Gazette wrote "Kiesling is one of the most experienced players in the pro grid game. Practically no one gains through his side of the line consistently ... Kiesling never dissipates, and trains in the year around, remaining always in top condition".

Kiesling appeared in 10 games for the Packers in 1935. He also appeared in eight games for the 1936 Green Bay Packers team that won the NFL championship.

Kiesling began his coaching career at age 34 during the 1937 season as an assistant coach under Johnny Blood for the Pittsburgh Pirates (renamed the Steelers in 1940). He was also a player for the Pirates during the 1937 and 1938 seasons, appearing in a total of 12 games. When Blood resigned as head coach after the team lost the first three games of the 1939 season, team owner Art Rooney hired Kiesling as the team's new head coach. Kiesling led the Pirates to a 1–6–1 record in the final eight games of the 1939 season.

Kiesling led the Steelers to a 2–7–2 record during the 1940 season and was replaced by Bert Bell and Aldo Donelli in 1941. Kiesling resumed his role as head coach near the end of the 1941 season, leading the team to a 1–2–1 in the final four games.

Kiesling led the 1942 Steelers to a 7–4 record, the first winning season in club history since the team was formed in 1933. Kiesling's 1942 team was led on the field by rookie halfback Bill Dudley who totaled 1,138 yards of total offense (696 rushing and 438 passing) and also had 576 yards on punt and kickoff returns. Dudley was drafted into Army after the 1942 season.

In 1943, with so many players lost to military service, the Steelers were temporarily merged with the Philadelphia Eagles to form the Steagles. Kiesling and the Eagles' coach Greasy Neale served as co-coaches of the Steagles. The Steagles compiled a 5–4–1 record.

In 1944, the Steelers were still lacking players due to the war and formed a one-year merger with the Chicago Cardinals, operating under the name Card-Pitt. Kiesling and the Cardinals' coach Phil Handler served as co-coaches. Despite the play of John Grigas, a Cardinals back who led the NFL in 1944 with 1,154 all-purpose yards and 471 kickoff return yards, the Card-Pitt team gave up 32.8 points per game, compiled a 0–10 record, and was outscored by a combined total of 328–108.

In January 1945, Kiesling resigned as the Steelers' coach. Hours after resigning his position with the Steelers, Kiesling was hired as assistant coach for the Green Bay Packers. He coached the Packers' linemen, and in December 1945, he signed a contract extending his service through the 1947 season. In January 1948, his contract was renewed again through the 1948 season. At the time, Curly Lambeau called Kiesling the top line coach in college or professional football.

Kiesling contracted pneumonia in the winter of 1947 and lost 51 pounds while battling the illness. In February 1949, Kiesling was released by the Packers, with Lambeau advising Kiesling "in the interests of his health to take a year's vacation from football."

Ignoring Lambeau's advice, Kiesling returned to the Steelers in March 1949 as the line coach. He signed a contract extension with the Steelers in March 1950, and remained as line coach through the 1953 season.

In March 1952, Kiesling was hospitalized with what was described as a "heavy cold". In November 1953 he was hospitalized again with pneumonia. Starting with his 1947 bout with pneumonia, Kiesling was plagued with respiratory ailments for the rest of his life.

In late August 1954, Joe Bach resigned as the Steelers' head coach after a poor showing by the team in exhibition games, and Kiesling was promoted to head coach. In his third stint as head coach, Kiesling led the Steelers to records of 5–7 in 1954, 4–8 in 1955, and 5–7 in 1956.

Kiesling is often remembered as the coach who released Johnny Unitas, a player widely acclaimed as one of the greatest in NFL history. The Steelers had selected Unitas, a Pittsburgh native, in the ninth round of the 1955 NFL Draft. Kiesling was satisfied with Jim Finks and Ted Marchibroda as his quarterbacks and was unimpressed by the gangly Unitas. He did not allow Unitas to even play in any exhibition games, and after pre-season camp, Kiesling told Rooney: "Unitas is too dumb. He can't remember plays."

Kiesling's health was declining by the mid-1950s. Steelers' owner Art Rooney considered firing him, but concluded that loyalty outweighed winning. Rooney reportedly said, "Walt will be my head coach as long as he wants to be, and even if he doesn't want to be." Kiesling's health was poor during the 1956 season, yet he returned for the pre-season in 1957, finally retiring in late August 1957. He remained an aide to the Steelers' coaching staff until his death.

Kiesling's overall record as an NFL head coach was 30–55–5.

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Who Were The Milwaukee Badgers And What Scandel Were They Involved In?

The Milwaukee Badgers were a professional American football team based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, that played in the National Football League from 1922 to 1926. The team played its home games at Athletic Park, later known as Borchert Field, on Milwaukee's north side. The team was notable for having a large number of African-American players for the time.

After the team folded following the 1926 season (largely due to being left broke because of a $500 fine by the NFL for using four high-school players in a 1925 game against the Chicago Cardinals, a game arranged after the Badgers had disbanded for the season), many of its members played for the independent semi-pro Milwaukee Eagles. A few of the players from this team went on to play for the original Pittsburgh Pirates football team in 1933; the team later became the Steelers. This has led some to mistakenly believe that either the Badgers or Eagles became the Steelers. The 1925 Chicago Cardinals–Milwaukee Badgers scandal was a scandal centered around a 1925 game between the Chicago Cardinals and the Milwaukee Badgers of the National Football League. The scandal involved a Chicago player, Art Folz, hiring a group of high school football players to play for the Milwaukee Badgers, against the Cardinals. This would ensure an inferior opponent for Chicago. The game was used to help prop up their win-loss percentage and as a chance of wresting away the 1925 Championship away from the first place Pottsville Maroons.

In 1925, the Chicago Cardinals were in the running to win the NFL championship with the Pottsville Maroons. The Maroons had beaten the Cardinals 21-7 earlier in the season at Comiskey Park. This loss gave Pottsville a half game lead in the standings. However, the Cardinals felt that they could make up for the loss. Many professional football teams during the first decade of the NFL would schedule some easy extra games to pad their record and place in the standing. The Cardinals had hoped that the move would help bump the team to a first place finish over Pottsville. Prior to 1933, the team with the best record in the standings at the end of the season was named the season's NFL Champions.

The two extra games were scheduled against the inferior Milwaukee Badgers and Hammond Pros, both of which were NFL members but had disbanded for the year. The Badgers, owned by Ambrose McGuirk, agreed to a game against the Cardinals. However, McGuirk lived in Chicago, which put him at a disadvantage in getting his team back together to play the Cardinals. Art Folz, a substitute quarterback for the Cardinals, convinced four players from Englewood High School, located in Chicago, into joining the Badgers for the game under assumed names, thereby ensuring that the Cardinals' opponent was not a pro caliber club. It also should be noted that Folz himself was an Englewood High School graduate. Meanwhile the Cardinals' owner, Chris O'Brien, unaware of the roster tampering, but still sensing a mismatch, didn't even charge attendance to the few scattered spectators who turned up for the December 10, 1925 game. However, the second game on December 12, against Hammond proved to be much closer in score with 13-0 Cardinals win over the Pros.
A few weeks later, when NFL President Joseph Carr learned high school players had been used, he told reporters the 59-0 Cardinals win would be stricken from the record. However, the league had never got around to removing it. The game is still a part of the NFL records. Chris O'Brien was also fined $1,000 by Carr for allowing his team play a game against high schoolers, even though he claimed that he was unaware of the players' status. Ambrose McGuirk was ordered to sell his Milwaukee franchise within 90 days. Folz, for his role, was barred from football for life.

By the summer of 1926, Carr toned down his punishment for each party involved in the scandal. Folz's lifetime ban was lifted, probably to prevent him from going the first American Football League, however he chose not to return to pro football. The $1,000 fine against O'Brien was rescinded, probably since the amount would have put the Cardinals out of business. McGuirk though had already sold his Badgers franchise to Johnny Bryan, a fullback with the Chicago Bears. The Englewood players were also forgiven, and two of them, William Thompson and Charles Richardson, earned high school all-star recognition at the end of the season. Folz reportedly told the high schoolers that the game was a "practice game" and would in no part affect their amateur status.

In early December 1925, the Maroons, with a 9-2 record, were just a half-game behind the Cardinals, who were 9-1-1. At the same time as the Hammond-Chicago game, the Maroons scheduled a game against a team of Notre Dame all-stars that included the famed Four Horsemen. Due to the public interest of the game, it was played in a larger venue, Philadelphia's Shibe Park, not Pottsville's Minersville Park, which was mainly a high school stadium. By playing in Philadelphia, the Maroons were violating territory agreements drawn up by the NFL. Philadelphia was within the boundaries already claimed as the home by the Frankford Yellow Jackets. The Yellow Jackets, after hearing of the planned Notre Dame contest, filed a protest with the NFL. Pottsville's owner said all along that the game was sanctioned by the NFL and that he had received permission to play in Philadelphia from an NFL secretary. However, Carr had the final say and on several occasions, he threatened the Pottsville team with suspension from the league if the game took place. Pottsville played the game anyway and won, 9-7, on a last-minute field goal. The Maroons were fined, tossed from the league, and stripped of their title. They'd also have to cancel the remaining game on their schedule, against the Providence Steam Roller. The team also was ruled ineligible for the league title, which was eventually awarded to the Cardinals.

However, the Pottsville fans still demand to know why Cardinals was awarded the title even though they too were found by Carr to have violated the NFL's rules. According to Bob Carroll of the Professional Football Researchers Association, "The Cardinals didn't defy the league," Carroll said. "Pottsville did. It was a great team, but the owner made a mistake." However, it is still not entirely known if O'Brien knew of the high school players on the Badgers team.

The Pottsville team was reinstated by the NFL in July 1926, mainly because the NFL didn't want to lose Pottsville's skilled group of players to the upstart American Football League. Even though the Cardinals were awarded the 1925 Championship, O'Brien refused to accept it, stating that he didn't want to win the title "that way". However in 1933, as Charles Bidwell took over as the owner of the Cardinals, he began to claim the 1925 title belonged to the Cardinals, overturning O'Brien earlier decision. It is also believed that a Cardinals Football Curse was put upon the Cardinals and Bidwell because of the events surrounding the 1925 Championship. The Cardinals did however, win the NFL Championship in 1947.

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The Story And Significance Of Pete Henry - The Best Tackle Of The 1920s

Wilbur Francis "Pete" Henry was an American football player, coach, and athletic administrator. He was a charter inductee into both the College Football Hall of Fame in 1951 and the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1963.

Upon graduating from college in 1920, Henry was 5 feet, 11 inches and weighed 235 pounds, but was "considered a fast man, able to do the hundred in close to 11 seconds." He received offers to play professional football for the Canton Bulldogs, Cleveland Tigers, Akron Pros, Hammond Pros, and Rock Island Independents. He signed with Canton in September 1920, saying he wished to play with Jim Thorpe.

As a rookie, Henry participated in the first season of the new professional association that became the NFL. He played all 13 games for the 1920 Bulldogs team that compiled a 7–4–2 record. At the end of the 1920 season, Henry was selected as a first-team tackle on the All-Pro team selected by sportswriters Bruce Copeland (Rock Island Argus).

In 1921, Henry again played every game for the Bulldogs team that compiled an 8–3–3 record. Henry was selected as a first-team All-Pro team compiled by the Buffalo Evening News.

In 1922, Guy Chamberlin joined the Canton team as player, coach, and part owner and built the Bulldogs into one of the NFL's first powerhouse teams. The 1922 Bulldogs team included Pro Football Hall of Famers (Henry, Chamberlin, and Link Lyman), compiled a 10–0–2 record, shut out nine of twelve opponents, outscored all opponents 184 to 15, and won the 1922 NFL championship.

The following year, the 1923 Canton Bulldogs with Henry and Chamberlin compiled another undefeated season (11–0–1), shut out eight of twelve opponents, outscored all opponents by a combined total of 246 to 19, and won its second consecutive NFL championship. Henry led the 1923 team with 58 points on nine field goals, 25 extra points, and a touchdown reception. On October 23, 1923, he set an NFL record with a 94-yard punt; his record stood until 1969. On November 11, 1923, with the Bulldogs trailing to Buffalo by a 3–0 score and a half minute left in the game, Henry blocked a Tommy Hughitt punt and then drop-kicked a field goal to preserve Canton's undefeated season. At the end of the 1923 season, Henry was selected by Collyer's Eye magazine, the Green Bay Press-Gazette, and the Canton Daily News as a first-team player on the 1923 All-Pro Team.

In August 1924, Cleveland jeweler Samuel Deutsch bought the Canton Bulldogs and moved the team to Cleveland where they became the Cleveland Bulldogs during the 1924 NFL season. Henry did not join the Bulldogs in Cleveland, instead playing for the 1924 Pottsville Maroons of the Anthracite League. Henry led Pottsville to a 12–1–1 record and the Anthracite League championship and was named to the All-Anthracite team at the end of the 1924 season.

In January 1925, Henry was reinstated to good standing with the NFL, having been subjected to sanctions the previous year when he refused to join the Bulldogs when the team moved to Cleveland. In the summer of 1925, Henry and four other Canton alumni (Link Lyman, Rudy Comstock, Ben Jones, and Harry Robb) bought the Cleveland Bulldogs for $3,500 and moved the team back to Canton. Henry appeared in only six games for the 1925 Canton team, missing much of the season due to injury. The following year, he appeared in all 13 games and served as co-head coach with Harry Robb of the 1926 Canton team that compiled a 1–9–3 record.

Before the 1927 season, the NFL dropped 12 teams, including Canton. In September 1927, Henry signed to play with the New York Giants. He appeared in only four games for the Giants. In mid-October 1927, he was acquired by the Pottsville Maroons (for whom he had played in 1924) in a transaction with the Giants. He remained with Pottsville through the 1928 season. He also served as head coach of the 1928 Pottsville team that compiled a 2–8 record against NFL opponents.

In 1929, Henry returned to Washington & Jefferson as an assistant football coach. He became athletic director in 1932 and held that position until his death in 1952. He was also the head coach of the Washington & Jefferson football team in 1942 and 1945.

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 "Pete Henry In National League Again". The Mansfield News. January 19, 1925. p. 8 – via Newspapers.com.

 Old Leather, p. 59.

 "Canton Bulldogs to Return in Fall". The Gazette Times. Pittsburgh. July 19, 1925. p. 31 – via Newspapers.com.

 "1925 Canton Bulldogs Statistics & Players". Pro-Football-Reference.com. Sports Reference LLC. Retrieved October 22, 2017.

 "Akron Is Next On Bulldog Program". The Daily Times. New Philadelphia, Ohio. November 12, 1925. p. 7 – via Newspapers.com.

 "1926 Canton Bulldogs Statistics & Players". Pro-Football-Reference.com. Sports Reference LLC. Retrieved October 22, 2017.

 "Here's Your Hat" (PDF). Pro Football Researchers Association. Archived from the original (PDF) on December 18, 2010. Retrieved February 24, 2012.

 "Pete Henry Signs To Play With Giants". Chester (PA) Times. September 22, 1927. p. 15 – via Newspapers.com.

 "Pete Henry Comes Back To Pottsville". Mount Carmel (PA) Item. October 20, 1927. p. 2 – via Newspapers.com.

 "1928 Pottsville Maroons Statistics & Players". Pro-Football-Reference.com. Sports Reference LLC. Retrieved October 21, 2017.

 "Who's Football's Greatest Player?". The Courier-Journal. November 22, 1931. p. 54 – via Newspapers.com.

 "'Pete' Henry Named on Collier's Eternal All-America By Rice". The Mansfield News-Journal. December 2, 1939. p. 6 – via Newspapers.com.

 "Pete Henry Named To Pro Hall of Fame". The Daily Republican. Monongahela, PA. October 18, 1951. p. 2 – via Newspapers.com.

 "Hall of Fame Now Has 31 Players and 21 Coaches". Wisconsin Rapids (Wis.) Daily Tribune. November 5, 1951. p. 7 – via Newspapers.com.

 "Election of Late Pete Henry to Hall of Fame Will Be Honored Saturday". The Daily Notes. Canonsburg, PA. October 20, 1953. p. 8.

 "Pittsburgh Touch Given Pro Football's 'Hall' In Canton: 17, Including Bert Bell, Pete Henry And Cal Hubbard, Charter Members". The Pittsburgh Press. September 6, 1963. p. 32 – via Newspapers.com.

 National Collegiate Athletic Association, The Official National Collegiate Athletic Association Football Guide, 1970. Phoenix, AZ: College Athletics Publishing Service, 1970; p. 161.

 "All-1920s NFL Team Selected". The Baltimore Sun. August 27, 1969. p. C5.

 "W&J To Honor Former Athlete At Dedication". The Daily Notes. Canonsburg, PA. February 2, 1971. p. 5 – via Newspapers.com.

 "Wilbur Henry To Coach At W. & J." The Mansfield News. June 22, 1929. p. 19 – via Newspapers.com.

 "W. & J. Frosh To Meet Kiski". The Daily Republican. Monongahela, PA. October 2, 1929. p. 3 – via Newspapers.com.

 "W. & J. Elevates Henry As Coach". The Evening Independent. Massillon, Ohio. July 10, 1930. p. 11 – via Newspapers.com.

 "Henry Directs W-J Athletics". The Daily Times. Philadelphia, Ohio. April 22, 1932. p. 6 – via Newspapers.com.

 "Henry Is Named Football Coach At Wash-Jeff". The Daily Notes. Canonsburg, PA. April 24, 1942. p. 8 – via Newspapers.com.

 "The Sportseer". The Indiana (PA) Gazette. October 25, 1956. p. 10 – via Newspapers.com.

 "Coach Chosen To Lead W. & J. To Glory Road". The Daily Notes. Canonsburg, PA. January 15, 1946. p. 6 – via Newspapers.com.

 "Joins Professionals". The News-Messenger (Fremont, Ohio). September 19, 1927. p. 8 – via Newspapers.com.

 Rex Hess (November 11, 1942). "Sports Podge". Mansfield News-Journal. p. 10 – via Newspapers.com.

 "Pete Henry's Leg Amputated". The Daily Notes. Canonsburg, PA. January 20, 1949. p. 6 – via Newspapers.com.

 "Sports World Pays Tribute To Henry". The Daily Notes. Canonsburg, PA. February 8, 1952. p. 6 – via Newspapers.com.

 Death certificate for Wilbur Frank Henry, dated February 9, 1952. Pennsylvania Historic and Museum Commission; Pennsylvania, US; Certificate Number Range: 017401-019950. Ancestry.com. Pennsylvania, Death Certificates, 1906-1964 [database on-line].

 Scarborough, David Knowles (1979). "Intercollegiate Athletics at Washington and Jefferson College: the Building of a Tradition". Ph.D Dissertation. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: University of Pittsburgh: 73.

The Pottsville Maroons Controversy Of 1925 And The Teams History

The National Football League was in its infancy in 1925 and so were the Pottsville Maroons. A team in Pennsylvania that joined the NFL in 1925. Playing at Minerville Park near another NFL team called the Frankford Yellow Jackets. In their first game they shut out the Buffalo Bisons. Even though they had three NFL HOFers in 1928 but their best season was in 1925 where they went 10-2, second best in the NFL. The controversy of the season is a historic event that hasn't happened since nor before to an NFL team.

However, before the season ended, the Maroons were suspended by NFL commissioner Joseph Carr, ultimately denying them the championship title. This has been the subject of controversy ever since. Controversy surrounds who actually won the 1925 NFL Championship. Officially, the Chicago Cardinals are listed as the 1925 NFL champions because they finished with the best record; however, many Pottsville fans at the time claimed that the Maroons were the legitimate champions. The Maroons and the Cardinals were the top contenders for the title, with Pottsville winning a late-season meeting between them, 21–7. But the Maroons scheduled a game against a team of University of Notre Dame All-Stars in Philadelphia, Pottsville won 9–7 on the same day that the Frankford Yellow Jackets were scheduled to play a game in the same city. Frankford protested, saying that it was violating their protected territory rights that they had. Commissioner Carr warned Streigel several times that Pottsville's franchise would be suspended if they played in Philadelphia. Not wanting to give up on a potential financial windfall for his team, Streigel went ahead with the game. He would later claim he had received verbal permission from the NFL by telephone, though he gave inconsistent responses as to which official he had spoken to. Pottsville considered it a major win for professional football, but the match only attracted about 8,000 fans, a major financial disappointment. As threatened, Carr suspended Pottsville and removed them from the NFL, preventing them from finishing their schedule.

Meanwhile, Chicago Cardinals owner Chris O'Brien hastily scheduled two games against the Hammond Pros and the Milwaukee Badgers, both of whom had already disbanded for the season. Obviously playing the games to increase their record and it appears to secure the championship by improving their record. The game against the Badgers spurred a scandal of its own, when the Badgers filled out their roster with four high school players, which is against NFL rules. Both teams were sanctioned by the league. Regardless, with Pottsville out of the league, the Cardinals had the best record (11-2-1), and were awarded the championship by the league. For his part, O'Brien refused to accept the title, and afterward the league never officially awarded it at all. Later both the franchise and the NFL would claim the Cardinals as the 1925 champions. The Cardinals did not attempt to publicly take credit for the title until 1933, when it was acquired by Charles Bidwill whose descendants still own the modern-day franchise now Arizona. The Cardinals have won only one further NFL title, in 1947, leading to discussion that the franchise might be cursed as a result of this controversy. The NFL reinstated the Maroons the very next season. The league feared that the Maroons would jump to the threatening American Football League, sometimes called AFL I, AFLG, or the Grange League, was a professional American football league that operated in 1926. It was the first major competitor to the National Football League. Pottsville still feeling they were the rightful champions created their own trophy made out of coal. The Maroons coal trophy would later go on display at the NFL Hall of Fame in Canton. The City of Pottsville still celebrates the Pottsville Maroons stolen championship, while a request to re-examine the 1925 championship was declined in 1967 on a 12-2 vote with then St. Louis Cardinals leading the opposition. Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell lobbied the NFL in 2003 to reverse the decision, with President George W. Bush even writing in favor of the Maroons, but the title remained with the Chicago Cardinals. Still to this day the Chicago Cardinals are the 1925 NFL World Champions.

The NFL reinstated the Maroons the very next season. The league feared that the Maroons would jump to the threatening American Football League. In 1926 Red Grange and his manager C. C. Pyle wanted an NFL franchise in New York City. However, that move would have infringed on the territorial rights of the New York Giants. Pyle and Grange were turned down, so they decided to start their own league, the AFL. To keep independent teams from joining Grange's league, the NFL hastily expanded to 22 franchises. The Maroons were one of the teams added, or in this case reinstated.[8] That year the Maroons were once again in the thick of title contention until late in the season. Pottsville's shutout victories over the Buffalo Rangers and Akron Indians led to the team finishing with a 10–2–1 record and third place in the final standings. 1926 also saw the signing of George Kenneally, a rookie out of St. Bonaventure University, who earned all-pro status and was named team captain in just his second season, and would later become part owner of the club.

However, towards the end of the season, the Maroons management struggled to meet its financial obligations, and there were published reports of a strike among the team's players.

The 1927 season saw a decline in the team's on-field performance. Pottsville lost several of its stars, and others were growing older, and finished the season with a disappointing 5–8–0 record. Doc Striegel relinquished operational control of the team for the 1928 season by "loaning" it to a group of three players: Herb Stein, Pete Henry and Duke Osborn. Henry took over the coaching reins but the downward spiral continued. The Maroons ended what turned out to be their final season in Pottsville with a dismal 2–8–0 record. At the end of the season the players were given a small football made of anthracite coal, a memento of the last season played in Pottsville.

Striegel sold the club during the offseason to a New England-based partnership that included Maroons' standout, George Kenneally. The new owners relocated the franchise to Boston prior to the 1929 season, where it was renamed the Bulldogs. The Bulldogs would be the first of a string of unsuccessful attempts at establishing an NFL team in Massachusetts and would be followed by the Boston Redskins in the 1930s and the Boston Yanks in the 1940s. Not until the American Football League's Patriots (established in 1960) joined the NFL in 1970 would the league be able to establish a permanent presence in New England's most populous market (and even that team required a hostile takeover to prevent being relocated in the 1990s).

Six veteran Maroons players made the move with the team. Dick Rauch also returned to the fold, resuming his position as head coach. Based at Boston's Braves Field, the Bulldogs nonetheless had a two-game swan song in their old stomping grounds, defeating both the Buffalo Bison on October 27 at Minersville Park and the Orange Tornadoes on October 29 at Mitchell Field.[9] The team folded at season's end with a 4–4–0 record.

Because the Washington Football Team began in 1932 as the Boston Braves, some Pottsville backers, with help from a few writers, have suggested that the team descended from the Maroons by way of the Boston Bulldogs. The 1932 Boston franchise, however, had no relationship to the 1929 Bulldogs (that team instead descended from the Tornadoes, by way of the 1931 Cleveland Indians).

A dedicated website of the Pottsville Maroons.
http://www.pottsvillemaroons1925.com/
Video on the story of the 1925 Pottsville Maroons.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBHu8id_tm0

Sources

https://www.pro-football-reference.com/

https://www.profootballarchives.com/index.html

https://americanfootballdatabase.fandom.com/wiki/Football_Wiki

https://www.gridiron-uniforms.com/GUD/controller/controller.php?action=main

https://www.profootballhof.com/hall-of-famers/