Someday, bar bets will be won by proving that championship football games existed
before the Super Bowl was invented.
One of them featured such legendary names as Yelbarton Abraham and Ringo Starr.
But it was not a game of Rabbis against Rock & Rollers.
"Ringo Starr" was actually two people: Jim
Ringo hiked the ball to Bart
Starr,
the quarterback of the Green Bay Packers.
Yelbarton Abraham, the opposing quarterback, was better known as Y.A. Tittle.
He wore a San Francisco 49er uniform before the team’s current head coach–
Jim Harbaugh–was born.
In 1960, the bald-headed Tittle was traded to the New York Giants.
On December 30, 1962, the Giants and the Packers played at Yankee Stadium
for the
National Football Championship.
Life was simpler then. The entire NFL season fit into one calendar year.
Professional football was not as popular as it is today. The game was not a sell-out.
A local TV black-out created an abyss in the heart of every ticketless
New York City football fan.
The hole in nine-year old Hank Haligram’s heart was surgically removed when his father
received an invitation to watch the game at an NBC studio in Hartford, Connecticut.
Hank Haligram was the envy of all his friends. He was doubly excited about going beyond
the state of New York for the first time in his life. However, that excitement was compromised
on the morning of the game when the temperature was an unwholesome three degrees.
Sal Haligram drove across the Whitestone Bridge and through the Bronx to Westchester.
He stopped at a Shell station for gas, hot chocolate, Good&Plenty and unfiltered Pall Malls.
He entered Connecticut on the New England Thruway which Hank was to remember
as the "New Endland Throw Away."
Father & son proceeded to a town called Cos Cob.
The house where they met Mr. Mallid and Mr. Rimac–their escorts to the TV studio–
could barely be seen from the street.
Sal had told the boy that these men were network "VeePs."
Hank Haligram understood that to mean they were Vice-Presidents or executive bigshots
at NBC, not to be confused with such NBC personalities as Walt Disney and Jack Paar.
There were numerous other VeePs at the studio in Hartford. All of whom were introduced as "Mr. ______" and were always addressed in that manner by Hank's father
whom they all called "Sal."
Sal was the head bartender at the French Cafe in Rockefeller Center,
where the National Broadcasting Company has its national headquarters.
The only non-Veeps Hank Haligram was introduced to were Andrew and Robert, the sons of the escorts, who took him out for lunch before the game began.
"Don' t come back until the dancing girls leave," Mr. Mallid told them.
Over pepperoni pizza, Andrew and Robert mostly talked about girls,
particularly Barbra Devine.
She was the daughter of Andy Devine, who had hosted Hank's favorite TV show,
Andy's Gang.
She was also Robert's classmate at a "Yale University."
Hank Haligram was fascinated by this enlightening information and wondered if Yale required students to be a member of Andy's Gang.
***
By game time, the wind-chill factor was minus fifteen degrees and very little offense was generated in the 1962 National Football Championship game.
After the Packers re-covered a Giant fumble, fullback Jim Taylor scored on a 7-yard run.
At halftime, it was
Green Bay 10, New York 0
Early in the 2nd half, Giant fans had something to cheer about when Erick Barnes
blocked a punt. The ball was recovered in the end zone for a touchdown.
Trailing 13-7 in the 4th quarter, Tittle led the Giants downfield.
The biggest play was a pass interference penalty called against Willie Wood.
He was on the ground when the flag was thrown. He rolled over to get up on his feet
but knocked down an official in the process. Wood, a defensive back who would be enshrined in the football Hall of Fame, was ejected from the game but protested vehemently.
He was so distraught, he started crying.
(Or so it appeared to the biased and boisterous New York Giant fans
in the Connecticut television studio.)
The Giants had 1st-and-l0 on the Green Bay 17-yard line. Everybody at Yankee Stadium and in the NBC studio was going nuts. A few of the VeePs rubbed Hank's head for good luck
but it backfired.
After repeated penalties and incomplete passes, the Giants had to punt the ball away.
They posed no further threat to the Vince Lombardi-coached Packers and the final score was
Green Bay 16, New York 7
One of the Veeps in the studio remarked that there should have been a special trophy for Willie Wood's tears.
Then the real fun began.
***
Mr. Mallid, Mr. Rimac, Sal & son headed for home but the hosts decided to stop at a restaurant for dinner. Hank Haligram drank milk with his meal, his father drank coffee but Mallid and Rimac drank martinis, many of them.
The waitress exercised great restraint while being repeatedly goosed by the VeePs. When they left the restaurant, Mallid and Rimac staggered out to the car and Mr. Mallid slipped on the ice and hit his head against the bumper of his brand new 1963 Oldsmobile Delta 88.
He was not hurt but he let Mr. Rimac drive the car.
Within the first mile on the Connecticut Turnpike, Rimac sideswiped a pick-up truck parked on the shoulder of the road. One wobbly mile later, Rimac yielded the wheel to Mr. Mallid and his headbump. It was not much of an improvement.
During an eternity on that turnpike, Hank Haligram kept repeating a mantra:
Mr. Mallid, Mr. Rimac, pleeease let my Father drive.
Each time Hank said it, the Veeps laughed louder, mimicking the voice of the terrified boy in the backseat of their car. Sal Haligram said nothing.
The behemoth Oldsmobile swerved all over the road but miraculously survived the New Endland Throw Away and returned to Cos Cob without further damage.
As soon as they got there, Hank threw up the chicken cacciatore he had for dinner.
His father immediately called home to allay his mother's fears.
The Haligrams drove home very cautiously. Hank fell asleep in the driver's lap and dreamt about swimming in Willie Wood's tears as they filled Yankee Stadium.
Blogger's Notes
Some of the names have been changed to protect the protectable.
Willie Wood's Tears © was originally written in 1998.
This blogger is deeply indebted to the Burbank Public Library Reference librarian
for both her research and her extraordinary patience.
You may now feast your eyes on the Google image page for the
1962 NFL WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP
