Wednesday, January 15, 2025

The First Ever Super Bowl Was Played On This Day in 1967

 




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Green Bay Packers

35


10



Kansas City Chiefs









Here is that review of the first ever Super Bowl game between the then NFL champion Green Bay Packers and the AFL Champions Kansas City Chiefs.








These are pictures I took of the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum during my visit last spring. This was the site where the first Super Bowl game (which was then known as the First AFL-NFL Championship Game) was played on this day in January of 1967.




The Super Bowl I video is a reconstruction with various sources and radio. Original television broadcast not available, but this is likely the next best thing. 1967 - Full game in color, sound is the radio broadcast matched perfectly. Excellent quality with pre-game.



Super Bowl I Logo:



Vince Lombardi Quotes


The quality of a person's life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence, regardless of their chosen field of endeavor. It's not whether you get knocked down, it's whether you get up. The harder you work, the harder it is to surrender. 

"The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather a lack of will." - Vince Lombardi 

“Gentlemen, we will chase perfection, and we will chase it relentlessly, knowing all the while we can never attain it. But along the way, we shall catch excellence.”  ― Vince Lombardi 

The man on top of a mountain didn’t fall there.  Vince Lombardi 

https://www.ebth.com/items/683381-inspirational-framed-poster-vince-lombardi  

WHAT IT TAKES TO BE NO. 1     

Winning is not a sometime thing; it's an all the time thing. You don't win  once in a while; you don't do things right once in a while; you do them  right all the time. Winning is a habit. Unfortunately, so is losing.  There is no room for second place. There is only one place in my game, and  that's first place. I have finished second twice in my time at Green Bay,  and I don't ever want to finish second again. There is a second place bowl  game, but it is a game for losers played by losers. It is and always has  been an American zeal to be first in anything we do, and to win, and to win,  and to win.    
Every time a football player goes to play his trade he's got to play from  the ground up-from the soles of his feet right up to his head. Every inch of  him has to play. Some guys play with their heads. That's O.K. You've got to  be smart to be number one in any business. But more importantly, you've got  to play with your heart, with every fiber of your body. If you're lucky  enough to find a guy with a lot of head and a lot of heart, he's never going  to come off the field second.     

Running a football team is no different than running any other kind of  organization-an army, a political party or a business. The principles are  the same. The object is to win-to beat the other guy. Maybe that sounds hard  or cruel. I don't think it is.     

It is a reality of life that men are competitive and the most competitive  games draw the most competitive men. That's why they are there-to compete.  

To know the rules and objectives when they get in the game. The object is to  win fairly, squarely, by the rules-but to win.     

And in truth, I've never known a man worth his salt who in the long run,  deep down in his heart, didn't appreciate the grind, the discipline. There  is something in good men that really yearns for discipline and the harsh  reality of head to head combat.     

I don't say these things because I believe in the "brute" nature of man or  that men must be brutalized to be combative. I believe in God, and I believe  in human decency. But I firmly believe that any man's finest hour, the  greatest fulfillment of all that he holds dear, is that moment when he has  worked his heart out in a good cause and lies exhausted on the field of  battle - victorious.    

 ~ Vince Lombardi


Okay, so I was not yet born for the first Super Bowls. In fact, the first Super Bowl that I actually was following the NFL for and watched was Super Bowl XVI, which means that I missed the first decade and a half of Super Bowls. So, it will take me a while in this series before I can mention personal memories, or anything.

However, there are some things that I can specifically mention about these times. The Vietnam War was well under way, although they were only really starting to grow very sour by this point, and opposition was starting to grow much more serious. The Beatles dominated the airwaves, although Wild Thing was quite huge, as well. Lyndon Johnson was president and still fighting his war on poverty in the attempt to create his "Great Society."

This game was a sort of experiment, merging the champions of the National Football League, the mighty Green Bay Packers with their legendary coach, Vince Lombardi, against the champions of the upstart American Football League, the Kansas City Chiefs. Understandably, the Packers were very heavy favorites, and they showed why in this one. After the Chiefs managed to keep it relatively close throughout the first half, with the Packers taking a 14-10 lead into the locker room at halftime, they blew the game open in the second half, ultimately winning, 35-10. 

Green Bay had become a dynasty in the 1960's. They won their fourth NFL title of the 1960's to qualify for this game. After they won this one, they cemented their status as the best team of the decade and, in fact, would go on to win a third straight title the following season, ending with a 33-14 win over the Oakland Raiders in Super Bowl II. That means that they are the only team in the Super Bowl era to have won three straight championships, although since the first one came before the Super Bowls, it is more often than not counted as a "three-peat."

As for Kansas City, they lost this game. But they played well through the first half, and made history simply by qualifying for the first ever Super Bowl. They would return a few years later, one year after the New York Jets made history with a historical upset win over the mighty Baltimore Colts. The Chiefs also won against a heavily favored opponent, beating the Minnesota Vikings, 23-7. Many people feel that the Jets simply got lucky on that one day, beating the Colts, while the Chiefs really just dominated the NFL champion Minnesota Vikings all day in Super Bowl IV.

Yet, all of it really started with that first Super Bowl game between the Green Bay Packers and the Kansas City Chiefs, which was played at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on this day way back in 1967. It was nowhere near a sellout, and in fact, would be the only Super Bowl with a significant number of empty seats in the stadium until Super Bowl LV, which took place during the coronavirus pandemic shutdown. 


Super Bowl I - January 15, 1967 , Green Bay Packers 35, Kansas City Chiefs 10. MVP Bart Starr, Quarterback. The Packers were favored by 14, National anthem University of Arizona and University of Michigan Bands, Halftime show University of Arizona and University of Michigan Bands, Attendance 61,946, Network CBS, NBC, Announcers Ray Scott, Jack Whitaker, Frank Gifford, Curt Gowdy, Paul Christman, est. 51.18 million viewers. Cost of 30-second commercial US$42,000.

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